Human Resources and the Changing Role of HR Professionals
By:Kiran Karnik
While some young men, on the brink of starvation, desperately look for work, employers elsewhere look – with almost similar desperation – for appropriate persons to fill tens of thousands of vacancies. That this should happen in the same country is odd enough; however, what is more striking is not the known urban-rural difference, the clichéd India-Bharat divide, but the vast differential within educated urban India. Even as unemployed graduates abound, others with the very same qualifications are chased by recruitment agencies and offered huge raises over already-high salaries. In the case of engineers, while some fresh graduates begin at over Rs. 25,000 a month, others have difficulty in getting employment, even as industry bemoans a shortage. Clearly, the market is providing strong signals about the failure of our education system. It is not producing enough people of the quality and skill-sets that the economy needs.
Over the last decade, the Indian education system has gone through many changes. However, the overall regulatory framework has remained substantially unchanged, with a continuation of the philosophy of control, standardized norms and bureaucratic rules. There has been some expansion – mainly through private institutions in the case of professional education – but quality has declined. A few institutions have earned a good reputation, but the average quality is inadequate and a huge number are of abysmal quality. Many of the steps required to correct this will have an impact only in the medium to long term. Meanwhile, there is need and scope for industry to play a major role in creating short-term solutions that will meet its needs.
There has been much talk of industry-academia collaboration. However, till recently, examples of this were few and far between. Now, in the last few years, there have been many initiatives and more are in the pipeline. The IT industry has been at the forefront of this effort. While it continues to support education at the grass-roots level, particularly through work in primary schools in rural areas, collaboration with institutions of higher learning is growing. This industry now employs over 1.3 million and last year its revenue was about USD 30 billion with a potential to grow by about 25% and touch revenues of 80 billion in 2010. Current projections indicate that by 2010, the IT industry alone may face a shortfall of 500,000 professionals, unless proactive steps are taken. Sadly, of the large number of engineering and other graduates being churned out every year, only about ten per cent are employable in the IT industry. Most are unsuitable because of a lack of soft skills, particularly communication skills, which are essential for industries like IT. This could seriously stymie India's economic growth, even as we lose the opportunity of large-scale job creation. Immediate as well as long-term measures are needed to tackle this problem.
In the long term, radical reforms are essential if we are to compete globally. We need to reform the education system, and free it from the stifling control of governments and other regulating bodies, so that institutions have flexibility on fees, salaries and curriculum, among other things. They need to be detached from any political influences and control. It is necessary to make teaching an attractive career option. Many alternative approaches must be encouraged. One of these could be to adapt the Special Economic Zone concept (deregulation and removal of restrictions) for education, with the creation of Special Education Zones. As an experimental measure, an institute could be permitted to run on a model where there is no ceiling on the fee charged, as long as free education and adequate support is offered to a fixed percentage of students who meet the entry requirements. While government investments in higher education are essential, it is clear that budgetary constraints will not enable the kind of massive investment that is needed, especially when there are other critical social sector and infrastructure needs, including primary education and literacy. Encouraging private investment in education – whether through philanthropy or as a financially viable proposition – is, therefore necessary. This would be better than the insidious commercialization that is now underway.
In the short term, we have to think of ways to groom the qualified students in an effort to make them ‘employable' in the industry. NASSCOM has been working with Prof. Jhunjhunwala of IIT-Madras to explore the possibility of 3-4 month courses in a “finishing school” for IT professionals. This will add 20-25% people to the ‘employable' pool. Meanwhile, a BPO certification for entry-level employees (NASSCOM Assessment of Competence) is all set for an operational roll-out. This will evaluate candidates on seven identified basic skills required of BPO employees, including keyboard skills, communication, articulation and presentation, in addition to teamwork. The NAC pilot has been completed. The test will shorten the recruitment process; more importantly, it will provide feedback and thus enable candidates to improve in areas where their score indicates inadequacies. It will also enable aspirants from all over the country to appear for the test, thereby enlarging opportunities for individuals, and the recruitment-universe for companies.
NASSCOM, with the support of the IT industry, has been working on a broader IT Workforce Development initiative, to engage academia on a sustained basis through faculty development programmes, mentorship of colleges, curriculum updates and regular industry-academia interface. Faculty members spend time in companies to understand the industry's outlook, needs and technologies so that they could, in turn, sensitise the students to these developments. The Faculty Development Programme also addresses the need to develop soft skills, especially in communication and presentation. NASSCOM has signed MoUs with UGC and AICTE to take forward these initiatives, and has already run 15 programmes across India, primarily in Tier II colleges, providing inputs to about 500 faculty members. NASSCOM's annual HR Summit, on this week in Chennai, takes this process further by bringing together three key stake-holders: industry, academia and government.
The growing engagement of industry with academia requires a major re-orientation in the traditional role of HR in the corporate world. From focus on recruitment and in-service training, HR professionals now need to broaden their horizons and be outward rather than inward focused. The transition from locating talent to retaining talent has now moved to creating talent. HR professionals have to identify and constantly review the requirement of skill-sets for employees, and work with educational/training institutions so that these are inculcated. Attitudes, values and motivation of employees have become more important than ever, and HR professionals have not only to work on sophisticated tools to gauge these, but also on ways of integrating them into college curricula. This requires that they establish a close relationship, a partnership, with the academic community. Often, this may mean evolving new learning modules and joint teaching of courses.
Human resources are India's biggest asset. Once considered a liability, our large population and its growth rate have resulted in a demographic structure (with about 50% of the population below 25 years of age) that provides an unique competitive advantage. However, to capitalize fully on this opportunity, we need to ensure high-quality education and appropriate skill-sets. While much needs to be done by government and the universities, HR professionals in industry have a major role and a big challenge. From a useful service function, they can now occupy centre-stage and be the key drivers that create business value for their company and economic gain for the nation. Making our large population base an asset and adding value to excellent raw material: this should be the new role for HR professionals.
From India, Pune
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3By:Kiran Karnik
While some young men, on the brink of starvation, desperately look for work, employers elsewhere look – with almost similar desperation – for appropriate persons to fill tens of thousands of vacancies. That this should happen in the same country is odd enough; however, what is more striking is not the known urban-rural difference, the clichéd India-Bharat divide, but the vast differential within educated urban India. Even as unemployed graduates abound, others with the very same qualifications are chased by recruitment agencies and offered huge raises over already-high salaries. In the case of engineers, while some fresh graduates begin at over Rs. 25,000 a month, others have difficulty in getting employment, even as industry bemoans a shortage. Clearly, the market is providing strong signals about the failure of our education system. It is not producing enough people of the quality and skill-sets that the economy needs.
Over the last decade, the Indian education system has gone through many changes. However, the overall regulatory framework has remained substantially unchanged, with a continuation of the philosophy of control, standardized norms and bureaucratic rules. There has been some expansion – mainly through private institutions in the case of professional education – but quality has declined. A few institutions have earned a good reputation, but the average quality is inadequate and a huge number are of abysmal quality. Many of the steps required to correct this will have an impact only in the medium to long term. Meanwhile, there is need and scope for industry to play a major role in creating short-term solutions that will meet its needs.
There has been much talk of industry-academia collaboration. However, till recently, examples of this were few and far between. Now, in the last few years, there have been many initiatives and more are in the pipeline. The IT industry has been at the forefront of this effort. While it continues to support education at the grass-roots level, particularly through work in primary schools in rural areas, collaboration with institutions of higher learning is growing. This industry now employs over 1.3 million and last year its revenue was about USD 30 billion with a potential to grow by about 25% and touch revenues of 80 billion in 2010. Current projections indicate that by 2010, the IT industry alone may face a shortfall of 500,000 professionals, unless proactive steps are taken. Sadly, of the large number of engineering and other graduates being churned out every year, only about ten per cent are employable in the IT industry. Most are unsuitable because of a lack of soft skills, particularly communication skills, which are essential for industries like IT. This could seriously stymie India's economic growth, even as we lose the opportunity of large-scale job creation. Immediate as well as long-term measures are needed to tackle this problem.
In the long term, radical reforms are essential if we are to compete globally. We need to reform the education system, and free it from the stifling control of governments and other regulating bodies, so that institutions have flexibility on fees, salaries and curriculum, among other things. They need to be detached from any political influences and control. It is necessary to make teaching an attractive career option. Many alternative approaches must be encouraged. One of these could be to adapt the Special Economic Zone concept (deregulation and removal of restrictions) for education, with the creation of Special Education Zones. As an experimental measure, an institute could be permitted to run on a model where there is no ceiling on the fee charged, as long as free education and adequate support is offered to a fixed percentage of students who meet the entry requirements. While government investments in higher education are essential, it is clear that budgetary constraints will not enable the kind of massive investment that is needed, especially when there are other critical social sector and infrastructure needs, including primary education and literacy. Encouraging private investment in education – whether through philanthropy or as a financially viable proposition – is, therefore necessary. This would be better than the insidious commercialization that is now underway.
In the short term, we have to think of ways to groom the qualified students in an effort to make them ‘employable' in the industry. NASSCOM has been working with Prof. Jhunjhunwala of IIT-Madras to explore the possibility of 3-4 month courses in a “finishing school” for IT professionals. This will add 20-25% people to the ‘employable' pool. Meanwhile, a BPO certification for entry-level employees (NASSCOM Assessment of Competence) is all set for an operational roll-out. This will evaluate candidates on seven identified basic skills required of BPO employees, including keyboard skills, communication, articulation and presentation, in addition to teamwork. The NAC pilot has been completed. The test will shorten the recruitment process; more importantly, it will provide feedback and thus enable candidates to improve in areas where their score indicates inadequacies. It will also enable aspirants from all over the country to appear for the test, thereby enlarging opportunities for individuals, and the recruitment-universe for companies.
NASSCOM, with the support of the IT industry, has been working on a broader IT Workforce Development initiative, to engage academia on a sustained basis through faculty development programmes, mentorship of colleges, curriculum updates and regular industry-academia interface. Faculty members spend time in companies to understand the industry's outlook, needs and technologies so that they could, in turn, sensitise the students to these developments. The Faculty Development Programme also addresses the need to develop soft skills, especially in communication and presentation. NASSCOM has signed MoUs with UGC and AICTE to take forward these initiatives, and has already run 15 programmes across India, primarily in Tier II colleges, providing inputs to about 500 faculty members. NASSCOM's annual HR Summit, on this week in Chennai, takes this process further by bringing together three key stake-holders: industry, academia and government.
The growing engagement of industry with academia requires a major re-orientation in the traditional role of HR in the corporate world. From focus on recruitment and in-service training, HR professionals now need to broaden their horizons and be outward rather than inward focused. The transition from locating talent to retaining talent has now moved to creating talent. HR professionals have to identify and constantly review the requirement of skill-sets for employees, and work with educational/training institutions so that these are inculcated. Attitudes, values and motivation of employees have become more important than ever, and HR professionals have not only to work on sophisticated tools to gauge these, but also on ways of integrating them into college curricula. This requires that they establish a close relationship, a partnership, with the academic community. Often, this may mean evolving new learning modules and joint teaching of courses.
Human resources are India's biggest asset. Once considered a liability, our large population and its growth rate have resulted in a demographic structure (with about 50% of the population below 25 years of age) that provides an unique competitive advantage. However, to capitalize fully on this opportunity, we need to ensure high-quality education and appropriate skill-sets. While much needs to be done by government and the universities, HR professionals in industry have a major role and a big challenge. From a useful service function, they can now occupy centre-stage and be the key drivers that create business value for their company and economic gain for the nation. Making our large population base an asset and adding value to excellent raw material: this should be the new role for HR professionals.
From India, Pune
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Hi Atanu,
Really a thought-provoking contribution from you.
It's really puzzling to know where we all are going! Are we going to produce more and more robots or simply produce brains that are tuned to perform some chore to build India stronger for its brains but not for its empathetic people? We still have people reeling under poverty in rural India, and agriculture, which is our main resourceful area, is being neglected. All the educational institutions and academies are more fascinated in churning out graduates who are more interested in serving a foreign company rather than their motherland. Our basic aim is to develop our resources and excel in our basic occupation, i.e., agriculture. It's not wrong to go for technical education and to compete with other developing countries in improving our economy, but this should not be done at the cost of our main backbone of our economy, which is agriculture.
In addition, we have to recognize the potential of our rural artisans, and the government has to provide them with necessary infrastructure and encourage them to come out with spectacular creations that have no parallels in the whole world. Why are we not able to do this? Yes, there has to be urbanization and modernization, but not at the cost of our tradition and culture, which have richness beyond anything.
Our focus should be both on modernization and at the same time on preserving and encouraging our traditional values and culture, which are very unique. Similarly, it's not only about producing mechanical robots but also about sharpening the younger people in rural India to serve their motherland better. This balance is crucial so that our country can take up modern challenges and also be suitably equipped to recognize and utilize more of our existing resources without neglecting them in favor of modernization.
Regards,
PRADEEP
From India, Hyderabad
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Really a thought-provoking contribution from you.
It's really puzzling to know where we all are going! Are we going to produce more and more robots or simply produce brains that are tuned to perform some chore to build India stronger for its brains but not for its empathetic people? We still have people reeling under poverty in rural India, and agriculture, which is our main resourceful area, is being neglected. All the educational institutions and academies are more fascinated in churning out graduates who are more interested in serving a foreign company rather than their motherland. Our basic aim is to develop our resources and excel in our basic occupation, i.e., agriculture. It's not wrong to go for technical education and to compete with other developing countries in improving our economy, but this should not be done at the cost of our main backbone of our economy, which is agriculture.
In addition, we have to recognize the potential of our rural artisans, and the government has to provide them with necessary infrastructure and encourage them to come out with spectacular creations that have no parallels in the whole world. Why are we not able to do this? Yes, there has to be urbanization and modernization, but not at the cost of our tradition and culture, which have richness beyond anything.
Our focus should be both on modernization and at the same time on preserving and encouraging our traditional values and culture, which are very unique. Similarly, it's not only about producing mechanical robots but also about sharpening the younger people in rural India to serve their motherland better. This balance is crucial so that our country can take up modern challenges and also be suitably equipped to recognize and utilize more of our existing resources without neglecting them in favor of modernization.
Regards,
PRADEEP
From India, Hyderabad
Acknowledge(0)Amend(0)
Atanu
You have shared an article that should give all of us considerable food for thought.
It is true that the education system churns out millions of graduates and professionals who can't get employment. The reason in many cases is the lack of application. Graduates, even professionals, study material by memorizing both the content and the answers to the questions provided by the numerous guides; they can parrot it at the examinations and get adequate, even commendable marks. But they have not understood a single word of what they have memorized! How can they expect to get jobs after that?
The situation worsens when students do their graduation in their native language and then, due to the marks obtained by them, gain admission into good professional colleges where all the teaching is in English. I am an external faculty at management institutes and have to deal with many of these students. An extremely difficult situation.
Remedial measures have to come at the macro level, but how do we enable this?
Others, please contribute your views/suggestions.
Jeroo
From India, Mumbai
Acknowledge(0)Amend(0)
You have shared an article that should give all of us considerable food for thought.
It is true that the education system churns out millions of graduates and professionals who can't get employment. The reason in many cases is the lack of application. Graduates, even professionals, study material by memorizing both the content and the answers to the questions provided by the numerous guides; they can parrot it at the examinations and get adequate, even commendable marks. But they have not understood a single word of what they have memorized! How can they expect to get jobs after that?
The situation worsens when students do their graduation in their native language and then, due to the marks obtained by them, gain admission into good professional colleges where all the teaching is in English. I am an external faculty at management institutes and have to deal with many of these students. An extremely difficult situation.
Remedial measures have to come at the macro level, but how do we enable this?
Others, please contribute your views/suggestions.
Jeroo
From India, Mumbai
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