The Hindu Business Line : TeamLease taps voluntary organisations

Filling gaps
For market research jobs, door-to-door sales and some skilled jobs such as helpers and fitters, company has partnered with charitable vocational training and missionary institutions.
They can give the numbers and the skills needed for growing sectors such as retail, BFSI and infrastructure, says company.

Bangalore , June 23

Voluntary organisations were not typical headhunting ground for corporates. At least, not until now. Talent-hungry corporates are now turning to missionary institutions and government-sponsored livelihood projects to fill their talent gaps, especially in rural areas.

TeamLease, India's largest temping company, has brought almost 1,000 blue-collar workers and door-to-door sales professionals onto its rolls through various NGOs all over the country.

Says Mr Rajesh A.R., Vice-President, TeamLease Services, "For market research jobs, door-to-door sales and some skilled jobs such as helpers and fitters, we have partnered with several charitable vocational training and missionary institutions. They can give us the numbers and the skills needed for growing sectors such as retail, BFSI (banking, financial services and insurance) and infrastructure." In fact, retail and infrastructure alone is expected to create about 20-25 lakh jobs in the next one year and 40 per cent of this would get filled with talent from Tier II and Tier II towns.

Partnerships

TeamLease has sourced its temp talent from rural areas through partnerships with not-for-profit organisations such as LABS (Livelihood Advancement Business School), Centre for Social Initiative and Management, Hyderabad, and some AP Government-funded and World Bank-funded livelihood projects. Once they have made inroads into rural areas, then further sourcing becomes easier, says Mr Rajesh. "Most of our additional recruitment has been through referrals and word-of-mouth endorsements by the first-timers."

Training academy

With a huge talent crunch hitting the economy, innovative recruitment solutions is the need of the hour, says Mr Rajesh. TeamLease has also kicked off a Training Academy where candidates are identified and trained for the retail sector. Pilot projects have been initiated at Mysore and Surat and `we plan to start more soon," says Mr Rajesh.