The Hindu Business Line : Placement via online portal

The portal allows the new class to come out a wish list of companies. A link on the ISB Web site allows students and recruiters to access the secure placement portal.

Hyderabad March 13 If you have a wireless campus, submit e-presentations and e-assignments besides applying for courses online, it makes sense to have a technology-enabled placement process.

"We have a portal that tracks students from their entry right up to placement," says Mr V.K. Menon, Director, Career Advances Services, Indian School of Business (ISB). That is comforting given the fact that ISB has 418 students currently and each one of them can apply to 25 jobs.

Placement Portal

The portal allows the new class to come out a wish list of companies after they join their year-long course. A link on the ISB Web site allows students and recruiters to access the secure placement portal where the students profiles are made available. Companies can upload all relevant information here including advertisements.

As the course progresses, student resumes, their performance in all class tests and major exams are also uploaded on to the portal. "As candidates typically get hired for middle and senior management positions, recruiters look at this kind of data very keenly," says Mr Menon.

According to Mr Menon, though others also offer similar information in electronic form, the ISB portal facilitates more. For instance, students may apply to companies online, companies schedule interviews and shortlist them online.

Companies can also make offers online and students can accept or reject them.

"All this is without institute's intervention," stresses Mr Menon. The portal design is in-built with all rules pertaining to placements. For instance, if a student tries to apply to a 26th company, the portal will deny permission.

Fine-tuned since its creation in 2001, the placement portal today also handles most of the post-placement analysis. "All reports and metrics including trends, profiles, comparisons and future prospects are automatically generated in half a day," says Mr Menon. Incidentally, these metrics helped the institute to start a course on healthcare management, he says. The manual effort saved in analysis is utilised for counselling students, especially those who want to make a career shift after 5-8 years of work experience.

"We have successfully placed an armed forces officer with 22 years of work experience in the pharmaceutical industry at the COO level," Mr Menon cites a case in point.