The Hindu Business Line : Needed, employable talent

The steady growth of the Indian economy over the last few years has created multiple opportunities for the country’s youth who are looking beyond the traditional options of engineering, medicine or law when it comes to pursuing a career.

Across sectors such as aviation, telecom, insurance, IT, manufacturing, retail and real estate, there are several emerging areas providing excellent options for career seekers. For instance, a career in IT is no longer limited to programming or managing projects. IT Infrastructure Management is the new buzzword in the sector.

A BPO career need not necessarily be a call centre job anymore; it could be researching and developing a knowledge bank in areas such as equity research or clinical research. A career in the retail sector is not limited to the role of a store manager; there are critical roles such as as supply chain management or merchandising that are rewarding both in terms of job content as well as compensation.

Matching jobs with talent

The surge of opportunities in these areas has translated into a huge demand for employable talent. Though there is no dearth of talent in this country, employable talent or talent with the right set of skills and abilities for the job is still a question mark.

The reason lies deep in the method of career selection. Rather than taking an informed decision, people often opt for a career looking purely at the trend and realise later that it does not match their interest, abilities or aptitude and they can’t pursue it any more. It leaves the individual with no sense of accomplishment and he or she gets into the loop of seeking another option.

On the other hand, for the industry, the amount of time spent in training the individual on systems and procedures of business produces no results. Thus, it becomes critically important to identify and engage the right kind of talent for these emerging areas.

Making the right choice

To ensure the sustainable development of such sectors as well as to improve the employability scenario, it is important for all stakeholders — be it the industry or the career seekers or even academia as well as the government — to understand the extent of the problem and take corrective action because a correct step in the beginning would ensure the harmonious growth of the Careers of Future.

The first step could well be initiating the career selection procedure at an earlier stage. Today, typically, a student starts exploring career options after the 10th standard. In a cut-off driven education system, the percentage of marks alone decides which stream the student opts for, and this trend will continue.

There is need for a fundamental change in the approach — instead of marks alone, the interests and abilities of the individual constructing the building blocks of his career path should also be taken into account. When an individual has the chance to pursue something that interests him or her and for which he or she has the required skills, it helps him/her attain greater heights. However, this can only become possible if academia and government come together and introduce mechanisms for identifying an individual’s potential in the academic system itself.

The next important step is to ensure synergy between industry expectations and academic output. The onus lies equally on academia and the industry to come together and share both sides of the story on a regular basis. For every industry, there are certain specific and certain generic skills which the industry has to share with academia.

Academia can, thereafter, create a curriculum that would address the needs of the industry besides providing a strong knowledge base to the students. The process at the end of the day would help produce employable graduates from our institutions, helping the industry cut down “on job training time”. Our best institutions in the academic system have already demonstrated their ability to produce world class talent. With help from the industry, the others would also live up to, and exceed expectations.

Beyond identifying and developing employable skills, it’s also critical to hone such skills on a regular basis. The individual must try keeping him or her updated regularly because today, businesses are backed by fast-paced technologies that change every now and then. One has to be in tune with such changes to survive, if not succeed, when it comes to such emerging careers. Knowledge along with its proper application is the most vital component in designing a successful career. Ignoring it could result in stagnation in one’s career, while embracing it could help propel careers.

Last but not the least step for the industry is to set the standards right when it comes to talent engagement. Often the gap between increasing demand for employable talent and inadequate supply forces the industry to work out a compromise formula. As a result, a significant percentage of recruits fail to achieve the benchmark — while some can be trained, others hardly fit into the canvas even after a considerable amount of training. Thus, it becomes crucial for the industry to define the parameters clearly before getting into the talent engagement exercise and follow them religiously while recruiting.

So what essentially are the critical skills required to pursue these emerging careers? How does one understand whether he or she possesses those skills? What does the industry expect from the career seeker who wishes to be a part of this trend?

Let’s keep the excitement growing till we meet here on the same page next time with the answers.

(The author is co-founder & CEO , MeritTrac Services.)

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