Scribd
Upload
22 views2 pages

Engineering Grads Unemployable-V4

Most engineering graduates in India are deemed unemployable. Of the 600,000 engineers who graduate annually, only 18.43% are employable for software engineering roles and 3.95% can be deployed on projects. While engineering graduates have historically been unemployable straight out of college, industries used to invest in intensive training programs over 4-6 months to make graduates productive employees. However, with pressures to cut costs and see faster returns on investment, industries have reduced the duration of training programs, expecting graduates to be industry-ready from day one. This gap between industry expectations and graduates' actual skills has led to complaints about unemployable engineers.

Uploaded by

Sameer Gharpurey
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
22 views2 pages

Engineering Grads Unemployable-V4

Most engineering graduates in India are deemed unemployable. Of the 600,000 engineers who graduate annually, only 18.43% are employable for software engineering roles and 3.95% can be deployed on projects. While engineering graduates have historically been unemployable straight out of college, industries used to invest in intensive training programs over 4-6 months to make graduates productive employees. However, with pressures to cut costs and see faster returns on investment, industries have reduced the duration of training programs, expecting graduates to be industry-ready from day one. This gap between industry expectations and graduates' actual skills has led to complaints about unemployable engineers.

Uploaded by

Sameer Gharpurey
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 2

‘Most Engineering Graduates (in India) are Unemployable’

A number of articles periodically ‘lament’ the fact that ‘fresh’ engineering graduates in India are deemed
‘unemployable’.

I am reproducing an excerpt from an article by Prachi Salve that originally appeared on Indiaspend and also
on below link:https://www.youthkiawaaz.com/2015/08/employability-of-engineers-in-india/)

Of 600,000 engineers who graduate annually, only 18.43% are employable for software engineer-IT services
role; no more than 3.95% can be deployed on projects.

While I do not disagree with the aforementioned facts and figures, the ‘issue’ needs to be seen from a wider
perspective.

All through the 50s till the late 90s and early part of the 2000s, all fresh engineers recruited by organizations
would be put through a rigorous ‘induction boot camp’ that was a mix of theory plus on-job training before
they were inducted into the ‘core’ work force(Graduate Engineering Trainee programs). There was an
unwritten understanding that while the graduates have studied the theoretical concepts as part of their
curriculum, the ‘finishing’ and ‘alignment’ to the specific organizational needs was something that would be
taken care of by the intensive GET programs. Hence it was pretty routine for the industries to chalk out
detailed orientation, induction and training programmes to ‘on board’ new graduates. While the effort and
capital expenditure incurred was substantial, it was expected that this would have exponential benefits
accrued over a longer period(in many cases over the next 30-35 years as most employees back then worked in
the same place all their work lives).

In the 90s, the IT industry replicated the ‘Graduate Engineering Trainee(GET) model’ of hiring engineering
graduates fresh out of college ,having them undergo an intensive training program aligned to the
organizational needs and then inducting them into the ‘core’ workforce.

Post liberalization(mid 90s),the boom in many sectors, the opportunities afforded to people increased
manifold and people were more liable to switch jobs within a few years of joining as opposed to retiring in the
same organization where they started(as before). This lead to organizations having a ‘re-think’ about the
‘benefits realization’ over a much smaller window of time.

The global recession in 2008-10 further forced organizations to tighten their purse strings and adopt more
austere measures to ensure profitability.

In light of this, one of the first ‘low hanging fruit’ items to prune(to demonstrate cost cutting) seemed to be
the ‘intensive’ fresher/GET programs. These were seen to be ‘costs’ that need to be ‘rationalized’.
Organizations focused extensively on ways to shorten the duration of these ‘cost -programs’ and make them
‘revenue/profit’ generators as quickly as possible. While the utility of the programs was recognized, fiscal
pressures prompted them to undertake a steady pruning of the duration of such programs across all industries
(more so in the IT world). GET programs that hitherto were of durations up to 6 months were halved or
reduced even further in some organizations.

This in turn led to the clamour for people with skills that were more ‘industry ready’ and ‘hit the ground
running’. Sadly due to the way the curriculum in most universities in India is structured, most engineering
graduates were not deemed ‘industry ready’.

This lead to the chorus amongst industry captains about ‘unemployable’ graduates.

I dare say that engineers even in the 70s, 80s and 90s were as ‘unemployable’(or ‘employable’) as their
counterparts are today when they were just out of college. Given that there were fewer colleges then, the
numbers may be different.

The only difference was that earlier on, industries were more amenable to ‘invest’ capital in intensive training
programs as they were assured of clear ‘Return on Investment (RoI)’ over the years. The protectionist regime
(pre 1991) also ensured ‘long’ tenures for people in the same organizations.

In the current times, industry expects faster ‘benefits realization’ and Investment returns-thereby heightening
the ‘expectations’ from a fresh graduate. The ‘gap’ between the ‘new’ expectation about graduates being
‘industry ready’ and the real and/or perceived ‘lack of a critical skills’, is causing anguish to all.

While discussions followed by concrete steps on improvements in the curriculum should happen, the point is
that this is not something new. Hence pretending that this situation sprang up suddenly and everything was
hunky dory before is fallacious.

Hence let us re-state what industry pundits state that : “Most engineers nowadays are unemployable’ , they
actually are saying that : “ Given our need for quicker Return on Investment (RoI) , we are either unwilling or
unable (or both) to invest 4-6 months of our time and capital on making fresh graduates ‘productive’ and
would expect them to be the ‘finished product’ that we need on day 1 itself.”

You might also like

pFad - Phonifier reborn

Pfad - The Proxy pFad of © 2024 Garber Painting. All rights reserved.

Note: This service is not intended for secure transactions such as banking, social media, email, or purchasing. Use at your own risk. We assume no liability whatsoever for broken pages.


Alternative Proxies:

Alternative Proxy

pFad Proxy

pFad v3 Proxy

pFad v4 Proxy