Q: With 24 yrs of experience in Auto, Telecom and IT Industry, can you guide us hiring methodology and strategies pre and post liberation years? Ans: The hiring methodology for freshers in the earlier days was to recruit in small numbers. So you see that, the number of people absorbed from campuses were in small batches may be 10, 20,25,max 50 in numbers. We also need to keep in mind that the manufacturing industry could absorb only those numbers. But today especially with the growth in the IT industry there is a huge demand for professionals. Now where ever you go you are not going to get ready made professionals. Further companies have realized that it is not possible to hire laterally large numbers at one point of time, so brought the shift in inducting fresher into the organization. So today we see companies bringing in large number of people. Smaller companies will be absorbing 500 to 2000 people and bigger company looking at 10,000 to 15,000 freshers. The advantage is that at one point in time you are able to induct large number of professional into the organization. Today with the standard of education going up in all the institution, be it engineering, or science you can get really bright students from the campuses. So you can bring these youngsters with so much of energy and enthusiasm into the organization. Induct them and train them between 3 month to 6 month and you have people who can be put on the job and they grow with the growth of the organization. So this shift fuelled largely through huge growth resulted in large requirement for professionals. Organizations are investing into training these people and deploying them so that they have good professionals working in their organizations. This is the shift that I see which happened in IT industry. I suppose it is similar with any other service industry. Wherever there is a huge growth coupled with large requirement for people, this shift is bound to happen. Q: What are the best ways to go for Campus in India? Ans: There are 2 things that you need to understand - what is the mix of people and where do you want them from. You may decide to go to the IITs and NITs and bring in high quality people or you may decide to go to tier one institute in each state get the quality of people that meet your standards or norms. If you want to induct large numbers then you need to go to tier one and tier two institutions so that you are able to select the numbers you want. It is also important to understand the campus interview schedules of these institutions, because each of them have own schedule. So it is important to plan ahead as to which institutions you plan to visit, understand their schedule and have a clear campus recruitment plan laid out. There are organizations like SHREDS ( Society for Human Resource Development Services ) which bring together the freshers from all institutions in Kerala on a single platform for employers. SHREDS is managed and run by Mrs Rubi Mathai. They have an exhaustive data base of fresher from all colleges in Kerala and they provide support for the entire selection process like testing, interviewing etc. You have the opportunity to shortlist candidates based on your criteria. Q- Please advice first Job Seekers: Ans: Every college has a certain brand that's why the organization come to them but ultimately the selection depends upon how a student performs in the interview. The interviewer is assessing your knowledge level and ability to apply that knowledge so it's important that your fundamentals are strong. * They look at how you are able to approach a problem. They are not so bothered about the correctness of your answers but rather the approach to the problem correct. Similarly are would assess how logical you are in your thinking. * Finally the key think is your learning ability because how much you have learnt that's only a small portion. There is a lot of learning that you need to do on the job because technology is changing rapidly and you need to continually learn in order to be on the top. * People are looking that what you have done other than your studies. How have you channelled your energy in extra curricular activities that help build your personality? * Once you get into the organization, what is important is your ability to work with other people. It's not just your knowledge which is important, but how you use your knowledge and work along with other people and produce better result. People who are loners may now find difficult it because now they have to be dependent on other people in system to produce better result. Q- What will you say to various delegates attending the TPO conference which is a convention of senior directors, placement officers and all the employers both at senior and junior level? Ans: : I would like to say this is a wonderful platform which rangrut has created for you where you have an opportunity for first time job seekers, the employers and the educational institution come together at one place and look at how various partner can work together. I feel that this is an excellent program and I think that will be great success. Courtesy:rangrut.com