The present job scenario means that the economy is swinging more down that up. This has slowed down the hiring. But Pratap TP says that a person with an ability, willingness & attitude to change will find jobs easily
The buzz is about the hard times on the job front. Employers across sectors are seemingly slowing down their recruitment. The present scenario of the impending general elections next year is only aiding in prolonging this state of uncertainty. Tracking Studies over the last two quarters for the industry in India indicate the slowing down of the recruitment sentiment.
The Indian economy is swinging back and forth. More down than up. The adverse performance with the dollar has helped the IT to shore up their bottomline performances this year. The top tier I and II companies are in a state of flux.
Management changes at their end are only causing that much more angst at the lower levels. The churn and changes in their business models are impacting the recruitment sentiment for freshers and professionals with three to five years of experience. The job employment outlook for the last two quarters has been the worst in eight years, a Manpower Global report says. The Naukri Job Speak Index keeps track of monthly online hiring trends and has also indicated sluggish hiring sentiment.
In these times, it does help if IT professionals in the two to 10 year experience bracket seeking to build their career in large IT organisations are able to find a suitable sponsor. The new book by Sylvia Ann Hewlett, published by Harvard Business Review Press titled Forget a Mentor, Find a Sponsor, highlights the need for individuals to be able to find their growth through sponsors in senior management who are willing to be championing the cause of the promotion or raise for them.
The MSME segment in India — with a strong base of IT product companies setting up their business is certainly looking to recruit individuals in India. Companies with staff size ranging from single digits to three digits, are scaling up their business. As a result, these entities are seeking to recruit employees across sectors and functions. There has been a shift in the nature of individuals that are being recruited in these MSMEs — a segment that is growing and is only slated to grow by 25 per cent yearly for the next decade.
Unlike the needs of the larger service driven organisations of yore, these IT product companies have changed the face of the IT requirements. The needs for IT product development companies are significantly different from the needs of the services organisations.
With cloud-based IT infrastructure only growing in double digit quanta, the recruitment outlook for individuals in this space is positive. The IT professionals will need to consider a change in their outlook and perceptions of what the Job content would be in the company years. The IT companies in the MSME segment would focus on individuals who display some or all of the following traits :
Are multi-dimensional in their skills
Are individual contributors
Are delighted about dirtying their hands and minds on coding as compared to leading large teams
Are capable of working in unstructured environments
Are capable of handling client facing roles
Have a strong commercial sense and comfortable with financial numbers
Can handle client side and server side infrastructure
With the rapid adoption of this infrastructure, there is a tremendous growth that would take place in the requirement for IT infrastructure management personnel and IT security personnel. The re-skilling for IT individuals will also include an ability to work with data centers in managing all the network infrastructure needs, procuring need servers for test teams, monitoring the use of web, bandwidth management, network management, maintaining data backup, ensuring data security, troubleshooting, defining, implementing company level IT policies for email, data security and compliance needs. Speaking to the MSME IT product companies who have made a success over the last half-a-dozen years would show their increasing needs for the IT professionals who have speedily changed their own profiles. There are ample opportunities for those who display the willingness and attitude to change.
(The writer is co-founder & CMO, QwikCilver Solutions)