Trouble in IT services sector hits placements from campuses

Shaken by the technological changes and global political developments, IT majors, once the mass recruiters at engineering colleges in Tamil Nadu, have drastically cut down their hiring this year – especially for the entry-level jobs. This has hit the campuses hard, particularly the tier II colleges in the private sector. 

According to experts, recruiters are now looking for specific skill-sets, and are choosing quality over quantity. This has not affected the top colleges which have managed to record a good season despite the headwinds. 

For instance, the Indian Institute of Technology - Madras has placed 62 per cent of the students registered for placements in phase one itself. But a closer look at the numbers reveals that the offers from sectors line analytics, finance, consulting, core areas, and research and development far outnumber those from the IT sector. The lowest in the list were the fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) companies – a meagre two. But the story is different when it comes to the smaller private institutions, which have been dependent on mass recruiters. “Engineering colleges are finding it difficult to place all their students this year, as the opportunities are fewer. The recruiters, who used to hire in bulk, are now looking at the skill sets of the candidate. They are also organising more walk-ins,” says Archana Ram, managing director, SMART Training Resources. 

For the lower-level jobs, IT companies are increasingly hiring from arts and science colleges that work out much cheaper, she adds. “The pay package for a BSc Computer Science graduate will be lesser than that of an engineering graduate,” she remarks. However, while decoding the shifting trend in IT recruiting, it is important to understand the idea of IT industry, which can be misleading, says Sriram Padmanaban, director, Career Centre at SRM. “Both service and product providers come under IT,” he explains. IT product companies are consistent when it comes to hiring numbers. As they require specific skills at highly competitive levels, they hire less but pay way better salaries. On the other hand, companies like Tata Consultancy Services, Wipro, Infosys, etc. are IT service providers that traditionally hire in large numbers. But this year, there has been a sizeable drop in hiring by these companies due to many reasons.

“One is the impact of the changing technology, which has affected the creation of entry-level jobs. Second is politics, over which no one has control: the policies of the US government under President Donald Trump and Brexit. Each of them is significant and happened simultaneously. Added to this is the competition that has forced companies to restructure themselves,” Padmanaban adds. 

After this change, traditional IT service companies are now looking for people with higher level of competence. “Earlier, placements involved only an aptitude test and an interview. But this year, most of them have introduced a certain level of coding as part of the test. One firm even introduced two levels of technical and written tests,” he says, and points out that though numbers have dropped, recruiters have increased the pay packages.

While a stellar academic record is essential to place oneself in the leading companies, those bright minds with less than flattering scores in the test are considering the start-up ecosystem that celebrates disruption. It is an opportunity the young entrepreneurs have realised. “We approached our co-founder’s alma matter and hired four candidates. Two of them haven’t finished the course yet – they have arrear papers to settle. But we went ahead and hired them, as they were smart and had started coding when they were still in school,” says Sabin Rodriguez, co-founder of BigFday. “Last time, instead of doing the usual tests, we gave threw up a coding challenge for the aspirants. Out of the 15 candidates who responded, we selected four,” says Rodriguez, who even has a drop-out in the team.

Arts and science colleges, too, are witnessing a shift, with more recruiters from banking sector coming forward to hire students from their campus. “Now, we have more banking and consultancy companies coming to the campus. Also, marketing is a field that the young graduates are exploring; social media marketing is one of their favourite options,” says Lalitha Balakrishnan, principal, MOP Vaishnav College for Women