Bulk hiring by IT companies at tier-2 & 3 engineering colleges and B-schools may get hit hard

That is expected to hit campus hiring in India — particularly in tier-2, tier-3 campuses where IT is among the most prominent recruiters.

Some small IT companies — who campuses declined to name — have pulled back on offers made to the batch of 2017 at some of the smaller institutes, claiming that projects have not taken off. None of the bigger players have retracted any offers yet — but hiring numbers may take a beating for the upcoming placements, feel institutes.

“We take a multifaceted approach toward hiring. We hire talent from colleges and train them on new and emerging technologies, train existing talent on new technologies to fulfil demand and also hire senior level laterals from the market. We will honour the offers that have been made and will continue to hire from campuses. We do not provide hiring guidance,” said Wipro in an email response to ET.

An Infosys spokesperson too said it was too early to comment on the hiring numbers for the year ahead. “We have extended over 20,000 offers on campus for this year. As always, on-boarding of these graduating batches will be driven by business needs,” said the spokesperson, adding that they will continue to hire people from the campuses with high learnability and excellent orientation to technology.

IT Image hit

Things have been worsening for some time now. An earlier ET article (January 27) had highlighted how IT companies had slashed hiring during placements for the batch of 2017 due to factors such as Trump’s protectionist stance, muted growth numbers and increasing automation. IT recruitments had slumped 20-40% in several tier-II — and even some tier-I — management schools with Infosys, Wipro and Dell among those who had pared down hiring numbers.

The perception of IT services as a massive creator of jobs will take a hit during short term as hiring slows down tremendously at the bottom of pyramid (BOP), feels Thammaiah BN, managing director, Kelly Services India.

“BOP hiring happens almost entirely in campuses and this what shapes the perception of the IT sector,” he says. “It’s time technical campuses listen to the clarion call and look at a total and holistic development of a student — with good communication skills aided by critical/cognitive thinking ability — and hence thinking beyond just technical ability,” said Dr Yaj Medury, vice-chancellor of the Bennett University.

“There are only jobs for the top-of-the-pyramid students; none for those at the bottom,” said Rupamanjari Ghosh, vice chancellor, Shiv Nadar University. More recently, the Naukri job speak index said the IT-software industry had seen a 24% fall in hiring in April, compared to the corresponding period last year.

“The preference for an IT career in the minds of students takes a beating under such circumstances,” says G Balasubramanian, chief placement officer at BITS Pilani. He says their campuses are more insulated since most of the IT services companies hiring in bulk do not hire from them.

Consequently just about 3-4% of their batch gets absorbed in IT service roles. “Now given the situation, even some lower CGPA students, would now rather opt for a sabbatical or pursue higher studies than take up a job in an IT services company,” he said.

Good graduates will not really face a problem, but there is nonetheless a bit of concern, says NP Padhy, professor-in-charge of placements at IIT Roorkee. “Individual companies will recruit in lower numbers and that compounded with the fact that startups are hiring less will pose a problem. The job market is quite challenging,” signed off Padhy.