sitting on the other side..... :)

This post was due since March, but I could actually beat the procrastination only a few weeks back when I started jotting down my recollection, and it goes like .....

I still remember the days in college when I used to hear the most talked about things either on the campus or off the campus (while at home or with non-engineering frnds or with relatives), everyone used to talk about the hallowed campus placements. And its one reason why today in India everyone studying science at +2 level wants to get a seat in an engineering college, as studentship in an enigineering college by itself becomes a passport to a job as soon as the person clears his course. Well, I was not much different when it came to the recruitment at the campus, and the only saviour to me was the brand name which I had with me in the form of my college's rock solid standing in India as well the Global arena. 

It would be an understatement if I say that I was not hopeful of a job in my final year, more because the industry connections of the institute were very well very knit and very well distributed in almost all the parts of this country. So the only fear I had was that which company would actually hire me and for what qualities in me? (This was more of a self doubt rather than a doubt imposed by others). 

Well, my campus story would need a separate post and I guess I will post that one too sometime soon, but for this one, let me go ahead with what ever I had planned with. So coming back to the 'campus-mania' prevailing in India. Well, I got placed in an MNC after a slight effort (if I use the term 'making mawkery of the process' then also I would not be out of place), and did enjoy my final year in the college with a blind faith that my life is settled now and no one can question any of my actions.

Few years from then, when I have already quit that American MNC (after working for quite some time), and now working in an Indian MNC. I guess many things have changed in me and my whole approach towards things have drastically changed.  I have stopped believing in the term 'Campus Placement'. Ask anyone who has been working since past 4-5 years and was selected in some company during his college days. The chances of that person sitting in the same company would be somewhere as low as 15-20%, everyone believes hat campus selection was a big compromise in his life and his career, and he was definitely not happy when he joined the organization. 

Moreover, I believe that Engineering education in India has become easier than passing the class 12th board exam. Teachers dont have any motivation to teach because even they have come to know that the entire batch is going to join some software company and will not be using even 10% of what is being taught in the class-room, students are also chilled out about the fact that 'job is a surity' and hence the only need is to cross the minimum barrier of marks. Even I remember that it was only during the exam's night when I used to study a paper (at least in the last 6 semesters). Classrooms became more a place for gossips, and canteen became more useful than the class-rooms. But I guess no one is to be blamed for all this. The industry has experienced a rise in software and hence it is bound to eat-up the talents of other sectors and at the same time every student would want to make things easier for himself. But I guess the only change we could make at this point of time is that we must STOP the campus placement system. This is one thing which killing the entire engineering acumen of this nation.

Anyway, in Januray this year I was one of the panels for the campus recruitment drive of my current organization. It was indeed a great feeling to be a part of the team which would decide the destiny of the hundreds of fresh pass-outs from the colleges. And the very thought of me sitting in front of some candidate and taking the interview of the candidate took me back into my college days when I used to sit infront of some guy asking me some questions and I used to try my best to impress him by hook or crook.

The days of the interview came and went, and I alone would have interviewed at least 700+ candidates with an intent of selecting then (mind you, I am saying that I wanted to select them). In India life is often termed as unfair, be it the traffic, or a job interview, or anything else. We Indians face a huge discrimination in almost all possible walks of life, but thats how things work in India. You need to be either lucky enough to get what you desire or have to be born  as the son of a rich father. I tried to kill this unfairness to the maximum extent I could have stretched, and I just tried to gauge the capability of the student sitting in front of me.

Sadly, despite all my efforts I could find only a few candidates who had the spark in them, and who need not have waited for the luck factor to favour them. Mostly, I found that the candidates are living in a self-aura that they are born in the times where they will be picked by some software company for no actually visible reasons. They were least bothered about the knowledge, instead they believed that speaking some sparkling english would do the trick. And worst of all, they were proud of the fact that they do not know anything about their branch of study (afterall they had to work for some software company, where the only thing they need to know is good english and some copy-paste tricks).

I couldn't convince myself about the fact that - if these guys have not been loyal to their branch of study then how could they be loyal to the work they are going to do in near future? I tried asking them even the simplest questions I could have asked about their branch (which anyone would know having studied those things in the very 1st semester of engineering), but they disappointed me to the deepest possible levels.

But then I guess the students are not to be blamed solely. The whole system should be blamed. Companies start hiring much before these students pass out from the college (just to get a pool of the work-force at the minimum possible expenditure in today's industry), and this definitely gives rise to the laid-back attitude in students. Colleges want that more and more companies should visit their campus (irrespective of any correlation between the branch of study of the student and the core work of the company). Colleges want to show up the placement figures in their advertisements and hence become the most sought after college among the students. Basically everything is a part of the dirty business practices. And I would be absolutely unfair if I say that its only the student who need to be blamed for all this mess up.

But without sounding like one of those planning commission officers who just push things to the next 'five-year' plan, I strongly suggest that some amendments are required in this whole campus recruitment process. And the least our companies could do is to wait till the students have appeared for their final semester exams. This would not only mean that the students have finished their engineering course, but would also mean that companies are not getting half-baked talent. And what could be a better time to implement such a corrective measure than this one, when the whole world is undergoing a recession and the hirings are at a all time low. This would not only bring more competency and talent into the selected candidates, but also the organization would be getting the right kind of talent for a long term. Which, inturn implies that the organization would be saving a huge amount of money in the long run. 

This post would be incomplete if I do not mention those people who still believe that things can work the way Govt of UP works (or for that matter the whole of Govt offices in India work). and here goes a small list of my bad experiences ....

-I got some open invitations to do the favour to their students, ofcourse for some financial gains. I met placement officers at some of the colleges who if fired from that college would never get a job again in their whole life-time (I am talking especially about the one whom I met in a Greater Noida college, he is a cheap guy, to say the least!). 

-I met students who talked about more about their mobile phone's looks rather than explaining me about what Bluetooth actually does. 

-I met girls who wore deep neck clothes and believed in the fact that by bending over and over again they could get a favour from my end. (I remember a girl who was more interested in telling me that how much she likes to be at a popular pub of Noida during the weekends when I asked her a question in C). 

-I also met a girl who wanted to let me know that her father is  stinking rich and it is of utmost importance for me to know that who she is and what her family does. 

-I met such unprofessional and ill-cultured teachers that they insisted that I smoke with-in the college campus itself (when I asked them a place outside the campus where I could smoke, they happily insisted that I can smoke in the very room where I was sitting with the candidate). 

I believe this whole assignment was more of a learning experience to me, I got to see the actual colour of things, which I didn't even imagine while I was studying in a college. Although it would be a very hectic process, but in case you get such an opportunity, then please go ahead and grab it - You will definitely learn much more while sitting on the other side :)