Slowdown effect: campus recruitment takes a six-month hit

The National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM) has sent a letter to its member-companies and all engineering colleges in Pune requesting to note that companies will visit engineering colleges for campus recruitment only in December.

NASSCOM chairman Ganesh Natarajan confirmed that the letter had been sent to company heads,engineering college heads and their respective training and placement officers (T&PO). “We have forwarded the letter to conduct campus recruitment in the eighth semester to ensure companies do not make hasty job offers and back out later,” he said.

Bharat Reddy,a representative of Wipro Technologies,agreed with NASSCOM’s decision. “Being a member of NASSCOM,we shall abide by their decision.

During the boom period,companies started coming a year earlier for campus recruitment. Now that there is a slowdown,it is natural that they will postpone recruitment plans,” he said.

Reddy said postponement will help companies to ascertain the number of fresh recruits needed by them and the desirable skills. He was speaking at a brainstorming session of industry representatives,T&POs and student representatives at COEP on Monday.

Human resource personnel from the industry suggest that the number of freshers usually hired will also go down. Shriram Deshpande,technology architect,John Deere,Koregaon Park,said,“As far as our company is concerned,December would be the ideal time to hire freshers. While we are surely looking at taking in freshers,the number will be lesser.”

Pradyum Pandit from Avaya,a telecommunications company,objected to postponing of campus placements.

“Considering that some companies have not honoured their offers to students from the 2008 batch and the equally grim scenario this year,it will not be wise to postpone the recruitment drive,” he said.

Kalyani Kavathekar,team leader,international projects,Suzlon Energy Limited,said the company will be hiring freshers and has approached a few leading institutes in Pune. “After blue-collared and white-collared job,students are keen to take up green jobs,” she said.

Prof Sandeep Meshram,associate T&PO with COEP,said that in order to resolve placement issues and to come to a consensus,the T&POs representing 30 colleges in the city have come together to form a federation for better industry-academia interaction. “We have been called for a meeting on April 4 to decide on the postponement of campus recruitment,” he said.

Considering that there are at least half a dozen companies that have backed out on their offer to students of the 2008 batch,the federation will also work towards avoiding such instances,Meshram added.

Suggestions by HR personnel for students
* Enhance aptitude
* Have a logical approach
* Innovative & out-of-box thinking
* Communication skills
* Ability to suggest cost reduction
* Ability to reduce project time
* Pursue post graduation
* Explore entrepreneurship
* Learn foreign language
* Learn to apply theory