Feature

Does a talent crunch really exist?

Nasscom predicts that by 2010, India could face a shortfall of 500,000 IT professionals. Faiz Askari tries to find out if there is a talent crunch, and organizations’ plans to battle it

Organizations which are a part of the exponential growth cycle of the IT and ITeS industry, are also looking at a growing crisis—the problem of talent shortage. But, does it really exist? The answer to this question in India is that, there is a shortfall of the skilled and experienced workforce combination. Analysts have pointed out that this trend could be an indication of the impending talent shortage in the Indian IT sector. Nasscom’s prediction that by 2010, India could face a shortfall of 500,000 IT professionals, could seriously endanger India’s position as a leading provider of the IT/ITeS services.

Rohit Agarwal, CEO and Co-founder, techTribe Networks belie-ved, “There is a shortage of talent across the entire knowledge worker industry—IT services, BPO/KPO, financial services and even HR, but the shortage is worse at the mid-senior levels because the number of available resources are directly proportional to the workforce size.  As the workforce grows at the bottom, the talent crunch at the mid-top levels gets worse.” techTribe introduced the referral recruiting model because of this shortage for qualified middle-senior level talent. Agarwal also said, “Skills management, marketing, development (software) and project management, are all mid level positions where we see our customers looking to hire in large numbers.”

According to Nasscom, every year over three million people, graduates and post-graduates, are added to the workforce in India. Interestingly, out of these, only 25 percent of the technical graduates and 10-15 percent of graduates from other fields, are considered employable by the growing IT sector. Even after employing these graduates, most companies have to spend considerable amount of time and resources on their training, so as to develop the skills required by the industry. Indian IT majors like Infosys, TCS and Wipro, and even global entities like IBM and Cognizant, have invested heavily in training their new recruits.

Vineet Narang, CEO of Xceed IT Solutions, informed, “There is a big problem of talent shortage; some people may call it a shortage of skilled manpower. Be it a fresher or even a person with some years of experience, an organization has to invest on grooming and training that person according to the required skill sets. Even if we hire MBAs, we need to customize their potential according to the nature of our work. This takes both time and resources.”

Growing concern

Sharing his opinion on this growing crisis, Agarwal said, “In my opinion, the escalation depends on the future needs. If the industries grow at the rate of 10 percent or more, the shortage will get worse. If the growth is flat, there is room for the talent to mature. The problem in this case may not get worse, but it won’t get any better either. Overall, I think the shortage at the mid-senior level is here to stay for a decade.  Now, for fresher positions, and juniors, as the growth evens out, and education gets better, the problem is solved relatively easily.”

Hinting that the talent crisis is a big global concern, Mark A Miller, President and CEO, New Horizons, stated, “This is undoubtedly a global concern. India has established itself as a big knowledge services destination. In such scenario which is full of opportunities, it becomes very difficult for organizations to keep on delivering high quality of work continuously, without properly trained and skilled workforce. Employee retention and shortage of available skilled professionals are the big challenges facing the IT industry.” Experts warned that the talent shortage resulting in increasing salaries and high attrition rates could make India lose its competitive advantage in the IT sector.

Training as a solution

Miller added, “Organizations have to come up with proper solution to tackle this crisis; training being the most accepted tool. By providing effective training, employees can generate the required skills and organizations can give them career enhancements.” Further advocating on the e-learning and training aspect, he mentioned, “When e-learning emerged as a revolutionary learning method, it paved way for the traditional classroom learning. It proved to be cost-effective, especially when training a dispersed workforce. It was also convenient because training could take place anytime, anywhere. “

Narang explained, “In such a situation where skilled hands are less than what the actual requirement is, it becomes very essential for organizations to train the unskilled employees and try to retain them as long as possible. Since the situation is becoming very critical, organizations need to define a competitive area. The HR team can also formulate activities which can help various departments of the organization to fight with this talent crunch.”

Agarwal had a different viewpoint. He concluded, “There is no solution for the overall problem—it is a resource management issue. Companies can solve these problems within their organizations by focusing on retention, growing skill sets among employees, and training and mentorship. techTribe has launched a programme called ‘Tribes,’ which focuses on topics like project management where people can learn in small bites about project management without having to go out and enroll for an external course.”

faiz.askari@expressindia.com