Difficult to fill vacancies, say firms

Only 25% of India's professionals who have already been hired are of any merit, the rest lack the skills to do their job well. This is the finding of a report by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) and Ernst and Young. With school dropout rate as high at 57%, employers are finding it difficult to fill skilled job vacancies. The report says 90% of the country's total workforce lacks skills for gainful employment. Four out of every ten people are in the working age group.

The report says that over 40 million people are registered in employment exchanges but only 0.2 million get jobs annually; almost 80% of the workforce in rural and urban India does not have marketable skills; and the difficulty of employers in India to fill job vacancies has increased to 67% in 2011 compared to 16% in the previous year. Almost 93% of the Indian workforce is in the unorganised sector with no formal training.

"There is a critical need to upgrade the skills of India's workforce, like in Germany, which is doing well compared to the highly depressed economies of the Eurozone, primarily because of its skilled workforce," S. Ramadorai, advisor of the Prime Minister's National Skill Development Council, told The Sunday Guardian.

"It is imperative for society to legitimise vocational education and training as an equally attractive alternative to conventional degree-based education," said R.V. Kanoria, managing director of Kanoria Chemicals and Industries Limited, Delhi.

Analysts believe that India needs to gear up for internal challenges like inconsistency in infrastructure and delivery mechanisms and a larger role for sector-wise skills councils. "There are six basic steps for better implementation of skills development. They are pre-training assessment, training obtained from working on the job, certification, which guarantees that you have received skills training, placement and on the job mentoring, which leads to better productivity. Embedding appropriate training at the source will help in achieving targets and providing jobs," Pooja Gyanchandani, director, FICCI Skills Development, told this newspaper.

There are 17 Central ministries, along with the National Skill Development Corporation and State governments who provide skill development programmes. "National level strategic collaboration and co-operation of existing bodies will increase hiring levels. Skill enhancement at the individual level will lead to better trained manpower, lower attrition rates, and better matching of aspirations," added Gyanchandani.

Dilip Chenoy, CEO of National Skills Development Corporation said that the industry is coming forward to enhance awareness on skill development. While referring to organisations like Tata Steel and Delhi Metro Rail Corporation, he highlighted the impact and reach that an organisation can have towards contributing to skill development.

28 September in The Sunday Guardian.