Hyderabad lags behind in quality of recruits

There are 16 universities in Hyderabad and hundreds of schools and colleges across all kinds of educational subjects. Together, these institutions produce lakhs of fresh graduates every year of which only 38 per cent are recruitment-ready. This is the sad reality that was found in a recent survey by Wisdomjobs.com.

The survey, ‘Hiring Freshers: Challenges Faced by Recruiters’ was conducted across 10 cities with 850 recruiters from 10 industries/sectors in which Hyderabad fared miserably amongst the metro cities; the city is at the second last position in terms of job-ready youth.

With freshers making up the major chunk of annual hiring for most mid and large sized organisations, recruiters and companies invest a lot of time and effort in ensuring that they find the right talent. While recruiting freshers offers the most cost-effective means of hiring entry-level talent, hiring them brings its own set of challenges for hiring managers.

Ajay Kolla, Founder & CEO, Wisdomjobs.com said, “Be it campus hiring or large-scale walk-in drives, recruiters and companies grapple with several problems that are unique to fresher recruitment. From sketchy resumes and insufficient practical exposure to unrealistic expectations about the job and attitudinal issues, recruiters feel are some of the problems which companies deal with as they try to onboard fresher talent.”

In city-wise satisfaction regarding overall quality of fresher hires, Delhi topped among the metros with nearly 50 per cent of recruiters saying that they are happy with the quality of candidates they hired, followed by recruiters in Bengaluru, Chennai, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Kolkata in that order with 46 per cent, 43 per cent, 39 per cent, 38 per cent and 35 per cent respectively.

Among the other cities, Coimbatore is on top with 48 per cent followed by Trivandrum, Nagpur and Ghaziabad with 45 per cent, 44 per cent and 40 per cent respectively.

What is the problem?
Since freshers enter their workplaces directly from their academic environments, quite often, the transition is not smooth or easy. From lack of awareness regarding workplace etiquette to unrealistic expectations regarding their roles and from lack of exposure to a collaborative environment to inability to meet deadlines, freshers find it tough to adapt to the demands of their workplaces.

Freshers lack the requisite experience and exposure when it comes to creating an impact upfront with their resumes. Consequently, recruiters have to sift through several incomplete and inaccurate resumes when they are hiring freshers. Consequentially, resume-related hurdles are the most commonly cited issue by recruiters.

As more and more students continue to opt for Engineering courses, they make the majority (57 per cent) of the category in insufficient skills be it technical or soft. In spite of universities having a ‘mass communication’ subject in their curriculum, freshers still lack basic communication skills.

What do recruiters want?
It goes without saying that freshers would prosper better in the ‘real world’ if curricula are designed in a way that help them in being job-ready. The Education Department can take a note from the survey in understanding what recruiters want from a candidate and move beyond teaching only core skills.