No job threats for Indians in overseas market

The prospects of jobs in foreign countries have not dried up for Indians, despite the turbulence in global economies. It’s only the nature of jobs that have changed.

The world may be debating the effects of dwindling oil economy and Donald Trump’s ‘no outsourcing to India’ jibe, industry experts back home are not too worried about any of these. They say these or any other negative news spiraling down doesn’t make much of a difference to overseas hiring or job prospects right now.

“The trend for overseas jobs for Indians is not negative for now. It’s just stagnant,” says Amar Ganeshan, director-global solutions, Kelly Services. He says that while oil and financial services may be down, the construction sector is still stable. “The demand for Indian workers abroad, particularly in the Arab segment, is not down as such.”

What’s making bad news

The cause of concern is a series of recent developments which is causing people to question the lure of Indian labour and their career prospects in foreign lands. Globally, the world is witnessing stagnant economies which is – somewhere directly and in other places indirectly because – of the oil and related economy going down.

It began with the Arab countries and further impacted the European economies in an indirect way. This was accompanied by the slump in the financial/banking sector in these regions. Add to that the US Presidential elections and president frontrunner Donald Trump’s concerns with outsourcing. Further, the IT industry too has murmurs about Indian companies acting as overseas placement agents. Recently Infosys-founder Narayana Murthy said that Indian IT companies act as immigration agents. The others in the industry refuse to endorse this feeling. Add to that a daily baggage of news about layoffs in companies, across all levels in different countries – including India.

The Good News Awaits

The recruiters however feel these should not be interpreted as “bad news”.

A representative of overseas staffing firm Aman Overseas says: “The news is a reflection of economic scenario over all. We do agree that job market is impacted by the economic scenario but for now it is not bad news for jobs. The demand for jobs hasn’t gone down but just become stagnant. From the candidates too, the number of queries has gone up but the interest level hasn’t dwindled,” he says. Aman Overseas receives about 30-40 queries on daily basis for overseas placements.

For Gulf jobs, the major concern is regarding passports and visa processes and the latest news about expat salaries being considered for tax purview. For these countries, jobs are available in the manufacturing sector and IT. The jobs for finance and related segments have dried up really but that too is a good sign.

One recruiter Vira International Placements said one must look at it from a different angle. “Have you heard of layoffs from any Gulf firms? Have you heard of salary cuts in any Gulf-based firm? No. The only thing that has happened is that number of vacancies has gone down. As long as there are no cut in jobs, everything is fine. Once the economy picks up, these numbers will swell. It is a phase which is related to economy of the world as such and will pass,” said a recruiter associated with the firm.

Tips for candidates

Ganesan says the foreign job market will accelerate but one must foresee the economic environment as well. “Segments like life sciences and pharmaceuticals are still hiring. Other sectors which have low cost operations are also hiring. The only sectors where hiring activity has halted a bit is oil and gas, petroleum, manufacturing and construction-related segments. One need not worry but understand clearly where more jobs are coming in overseas and prepare himself accordingly.”

He points at another trend. “Many multinational companies are setting up their corporate services centre in India. That is because the cost of living in the native country is too huge as compared to placing staff here. Further, the value of Indian Rupee right now is little soft when compared to most currencies. And Indians are skilled, speak English and have a great global approach. Hence such jobs which were perceived to be overseas jobs are now coming in India big time. However, both companies and candidates need to brace themselves because the Philippines is fast catching up as a strong competitor to India,” he says.

Most jobs in Canada, Gulf, shows TimesJobs.com data

An analysis of TimesJobs.com data shows there are currently thousands of overseas listed jobs. Excluding Gulf countries, most of the jobs are for locations in Canada, Australia, Hong Kong and Germany. The top job functions in demand are IT/Telecom, administration and Teaching/Education. The industries hiring the most are consultancy services, healthcare and engineering/projects. Presently people with 5-8 years of experience are in demand for junior or mid-level jobs.

In the Gulf, majority of jobs are for engineering roles, with the demand highest in the 1-5 year experience category. Most jobs are available in the state of Bahrain and Kuwait. One takeaway here is that while Gulf, the US and the UK have been a favourite destination of Indians, now countries like Australia and New Zealand are finding favours both from employers and employment seekers.

Source: techgig.com