The National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM) president, Som Mittal, on Tuesday said that campus hiring for IT graduates in the country is set to undergo a change, with soft skills and domain based specialisation coming into play.
His statement comes in the wake of a drop in campus hiring in the IT sector, which is reeling due to the economic downturn. However Mittal added that the industry will continue to hire, but at a slower rate. He said that 2013 is expected to see just in-time hiring, with more focus on domain specialists as well as those possessing soft skills.
Addressing a press conference here, NASSCOM president Som Mittal and senior vice president Sangeeta Gupta, said, “Campus hiring would not be the same as earlier, due to uncertainty in the IT sector.”
Mittal said that currently hiring will happen in two phases – September to October and in May to July. “In the first phase, it will happen in the seventh semester and the other will happen once the student graduates from the institute,” he said.
“This will also pose a bigger challenge to nearly 13 lakh students who are graduating from colleges this year,” he said. The future demands for skills would include mobile application, cloud virtualisation, platform engineering besides the need for data scientists.
Mittal also added that in order to attract IT firms, colleges have to mould students with industry-ready skills, besides strengthening foundation skills and defining occupational standards for entry-level jobs.