Hiring goes 2 steps forward

PUNE: Recruiting engineering graduates from a common campus or sharing the much sought-after 'Day 1' hiring opportunity may soon become a reality for bulk recruiters from the infotech (IT) sector.

Training and placement officers (TPOs) from 40 colleges, led by the College of Engineering Pune (COEP), are working on a model that will spare recruiters the hassles of visiting different campuses and give them each a level platform to hire the best of engineering talent.

"Collectively, these colleges account for over 15,000 students (from the 8th and final semester of the four-year engineering degree course), who go through the campus recruitment exercise every year," COEP's training and placement officer S A Meshram told TOI on Monday.

Bulk recruitment enables a college to present its entire batch of eligible students to the IT firm visiting the campus so that they can assess, pick and choose the best brains. 'Day 1' opportunity is important for most IT majors that hire 150 to 200 or even more students. Often, there is stiff competition between these companies for the first-day opportunity.

The campus and day-sharing plan was discussed at the Federation of TPOs' (FTPO) meeting on Monday, ahead of the 2011-12 recruitment season that begins from August 1 for the core and consulting companies and from December 1 for the IT industry. The plan is likely to roll out from December.

COEP's director Anil Sahasrabudhe chaired the meeting which also discussed varying eligibility criteria for students to quality for placements, allowing students to hold more than one job offer, attracting public sector undertakings for recruitments from engineering colleges and appealing to the University of Pune (UOP) to work out ways for declaring revaluation results as early as possible so that students do not miss out on a wider recruitment opportunity.

"Some IT majors prefer exclusive campus visits on the first day as competing firms are usually reluctant to share the talent pool. Opportunity extended to one company often puts undue strain on the relations between other competing firms and the institute," said FTPO convener Sheetalkumar Rawandale.

According to P Subrahmanyam, director (industry-academia collaborations) at Maharashtra Institute of Technology, the proposed model provides for each bulk recruiter to visit the campus on a given day over a period of five to six days. "Offers made to students by these recruiters will be kept in sealed envelopes till the last of the bulk recruiter is through with the placement session. Later, the envelopes will be opened for the students to make a choice," he said. The TPOs view this arrangement as an option to the exercise of running the placement from a common campus.

Securing a uniform eligibility mark, the minimum score required for a student to qualify for the recruitment exercise, is another issue. The eligibility varies from company to company. "Some companies insist on minimum 60% score in all seven semesters, with no backlog or allowed-to-keep-term record, while some others are okay with a 55% benchmark," said N D Gaikwad, TPO at Institute of Information Technology.

Rajarshi Shahu college of engineering's (CoE) executive director for training and placement, Wg Cdr N B Shikhare (Retd), said, "The UOP should declare revaluation results as early as possible so that a student, who may cross the eligibility mark after revaluation, does not miss out on wider opportunity of recruitment."

S V Dravid, TPO at D Y Patil College of Engineering, said, "There are cases where marks have increased by 15 points, post-revaluation, which makes a huge difference in terms of a student qualifying for the recruitment."

Preeti Mulay, TPO at Modern College of Engineering, said students in the final semester often hold two offers and simultaneously prepare for GRE and TOEFL to go abroad.

"Often, they ditch the recruiter when they clear these exams and the college has to face the embarrassment," she said.