IT firms eye rural students to beat attrition
Karnataka Vocational Training & Skill Development Corporation’s employment drive
Go rural for longevity of your recruits stay in the company seems to be the new credo among IT companies faced with the bugbear of high attrition among upwardly mobile urban recruitees.
With urban students more skewed towards fancy salaries, brand and designations, besides several leaving mid-stream to pursue higher studies rendering investments into training futile, IT companies now see ray of sunshine with rural graduates who they believe will not only stick with the company for longer duration as also are not that overtly fussy on salary and perks front besides relocation to the City.
It is no wonder that Wipro, Tech Mahindra and TCS, have taken to first of its kind initiative launched by State government’s — Central Placement Cell (CPC) of Karnataka Vocational Training & Skill Development Corporation Limited’s employment initiative.
The CPC, which recently conducted placement drive for fresh BSc & BCA graduates in five districts besides Bangalore saw as many as 137 of 736 rural graduates who registered for the fair being given on spot job offers. Speaking to Deccan Herald, CPC Head (Operations) Raghav said surprisingly the drive for urban candidates in Bangalore saw only 55 offered jobs even though total walk-ins was 737.
Provide exposure
The placement drive, aimed at giving exposure to rural students to attend interviews, assess their individual worth & what they can expect from their career, has been taken up, Raghav said, to provide equal opportunity to students irrespective of being from urban or rural colleges and talent. The main objective, though of CPC, he said, was to take IT employers to the rural youth.
The drive, he said, was conducted in Davangere, Mysore, Tumkur, Chikamagalur, and Brahmavara in Udupi, for Wipro, with few rural students registering in for Bangalore walk-ins. While in Davangere out of 146 walk-ins and among the 108 shortlisted 38 were given offers. In Mysore, of the 78 walk-ins 14 were offered jobs. In Tumkur, which saw the largest of 180 walk-ins 30 received offers.
In Chikmagalur, out of the 56, six received offers. In Udupi, of the 120, job offers were given to 16. The walk-ins of rural students in Bangalore saw 156 of which 33 given offers.
The only criterion, he said, was irrespective of streams of study, compulsory subject was mathematics.
Most were taken in as junior technical associate, who, when confirmed would be drawing salary between Rs 2-2.5 lakh annually. Raghav further said similar walk-ins are being organised for Tech Mahindra and Wipro in Hubli and Mangalore in June and July, while for TCS a couple of locations have been identified and dates to be confirmed.
