Boosting your market potential

Unfortunately, the prevailing economic scenario does not make this easier.  It thus becomes imperative to find the right blend of skills and education to successfully meet this challenging job scenario.

A fast growing economy like ours throws infinite opportunities not just to those with high levels of education. On the contrary, with the service industry growing in multiple folds, need for staff to cater to numerous requirements of the economy has grown tremendously, enabling a person to juggle more than one job at a time.

Interestingly, this large opening in the service sector has given rise to plenty of individual entrepreneurs who are enterprising enough to cash in on skills acquired in related employments and branch out to new avenues using the same.
A classic example of this is an employee of a pizza outlet whose primary job was making pizzas but also entailed chipping in to deliver them. Having thus acquired driving skills, he decided to put this to good use by driving an auto during his days off, thus supplementing his income.

A point to be noted here is not only the drive and determination of the concerned employee to work hard and enhance his income, but also his enterprising nature, aiding him to put to economic use a skill that he learnt on the side in his prevailing job.  Quite often, individuals have multiple skills which can supplement their income if marketed. Yet, the drive and enterprise needed for the same is lacking, preventing them from cashing in on the additional skills.

Human resource, like any other resource has a market and its salability is determined by the capacity to continuously add value to one’s abilities. This could be in terms of acquiring multiple skills, improving communication skills, keeping abreast of latest developments and assimilating relevant information.  While the above would significantly increase a potential employee’s marketability, the crucial factor that would make the difference between a successful worker and one who is not is the drive and the enterprise.  A look at another example would make this point clearer. A cab driver, associated with a transport company has access to many customers he ferries, some of whom are regulars to destinations such as the airport. One such driver decided to become enterprising and with his good communication skills, struck a rapport with his clients. The result was not only an excellent service, but also an offer of his cab services at a discounted rate to the frequent travellers. By adding in a bit of his personalised service like keeping track of their return to the city and picking them up on time and similar services for forthcoming visits to the airport, he ensured that he had a regular stream of clientele, independent of the transport company he was associated with. The result, his income was higher than what he earned through calls from his company.  The fact that drive and enterprise can take a person far is borne out by many success stories of entrepreneurs whose achievements read like a fairytale but are an offshoot of their intense determination to overcome all odds and succeed.

Our country has many such stalwarts, notable among them being the founders of the Ambani Group and Bharti Airtel. Both Dhirubhai Ambani and Sunil Mittal started from extremely humble situations and built their respective empires through sheer unflinching determination, drive and enterprise.      While it is imperative to develop multiple skills to increase marketability, many a time, the needs of the market as well as individual strengths are not clearly understood. Here is where, organisations specialising in enhancing one’s skills, providing the right training, counselling on appropriate job suitableness, play a crucial role.

By interacting with potential candidates, such organisations ensure right skill sets are acquired and the right approach is taken, increasing chances of landing the most suitable job for a given employee profile.  
The author is TeamLease Services Private Limited Director & Co-founder