Campus Recruitment Process - A Perspective of the Stakeholders

Transcription

1 Campus Recruitment Process - A Perspective of the Stakeholders Mohamed Tajudeen S. Director, Placement and Training B.S.Abdur Rahman University, Chennai - 48 Aravindh Kumaran L. Associate Professor, Department of Management Studies B.S.Abdur Rahman University, Chennai - 48 ABSTRACT Campus recruitment is a process through which the corporate (employer) organization recruits the required talent pool from the academic campuses. The selection process takes place in the final year of a programme for students of both undergraduate and post graduate courses. The campus recruitment process starts with a preparation by all the stake holders, the recruiters,the students and the campus placement team of the institution. The IT and the ITES companies where the man power is the major strength of the organization the preparation for deciding the size of the recruitment is decided much ahead of the recruitment process. INTRODUCTION Campus recruitment is a process through which the corporate (employer) organization recruits the required talent pool from the academic campuses. The selection process takes place in the final year of a programme for students of both undergraduate and post graduate courses. Over the years, campus recruitment has assumed greater significance in the minds of several stakeholders. The major stake holder s recruitment process is Institution Companies Students Parents INSTITUTION The college enrollment decision has become increasingly complex in the recent years, as education has transformed in many ways. The Information technology and Engineering industry has experienced dramatic growth both in size and complexity during the last decade. This growth in turn fueled a tremendous increase in the number of professional institutions across the country. The various accrediting bodies and the ranking surveys conducted by the media help the institutions have healthy competitions among them. They strive to increase the various factors that influence the ranking consistently, out of these parameters campus placements by reputed multinational companies and the pay package offered is one important parameter that decides the branding and the demand for the educational institution. COMPANIES Though the supply of the graduates is increasing multifold and the demand for graduates decreasing, the NASSCOM report (2011) says that only 25 per cent of the engineering graduates are employable. Engineering graduates constitute the major portion of the campus recruits who get recruited every year through campus recruitments. Companies also need to brand themselves to attract this 25 percent of the employable graduates. 42 Mohamed Tajudeen S., Aravindh Kumaran L.

2 STUDENTS Students are the major stake holders of the academic institutions. The branding of the institution, infrastructure and the feedback they get from their friends and seniors in school and most important is the social media reviews about the institutions are the major factors that decide the choice of college for admission. The admission is generally a consensual decision between parent and child. The students even when they are at school they have a strong social media presence and they are well communicated to their friends and seniors. They have a clear knowledge about the course they want to pursue and the institution that is good at that course. Figure 1. PARENTS Parents are very cautious while choosing the college for their children. They do a lot of homework before selecting a college Figure 1. Some of the important parameters parents look for are infrastructure (both college and hostel), library, laboratory facilities, transport, and general discipline and placements. Of late campus placements are given high priority by the parents, while selecting a college or a University. Parents are not hesitant to pay more to get admission into a college that has a consistent placement record. More focus is on campus recruitments as parents also realize the tough competition their child has to undergo in an open competition. Taking these important factors of the stake holders into consideration all converge into one important point employment of the student. Good academic scores and sound technical knowledge are only one part of the recruitment process. There is a need to enhance their communication skills and hone their problem solving capabilities to make them employable. Off-campus and on-campus recruitment most of the time follow the same process. It consists of a written or an online test process focused on testing the verbal reasoning, quantitative and logical thinking skills of the student. The test is generally followed by a group discussion, technical interview and personal interview. 43 Mohamed Tajudeen S., Aravindh Kumaran L.

3 CAREER OF A GRADUATE Figure 2.0 depicts the various career options of the graduates. The first option of any student would be employment. The support of various venture capitals and the government has encouraged many students to start their own business with their innovative business ideas. The institutions encourage this by setting up their own entrepreneur development cell and help them with the seed funding for the start-up companies. The third option would be to take up higher studies in India or Abroad. Career of a Graduate Employment Entrepreneurship Higher studies REGISTRATION WITH THE P & T CELL PREPAREDNESS ATTENDING THE CAMPUS RECRUITMENT SELECTION IN THE CAMPUS RECRUITMENTS Figure 2. CAMPUS RECRUITMENT PROCESS The campus recruitment process starts with a preparation by all the stake holders, the recruiters,the students and the campus placement team of the institution. The IT and the ITES companies where the man power is the major strength of the organization the preparation for deciding the size of the recruitment is decided much ahead of the recruitment process. It's a normal practice to convene a meeting of the placement and training heads to convey this number to the institutions and the expectation of the industry from the students. This enables the placement office to train the students if required in the key skills that are required by the graduates to get recruited. Students who are having other career options like Entrepreneurship or higher studies in India or abroad are requested to keep away from the campus recruitment because their indecisiveness is likely to deprive the student who are need of employment to miss an opportunity. HR systems also play a vital role in communicating the job profile to the potential applicants. The research study conducted earlier (Robert T Bretz Jr, and Timothy A Judge, 1994) emphasise that the organizations need to have specific attributes communicated for different job profiles offered by them. The first step in the campus placement process for a student is the registration process. This process helps in the elimination of the unregistered students. Unless a student registers with the Placement Cell he / she will not be eligible for Campus recruitment. The details about the rules and regulations for registration and the data sheet in excel format is issued to all students. The students will be intimated regarding the various 44 Mohamed Tajudeen S., Aravindh Kumaran L.

4 recruiters visits, their eligibility criteria and related details through the group mail, notice board and circular to the departments concerned. Bottjen Audrey and Cohen Andy (2001) suggest that building relationship is the key factor in campus recruiting. Offering student internships, connecting with the students through their alumni, academic interactions with the faculty etc., increase the visibility of the company on campus. In the same vein, James Bailey et al., (2002) report that the corporate should project its right image on the campuses. The corporate should aim for long term relationship with the campuses. The general policy followed is one man one job. It is not a unique policy. The idea is to give opportunities for everybody. Nevertheless, we are trying to help the student of core branches to get placed in core companies. The general eligibility criteria for the recruitment process for a company would be aggregate marks percentage, no history of arrears or no standing arrears, the branches considered, whether PG courses are considered etc., this varies vary from recruiter to recruiter. Nevertheless, the minimum eligibility criterion is 60% marks or equivalent CGPA and no arrears as on the date of the campus recruitment. Though this is not stringently followed. Christopher J. Collins and Cynthia Kay Stevens (2002) through their research suggested that the pre placement or branding activities done for the engineering students by the recruiting companies would have more influence on the career choice of the students. The following are the various steps in the campus placement process. o Pre-placement Talk o Written Test Objective type General / Technical / Quantitative Aptitude / Logical reasoning skills and English proficiency. o Group Discussion and o Interview Technical and HR o Pre Placement Talk During pre placement talk by the recruiter every student is expected to be patiently attentive. We emphasize on this, because the students should not miss out on the finer details like place of posting etc. And there may be questions during the interview from some of the information shared during the pre-placement talk. The students are advised; not to ask questions about the compensation package to the recruiter because it is our duty to ensure good pay masters visit to the institution. Also, atleast some companies do not take the question lightly arguing that this question arises only when the offer for employment is given. To ask the questions about, the career progression, the nature of learning opportunities, the uniqueness of the company, the accolades the company has received and such other positive aspects. Also, the students should be preparing comprehensively because every company has its own unique way of testing and assessing the students. That is why, we always advise the students not to make the preparation just based on the past question papers of any company. The following are some of the campus recruitment strategies followed by the institutions. a. Big pay masters / Brand names do less campus recruitment Some of the big names or pay masters may not be visiting the campus because their requirements for fresher's are quite less compared to the major recruiters. Even if the big brand names visit the campus their conditional ties are quite stiff which may not be in the best of interests. Nevertheless, we are trying our best to bring in the best of companies. b. Some companies of equal standing are missed out by good institutions Many big brand companies vie and compete with each other to get the early slots. In the bargain, some companies are missed out. Nevertheless by our relationship building- exercise our Placement and Training cell is bringing the best of companies to the campus. One may also note that new companies are added every year matching to the needs of the growth in the number of students. c. Determination of the campus recruitment slots The recruiters are invited to visit the campus in a particular pecking order taking into account a lot of factors, primarily the larger interests of the students of our institution. It needs to be mentioned here that in the past there have been no regrets by the students who got placed in the companies which came late. 45 Mohamed Tajudeen S., Aravindh Kumaran L.

5 d. Core companies campus recruitments Many core / manufacturing companies visit the campus in the even semester or even later rather than in the odd semester. This is so because unlike IT Companies their planning for manpower requirement is rather late. One should compare the number of students in the IT branches non-it branches. Also for the IT companies manpower is the major requirement and many times higher than the manufacturing companies. It may be understood many IT companies recruit Non-IT students also. e. Students with high academic scores get selected easily Not always, because the recruiters look at not only academic performance but also the performance in their recruitment process. To put it simple, every company looks at the right fit for them. f. Campus recruitments held combining some colleges at a common venue Many recruiters prefer to aggregate some colleges together for the purpose of campus recruitment process. This provides them a considerable savings in time and effort. Also, many companies are attracted to this proposition even when they are not keen to visit a particular college as such. Here one should also note that the synergy works to the common advantage of all the participants. It is a wrong proposition to think that somebody gets affected in this process. g. Importance of Curriculum Vitae The curriculum vitae of any student is enriched through not only his scholastic achievement but also the cocurricular and extracurricular activities. More specifically, paper presentation, mini projects, in-plant training, sports, cultural achievements, community service etc. definitely add value to once Curriculum Vitae. f. Preparation for the campus recruitment The student needs to be well prepared for campus recruitment on the following lines. i. Aptitude: The student is tested on the general aptitude analytical skills in term quantitative aptitude and logical reasoning. ii. Basics and fundamentals The student is tested on the fundamental knowledge of what he has studied. Here we need to emphasis that, there is a clear distinction between the preparation for University Examination and preparation for the campus recruitment. In particular, the student is tested on the conceptual and analytical skills. This is the reason why students cannot afford to forget the subjects which they have studied from the beginning of their professional course. Similarly, the students should be having a good knowledge about what is happening in terms of practical applications. For this, students can do better by constantly doing some extra reading. iii. Communication Skills: A recruiter looks at not necessarily one s English speaking skills but how effectively one can express his understanding, ideas, views and opinions to the other person. iv. Others Once the news about a campus recruitment is announced, the student should take efforts to know more details about the company by visiting the website, searching magazines or journals, talking to some seniors who are employed in the company etc., One should be keen to know not only about the earning potential but also the learning opportunities. g. Service agreement / bond Some recruiters insist on signing up a bond to ensure a fair return on the investment they have made in training a person. This in no way should inhibit the students from joining the company. The logic is, if you are determined to join the company and work for at least 2 or 3 years, then the signing of bond should not come in the way. 46 Mohamed Tajudeen S., Aravindh Kumaran L.

6 h. Will a non IT student be tested on his software knowledge. By and large, the answer is No Nevertheless, one may be tested on the software one studies in the curriculum; for example, one may be tested on C language. knowledge CONCLUSION The aim of any professional institution would be to increase the placements of the students. The number of students placed in reputed companies has a very high impact on the branding and value of the institution. The role of each stake holder in the process plays a crucial role in ensuring the recruiter gets the best talent, the institution ensures all the organization that recruits are not missed. The students are benefited the most as he is prepared to face the interview and acquires the required skills to be recruited. The first job is an important factor in shaping the career of the students. REFERENCES 1. Robert T Bretz Jr. and Timothy A Judge (1994), The role of Human Resource Systems in Job Applicant Decision Processes, Journal of Management, Vol.20, No.3, pp Bottjen Audrey, Cohen Andy (2001), The benefits of college recruiting, Journal of Sales & Marketing Management, Vol.153, No 4, pp James Bailey, Gary Heesaker, Karen Martinis, Connie Nott (2002), Student Recruitment Strategies, The CPA Journal, pp Christopher J. Collins, Cynthia Kay Stevens (2002), The Relationship Between Early Recruitment-Related Activities and the Application Decisions of New Labor-Market Entrants: A Brand Equity Approach to Recruitment, Journal of Applied Psychology, Vol. 87, No 6, pp Mohamed Tajudeen S., Aravindh Kumaran L.