Podcast in Marathi on “How to stay relevant and employable in the market?”

In today's career-oriented world, how should one approach upskilling? What skills are crucial when entering the corporate sector? Why personal branding is necessary? How should one approach a job interview? How important is networking? What are the current trends in the job market? We have covered these topics and more with Vinod Bidwaik, People & Culture Director at Sakal Media Group. 

Tune in to gain valuable insights and strategies to navigate and excel in your career journey.

Click on a link below to listen the full podcast:-

https://youtu.be/XnvHeACk47I?si=9g3lIJ3WRPnm1Kcc

 Click on a link below to listen the full podcast:-

https://youtu.be/XnvHeACk47I?si=9g3lIJ3WRPnm1Kcc

College to Corporate via Interview

Copy available on Amazon and Flipkart. Click here to grab your copy >>  College to Corporate via Interview

Jobseekers, make your search journey more meaningful!

I keep getting a lot of mails and requests from aspiring candidates. LinkedIn is one of the media where I get maximum requests for jobs. Few known people call randomly and ask me to check the jobs for their kids, relatives, friends etc. One of the myths people have is that HR decides who to hire. Few people think that being HR professionals can influence organizations to hire any candidates. HR professionals and senior leaders can connect candidates to a concerned network. They can coach and guide them to get the job, however candidates also need to be proactive and fast in their job search journey. Candidates are shortlisted for their fitment as per the role and selected for their employability skills.  

Few of my observations and suggestions to make your job search journey more meaningful are as under:

Professionalism: I keep getting messages in my LinkedIn inbox. Few candidates are very professional. They have everything, a nice covering letter, updated resume. They request in a sober language. Other hand, the majority of the candidates just message randomly without understanding what their value proposition is. I get messages from a few candidates who are too rude. “Hey, do you have a job for me? Hey, I want to work with your company, or hey, can you check my resume for so and so profile.” I understand their desperation, but this is not the language while asking for the job. Connect, engage, market and then sell is the basic principle on social media. 

Your education and college is just an entry pass: Candidates need to understand that your job fitment is important. Most of the organizations hire candidates from top engineering and business schools at entry level. Once you gain the experience your school doesn't have much value. That may be one of the additional factors, but it is your experience and skills that matter most. Few candidates push their candidature just because they are from top school. They assume that they are qualified for the job because of their school affiliation. 

Not trying enough: It is your journey. It is your struggle. Connecting with networks and relying only on them will not help. You have to try all measures to get the jobs. The organizations to whom you are connected may not have the right job for you, however you can keep trying, but don’t show desperation by messaging them every day or week. Instead speak about your strong points, your value proposition, skills you can bring to the organisation. Try different platforms and be active in the job market. 

Not working on the resume: Candidates have the same profile for every job. Sometimes it is unrealistic to write everything. One of the issues I have seen is copying the resume. Be genuine while making your resume. Don’t put things which you have never done. Sometimes, resumes are too lengthy, sometimes too short, sometimes with too many infographics. Just balanced it and customised as per the role. If required, you have to rewrite your resume from time to time. Invest your time on your resume making.

Not working on LinkedIn profile: Your LinkedIn profile is your professional identity in the digital world. Most of the students and candidates don’t give enough attention to their profile. Keep updating your profile. Use the platform effectively and wisely. Network with the right people and share relevant information. You can create a positive personal brand using this platform.  

Ineffective Networking: Do you know where your seniors and (school, institute or earlier companies’) alumni are working? They may be a great help to you. Network with friends, your seniors, and leaders in the industry.              

Mailing Unsolicited Resumes: One of the mistakes candidates do to send mass mails to everybody they know. Don’t spam the inbox of human resource and hiring managers. Don’t send mass mails and resume to all. Customise your mail in an appealing manner and then send it to relevant people. Nowadays, companies don’t entertain resumes received through mails. They want you to apply through their career page. It is easy for companies to track and find relevant resumes. But one of the problems with this system is your resume may get ignored if your resume doesn’t have the right keywords. Ensure that your resume contains the right key world and content which is relevant to the job advertisement.

Not focused search: One of the mistakes candidates do to apply for every position without reading job descriptions and details of the job. First decide what you want. Make your search focused. Make a list of companies and roles which are suitable and then try. Your resumes can be shortlisted if it matches at least 70% to the job descriptions.

The major issue in the job market is getting the right talent which has the employability skills. Unfortunately, very few candidates demonstrate those skills during interviews. You need to read, keep yourself updated, and focus on continuous learning. Work on improving your employability skills and create your ‘personal candidature brand’ using different platforms and being active on those platforms & job portals to get visibility in the talent market. Wish you best luck!

(Opinions are purely personal & does not represent my organizations, current or past) 

Author's book are available on Amazon, Flipkart, Pothi and BookGanga 

Vitality in Human Resource is now available in paperback edition. Please click here to buy

Buy Industrial Relations Strategy Framework For Every Manager on amazon. Click IR Strategy Framework.    

Please read "College to Corporate via Interviews" to prepare for your next dream job. Click here to grab the copy of book College to Corporate Via Interviews

How to bridge the industry academia gap?

Student, institutes, industries and employability

Discussion about employability of engineering and management students is not new. As per the report  only 15-16% engineers are employable and only 10% management graduates are employable (Employability report.). It means when employers hire engineering and management students they have to invest on training, skilling and developing most of the students. 

Let’s take an analogy of product and customer. Students are the product of colleges and companies are customers, however, how many times colleges approach companies asking what they need? What types of skills and behaviours are required for industries? How many times professors go to industries to learn what happens on the shop floor? And accordingly design the course so that product is delivered as per the requirement. I think this is a two-way process, however accountability is more on those colleges to make students more employable. Most of the time, colleges interact with industries only for seminars, conferences and inviting professionals in the campus. This is just a “feel good factor” for colleges, feeling that they are interacting with industries. There are very few exceptions where they understand the requirements and design the syllabus, plan some sandwich courses, and arrange internships for the student.  For others the only motive is relationship building and having a placement. Most of the time colleges, institutes and placement committees contact companies only during placement season requesting placements without asking what companies need. Management institutes have become grooming institutes only focusing presentation skills, interview skills, language skills etc. This is good but students think that these are the only skills which matters. When they realise that this is not enough, then they join private professional institutes to upgrade their skills, which ideally colleges should have done.     

On the other side, for students it is just a degree which they think that it would take them towards their goals. Majority of the students get their degrees and struggle for getting the job. Finally, they end up doing petty jobs on the assembly line or working from small companies doing everything. The struggle never ends. The attitude of the students is not developed properly. They are more concerned about salary and job profiles instead of learning. I get surprised when students ask recruiters what their job profile would be.

Students should focus on learning and developing instead of just focusing on the job profile. They need to understand that they become productive after a lot of efforts invested by the companies. It takes a minimum 1-2 years to become employable. 

This debate is discussed on every forum, still it remains there. 

Unfortunately, Corona pandemic has brought different challenges for the students who are waiting to start their career. Companies are not hiring. Fresh hiring is on hold. It must be stressful. However, these days will also go.

To improve the employability, institutes & colleges should focus on the following:

• Mandatory internship for teaching staff: There should be mandatory internship for professors for 2 months in a year in industries. Along with this every professor should have at least 4 consultancy assignments with industries. This can be paid or unpaid as per the requirement.  
• Participation of industries in designing syllabus: Industry and academia interaction should not be limited to only seminars and lectures. It should go beyond like designing the course for industries as per their requirements. Companies may not afford to hire students but still they can develop students. And companies will not do it free. Institutes should think how to reciprocate the efforts of industries.
• Specialized course for specific segment or industries: There can be specialized courses designed for specific segments and industries in collaboration of industries. This also can be for the group of industries.  

Few tips for students as under:

• Develop yourself in your domain: You need to be strong in the domain which you chose. When you are taking any degree, it is expected you have learnt all theories, principles. Go the extra mile to learn the domain, functional skills.  
• Develop a few more skills that will make you a more marketable candidate for the field you’re trying to break into. Keep learning and check around to find out which skills are highly valued, like coding, Analytics, social media, IoT, sensor technology etc.
• Focus on developing your behavioural skills: Behaviour and soft skills make you more employable. There are a variety of such skills, but mainly these are networking & influencing, selling skills, communication skills, presentation skills, design mindset, agility etc.  
• Network strongly with the seniors, alumina and professional in the field of your interest. Reach out to them, get their help to review your resume and be connected with them.
• Find our opportunities to learn by offering your time on projects, assignments, research and offering help to professional networks on small things like handling their social media page or digital marketing etc. it will show that you have the right attitude.
• Go for social work: Make sure you’re doing something useful that also gives back to your community or a cause that you’re passionate about. This will keep you feeling productive and fulfilled, while also giving you another line on your resume. 

Few training & placement officers are trying hard to bring the corporates and industries on board; however, this is limited to their level only. After the corona virus pandemic, the skilled workforce will be available in lateral hiring and if colleges and institutes & also students don’t wake up, it will be difficult for the students to get jobs in future. Institutes need to create the differentiator and should ask the question themselves: why will industries hire their students?  

Make yourself redundant

We study to get the job; we don’t study to be employable. Our education system doesn’t create employable workforce. They create qualified people who don’t have any idea how their life will take shape. Even topmost schools (except vital few) who claim that they create best engineers or management students, are not doing good. Students get their placement because of huge alumni network.

However, everybody in life manages to get something. Not everybody does what they wanted to do but they choose something in life for the livelihood. Few gets job, they change jobs assuming their life will be good, but it never happens. Few choose to be an entrepreneur. Few fails, few succeed. Success stories are discussed, and failure stories are buried under the carpet. Finally, they do what they have in their hand, and life moves on. Those who are successful in their lives are because of their individual efforts and not necessary what they learnt in their colleges.

The problem starts when they start settling in their job. In the struggle of life, most of the employees just stop learning new things assuming that what they are doing today will remain forever. Accountants do the same job for many years, same is for HR Professional and salesperson selling the product in same way what he uses to sell a few years back. Most of the people just learn but don’t want to unlearn. They don’t understand that the world is changing so fast that methods, ways, tools are becoming obsolete very fast. This is applicable for all generations.

When I started my career long back, the HR department was just a support function. Main responsibilities were transactional like employee relations, legal compliance, payroll processing, recruitment, training & development etc. Everybody working in HR department was doing all things without giving much thought. But over a period of time, role totally changed, organizations realised that they need HR specialist in different areas of HR, not only the person handling everything and missing the core. That’s how HR Transformation started, new roles like HRBP, Center of Excellence Experts in L&D, Talent Management, HR analyst etc started getting attention. Those who change their mindset and learn for the future ensure that they are in the Game. Rest remained at same role and then went outside from the profession or working somewhere which they are not enjoying. Same thing happened in Finance with new roles like business controller, finance controller, business analysts, experts in different functional areas. This is in all areas of the business. This change is because of the market and not because of internal change. Customers are more educated and aware. They already know the features of your products and hence it is not only selling the products but selling the value proposition and benefits of the product instead of product itself.            

So, with high end technology, changed expectations from customers and market, we need to reinvent our jobs also. For this we need to think how we can make ourselves redundant.

Once I think that the job I am doing will not be there tomorrow, then what are that roles will be for me and then what I need to learn. In this process, learning is fast. You not only confirm your seat when there is reorganization but also increase your employability in the market.        

My message to engineering graduates during the convocation ceremony

My message to engineering graduates during the convocation ceremony of SVPM’s College of Engineering Malegaon (Bk), Baramati on 8^th Feb 2020.

Principal of SVPS's COE, Dr. Mukane, CEO, of SVPM, Mr. Patil, dignitaries of the dais, on the dais, professors and dear students,

This day is important day in your life. You are going to start the new chapter. On the occasion, I congratulate you all. I would like to share few tips based on my experience to make the life better. 

(following is the excerpt from the speech)
  
Create Knowledge: You learnt the knowledge during your education. You learnt fundamental concepts, Principles and theories. Time has come to apply that, but most importantly before application, comes creation. Based on the fundamental knowledge, you should learn to create different concepts, models. You need to create the knowledge for the society, industries and ecosystem where you are living. Learn, Create and apply is the right sequence in knowledge management.

You are unique: Be the best you. Be confident and think that nobody is better than you. Your competition is not with others, it is with you. Always try to be better every day. Be open and always learn.    

Break invisible fences: You must have read the story of elephants. When they are very young and much smaller mahout uses the same size rope to tie them and, at that age, it’s enough to hold them. As they grow up, they are conditioned to believe they cannot break away. They believe the rope can still hold them, so they never try to break free. These animals could at any time break free from their bonds but because they believed they couldn’t, they were stuck right where they were. We also have conditioned our mind to play safe and we create invisible fences and strong chains which we don’t want to cross or break. That fences are like ‘I can’t do this, it is difficult, I have never done this, etc etc. All these are excuses we give for not doing something. This mindset is dangerous. We need to break those fences and remove negative beliefs, false assumptions and unnecessary fear.        

Success will come from simplicity: You are now engineers and understand complex theories and concepts, doesn’t mean you make life complicated. Engineers have the tendency to make things more complicated. Make things simple and the life of others. Your success will come from simplicity. Complex problems don’t mean that you have the complex solution. Find out simple solutions for complex problems.     

Life is always fair: Believe that life is always fair. There will be a lot of struggle, failures, frustrations but trust that every situation has some remedy. People around you may be unfair but life will always be fair for you. Something better will always be there.

Be a leader: Leadership doesn’t mean that you should have followers. Be the leader of yourself. Leadership comes through position and power which is not long lasting. But leadership which comes through your credibility, knowledge, wisdom is always long lasting. Create that credibility by your expertise, knowledge and wisdom.

You can curse the darkness, or you can light the candle, choose right option.

Don’t scare to do mistakes and failures: If you have the fear of doing mistakes, you will not do anything. Don’t be scared what will happen. Failures and mistakes will teach you lot of lessons. If you don’t try, you will never know what you can do. You are amazing person and you can do anything. Go ahead.

It must be a proud moment for all of you but don’t forget your parents. They must be prouder on your success. Recognize their contribution in your successes. I congratulate you and wish you all the best luck. I am sure you will rock going forward.

At the end, I would like to say that keep alive your dreams and aspirations. Don’t let it go away. I would like to recite my poem here…

Education, Job, Career & Dilemma

Recently one of the former colleagues called me to ask about the expectations from fresh talent. Her son is doing his engineering from reputed college at Delhi and he is aspiring to go outside India for post-graduation. She met one of the career counsellors who assured her that if his services are taken her son will get the admission in Stanford, Harvard etc. No comment about the career counsellor here. It is their business.  

But she asked me some interesting questions which I think every parents and students may have in their mind. I thought that such questions are important to understand what those things are, students should focus on.

1. Is it okay to do the post-graduation in India from reputed college or instead take an admission in foreign university? 

• Every student’s & parent’s dilemma. There are a lot of foreign universities which encourage students to take admission outside from their countries. If you have enough funds, it is easy to get admission in foreign universities. You can go in the US, Australia, Canada, Singapore, Germany or any other European countries.  Just you have to crack some entrance exams or language exams. It is not a big deal. Big deal is getting admission in top universities. If you are aspiring to take admission in top colleges in India, like top IIMs for business management, you have to prepare hard to crack the CAT. Getting admission in post-graduation in engineering in IITs is not that difficult. If you did your education in foreign universities, you may also get the job there. Question is what your purpose is. Lot of students still struggle to get a job in India, when they are back in India.

• Just getting the degree or postgraduate degree (unless you are from Top Universities) doesn’t make you eligible to get a job in India. For entry level your institute background or university matters. If you are from reputed (Not mostly advertised) institute anywhere from the world, your chance to get the job at entry level is easy. But once you get the job, everybody is equal. 

• In summary, if you want to study outside India, do it, but choose the university wisely. If you want to stay in India and study in top tier colleges, do it. But again, choose that institute wisely.

2. What are the top 5 things you see in the resume of an entry level candidate?

• Funny thing is that all resumes are just copy pasted in the college by students. Their objectives are the same, their hobbies are similar. Placement officer gives the format and students just put the information in the resume. I don’t think, either college or students give enough attention in designing the resume. They are trained how to give interviews, how to speak in group discussions, etc etc. Hence, it is difficult to get the clue from entry level resumes. But then as a professional I will notice the following things in the resume.

• Have the students given some thought while making his resume or just copy pasted the format?
• His score in different exams,
• What are that extra-curricular activities (leading the events, organising some fest etc) he has taken in the college to improve his soft skills?
• What he did during his summer and winter internship?
• What is his project and how seriously he did it?

During the interview the interview may ask more details about all above to understand the seriousness, depth, understanding of the student. 

3. What are those things one should focus to make a career in the corporate world at management level?

• First message is don’t go by the title, go by the role. Titles may be misleading. Whenever you join any organization, focus on formative experience and learning. Formative experience is as under:

• Building the functional or domain knowledge: In any organization, you need to be strong in your functional or domain knowledge. you have learned the concepts in the college, now it is the time to test them and understand them better. Practical application of your learning makes your foundation sound. Focus on more learning. Understand the things in detail. Strive for the excellence.

• Perspective Building: As you grow in the organization, start learning about the people, culture, diversity and interacting with them. Start learning what are different perspectives and thinking pattern and how are they developed. Work with different teams, on different projects. Build the perspective in social, international context. Widen your horizon.

• Leadership Building: This is about working on your personal style. Leadership not necessary means you should have a team to lead. It is about how you build your leadership by observing, learning and experiencing while working. 

As a professional when any resume and subsequently candidate comes to me, I will see how he learned in the organization, what is his development & experience pattern and how he has grown in the organization.

Please watch here to know more "How I build my Formative Experience." 

Be ready for future capabilities :- My Speech

I got the opportunity to interact with student managers of Balaji Society on 18th Aug 2017. Almost 1000 students were present to listen my views of challenges in corporate world, new way of working, future trends and new capabilities required to manage these challenges. 

The session is recorded by the management school. Please watch this video...




Some pics of this session.

Talent Management in Manufacturing Sector

Vinod Bidwaik, speaking during the panel discussion on Talent Management and Opportunities in manufacturing sector at PIBM, Pune on 6th Aug 2016. PIBM organises Manufacturing Day every year. 

He also spoke on "Employability and Learning Agility" here.

Students & their employability

Employability is the major issue in today’s world. There are (management & engineering) colleges which are below average quality. Students coming from those colleges have to struggle to get the jobs. If the student is struggler and has the fighting spirit, he may get the job. He then can build his career on this. However in those colleges, there are few students who really want to learn. Those few students are talented, good and really are in search of good opportunities. (Talented means, a recurring pattern of thought, feeling or behavior that can be productively applied.  When they get the opportunity, they value the job.) Unfortunately Industries tend to pick candidates from reputed institutes which is not wrong, but there is no point hiring the candidate from reputed institute with big cost for shop floor routine job and keeping the guy for only doing the routine job. I personally feel that these students should be really challenged and should be rotated through different functions and finally put them result oriented high level tasks. You really come to know the capabilities of the candidate.

Students from Tier 1 schools, in particular, are definitely more prepared, but when you talk about value for the money, and you talk about value per unit of money spent on a particular candidate or the efficiency level per unit of the money spent on a candidate, there is no major difference if you compare it other schools. When a new MBA comes in from one of the top institutes, “he has bought some level of premium tag”, but that does not mean this candidate will have the most or best practical knowledge.

Jobs like supervisor,  regular maintenance, logistics, , QA, regular production etc. where, there are routine jobs as per the standard operating procedures do not demand high level intelligence. however, they do require greater frustration tolerance, personal discipline, organization, management, and interpersonal skills than were required two decades and more ago. These are precisely the skills that many of the young people, who are in business schools today, as opposed to two decades ago, lack. 

India’s school and university-based education system doesn’t equip you with skills that employers look for.  While Indian graduates know something about the theoretical aspects, they lack domain skills, communication and professional (employability) skills. (see the exhibit)  Curriculum and pedagogy at teaching institutions are increasingly being set by people who do not understand what companies want. Most of the times, teachers’ quality is the major issues. Those teachers are the people, who fail to get good industrial and professional jobs. As the last option the teaching profession is accepted. There is not such passion of teaching.

Even the attitude of students is different. They spend big money for getting the degree certificate, sometimes they even don’t know why they are doing the particular degree. Their expectations is if they are spending such amount they would get the highly paid job with air-conditioned office. Third class management institutes made this totally business case to earn the money without any value addition.

Institutes should focus on following areas while preparing their students for industries. Otherwise all those institutes will perish one day.  

Skills :  Skill is the how part of the task and job. It is also capabilities that can be transferred from one person to another. This can be actually done by aligning with industries. Institutes need to take efforts to reach out to industries, understand the expectations and prepare the curriculum accordingly.

Knowledge: It is ‘what you are aware of .. Factual ( things you know) Can & should be taught. Experiential (understandings you have picked up along the way). Less Tangible and therefor much harder to teach

Talent: Recurring patterns of thought feeling behavior, that carve individual minds. If someone does not have the talent as part of his filter , then very difficult for others to inject it.

Now just look how many candidates have above capabilities. I think there is a long way to reach the goal.   

Exhibits: