With the advent of technology, the companies too are undergoing a major transformation as they need to adapt themselves to keep pace with the latest trends. To make this possible, they need to hire the right candidates who are adaptable and are ready to execute tasks at work right from the beginning. But, the poor quality of the higher education system in India prevents this situation to actualize. Today, only a fraction of the MBA graduates are actually employable.
The reason why so many Indians who graduate with an MBA are unemployable is that they aren’t industry ready. According to ASSOCHAM, barring a few top institutes most of India’s 5500 b-schools crank out poorly trained graduates. In fact, only 7% of the students who graduate from such colleges are employable and many remain unemployed or do jobs beneath their cognitive abilities.
With the ever-changing dynamic requirements of the corporate, the Indian higher education system too needs to update its curriculum and keep it sync with the industry demands. In fact, in most of the management schools the curriculum is still very theoretical without having any practical value. For example, some of the MBA colleges still teach VAT whereas the economy has now moved to the GST model.
Employers today expect employees to be abreast with the modern day business environment. Such an understanding also includes knowledge of selling products and negotiating with vendors. When employees have such skills, they benefit and so do their employers. MBA graduates must also have skills that allow them to work in a corporate setting; this means they must have good interpersonal skills using which they can easily get along with others in their office and with their clients.
To resolve this issue, policymakers and industry leaders need to intervene and create a new education curriculum that is relevant to students in a technologically enabled world. It is because of the flaws in the education system, a large number of students aren’t employable. What is needed is a paradigm shift in education. Such a shift means teaching students skills that are practical and make them employable. To ensure that a curriculum remains relevant there is also a need for interaction between industry and academia.
The writer is COO and Co-founder, Sunstone Eduversity