Higher Education Institutes play a pivotal role in preparing talent for
employability: Study by BML Munjal University
Gurugram [Haryana] | Published : November 23, 2022
BML Munjal University (BMU), a Hero Group initiative,
hosted the third edition of the Leadership Summit on 19th November 2022 at the
university campus in Manesar.
On the sidelines of the summit, BMU released a
report titled Future Of Work & Human Challenges: Technology & Beyond (FOW).
The report explores how the Future Of Work is going to be shaped by
technology and reveals findings from a survey with HR leaders on business
sentiment, the existing skills gap especially with soft skills and the role of
higher education institutions to prepare a future, more employable workforce.
Padma Shri Kiran Karnik, Chairman, IIIT Delhi & Former President, NASSCOM
was the keynote speaker at the Summit and unveiled the report along with the
dignitaries at the event.
Key highlights from the survey with HR Leaders:
89 per cent say their organizations will experience strong growth over the next
1 to 3 years
50 per cent say they need to address the skill gap in
technology roles
Reskilling of employees and hiring talent is a top
priority for 43 per cent and 27 per cent respectively
Entry level talent
will be most sought after to fulfill the gap, say 37 per cent
The
importance of soft skills cannot be overemphasized say 38 per cent
An
overwhelming 84 per cent say that higher education institutions must change the
way they groom students to make them 'more' employable
Higher Education
Institutions must focus on imparting training to help develop soft skills such
as communication, creativity, resilience, empathy, and integrity, say 43 per
cent
A majority, 49 per cent say that moonlighting is acceptable as long
as it is declared
At the summit, BMU hosted three-panel discussions
around a) future of work and technology b) future of work beyond technology and
c) future of work and human challenges with C-suite speakers from Capgemini
India, Adani Group, NASSCOM, Microsoft, Datamatics India, Google Cloud, and many
more.
The discussions examined the intersections between technology and
control in a variety of work contexts, using both quantitative and qualitative
lenses and also focused on the fundamental human challenges that lie ahead with
the future of work that go beyond technology.Dr Kiran Karnik, while speaking at
the Summit said, "There could be various alternative scenarios of the future, as
related to technology and jobs. One could well argue that the future is not
about jobs, but about livelihoods; that the current concerns about "quality"
jobs which assure social security benefits is ill-founded. Instead, we need to
look at livelihoods, with part-time, fixed-period and gig work being predominant
- supported, of course, by a universal system of retirement, pension and social
security guarantees. Also, there is no cause to look at Artificial Intelligence
(AI) or robots as threats: the future will not be a man or machine dichotomy,
but a man plus machine model."
The Future Of Work survey
A
positive business outlook
Despite the global outlook, HR Leaders are
confident about the prospects of business growth of their organization over the
next 1 to 3 years. 89 per cent say their organizations should experience strong
growth but market instability (36 per cent), inflation (21 per cent), and future
COVID-19 variants (23 per cent) are the most likely to play truant to this. Only
13 per cent cite talent or skills shortage to be a challenge to growth.
Skill gaps and strategies to address these challenges
49 per cent of the
respondents say IT / mobile / data analytics / R&D are the business areas that
need to address potential skill gaps the most, followed by executive management
and sales & marketing at around 12 per cent each.
43 per cent of HR
leaders state that reskilling employees is therefore their top most priority
followed by hiring talent at 26.6 per cent. Nearly 18 per cent say that helping
employees navigate workplace challenges is a conscious strategy to help retain
talent especially in a post COVID-19 workplace that is defined by change and
uncertainty.
Freshers (38 per cent) form the largest cohort of talent
that HR Leaders are looking to recruit to address the skill gap in their
organizations followed by those in middle and senior management at 30 per cent
each.A new work order is giving way to the importance of soft-skills. 38 per
cent say that the importance of soft skills cannot be overemphasized as it
allows talent to adapt quickly to a changing economy and needs. 31 per cent
state that a lack of soft skills among candidates can limit the company's
productivity.
A new work order is also evident in how organizations are
choosing to reward and motivate employees. HR Leaders say that both effort and
achievement are celebrated equally to motivate employees and not just the
latter. Further, 25 per cent also say that failures are celebrated that furthers
the importance of putting in the optimum effort.
Teamwork 57 per cent,
followed by creativity 54 per cent, and communication 50 per cent, emerge as the
top three soft skills that are most in demand.
Higher education
institutions can play a fundamental role in preparing talent for employability.
An overwhelming 84 per cent of respondents say that higher education
institutions must change the way they groom students to make them 'more'
employable by imparting soft skills training. 43 per cent emphasize on a focus
on soft skills such as communication, creativity, resilience, empathy, and
integrity, 21 per cent say hands-on education to prepare students for the 'real
world' and 18 per cent say that there must be a stress on helping develop a
learners mind set and curiosity as opposed to knowledge acquisitions. Students
would do well to develop a tolerance for uncertainty and a penchant for
initiative, advising 30 per cent of HR Leaders to be able to maneuver the new
emerging world of work.
In an interesting finding on the issue of
moonlighting, a majority of HR respondents are okay with the trend. While 43 per
cent were not in favor and called it cheating, 49 per cent say they would be
okay with it as long as the employee declares it.
Speaking at the Summit,
Prof Shyam Menon, Vice Chancellor, BML Munjal University, said, "We all know how
technology is shaping the present work environment and the emerging technologies
are going to shape the future of work as well. But factors beyond technology
namely the human aspects would not have any less impact either. The report
through its outreach to HR professionals in the industry collates the 'hiring
wisdom' and engages with the ideas like growth mindset, meta-skills, and
industry-academia integration. The report has highlighted how FutureTech, Growth
Mindset, Quality of Life, Corporate Citizenship, Strong Industry-Academia
Partnership along with Meta Skills, SDGs and scientific practices from Indian
Knowledge Systems are going to inform and shape the future of work in India. I
won't be surprised if this report sets a trend in the country and pioneers
research and practice initiatives in academia and industry respectively to deep
dive into predictive analysis in the field of future of work."
BMU also
collaborated with TeamLease Services Ltd., one of India's leading people supply
chain companies offering a range of solutions to 3500+ employers for their
hiring, productivity and scale challenges to understand the skills and jobs that
will be in demand over the next few years. Based on their data, TeamLease
suggests that the following domain skills will be most in demand - cyber
security and ethical hacking, blockchain, biotechnology, business analytics,
cloud computing, product management, machine learning, digital marketing & SEO,
financial management, and robotics.
Also, our interviews with HR leaders
have revealed why the focus must have to be also on both hard and soft skills.
The new skills set that is being discussed now is meta skills. Meta skill is a
"higher-order" skill that enables one to better learn other skills and improve
the existing ones. Essentially, meta skills are the foundation for developing,
cultivating, and executing other skills. For example, although the ability to
communicate in english can be considered a specific skill but knowing how to
develop the skills to learn any language is considered a meta skill.
Survey methodology
BMU commissioned a study with 250 HR Leaders and
interviewed 20+ academic and industry leaders.
HR Leaders who responded
to the survey represent a mix of industries and included IT/ITeS, Consulting,
Banking and Financial services, manufacturing, automobile, retail, oil and gas,
and renewable energy among others. 59 per cent were women HR Leaders while men
HR Leaders constituted the other 41 per cent.
Named after the late
Founder Chairman of the Hero Group, BML Munjal University (BMU) is a unique
not-for-profit initiative founded by the promoters of the Hero Group. BMU is
mentored by Imperial College London and is engaged in creating, preserving, and
imparting internationally benchmarked knowledge and skills.
The
university seeks to transform higher education in India by creating a
world-class innovative teaching, learning, and research environment. It
envisions becoming a nursery for the leaders of tomorrow and a repository of
knowledge. The School of Management at BML Munjal University has been ranked
54th among all management institutions in All India in the NIRF Rankings 2022
and has also attained the diamond subject rating by QS I-Gauge.
The
University offers undergraduate to doctoral programmes comprising BA (Hons) in
Economics, BBA, BCom (Hons), BA LLB (Hons), BBA LLB (Hons), BBA-MBA Integrated
Programme, B.Tech at the undergraduate level, and MBA, LLB (Hons) and Ph.D. at
the postgraduate level.
For more details, log in to
www.bmu.edu.in
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