Employability Skill Development

Employability skills:  How can we develop?

Employability skills are one most important skill set which everyone needs to have. It is estimated that by 2022 around 600 million skilled workers will be needed to meet the needs of growing Indian economy. We have the advantage of having youngest population in the world. Our 50% population is below 25 years and more than 65% population is under 35 years of age. Average Indian age is 29 year compare to 37 year of China and 48 years of Japan. It is clear indication of future trends for job and business. We are still the country with a very big pool of highly skilled and trained young people and this places us in advantageous position to provide solution to fill the skill and trained manpower gap globally. And it could be a great opportunity of us in future if we take care of training and skilling our youth for the employability skill gap for future. But at this moment we have another challenge i.e. shortage of skilled man power or the trained manpower with adequate employability skills. And we need a Holistic approach to address the skills shortage in the country. So the highly trained demographic needs to be harnessed efficiently by creating job opportunities. Mass education of youngsters and their employment is the key to ensuring that it is indeed a rich demographic dividend. On the contrary according to several studies, India's performance on the employment and education front has been below average.

We assume that having graduation degree will make us suitable foe job but a degree is not enough to guarantee the employability of graduates. it is evident that the recruiters these days are looking for job ready graduates with job specific skills in addition to academic excellence. Some of the skills that employers look for any candidate include communication, adaptability, listening, problem solving, teamwork and creativity.

Recent graduates have also started realising that having academic knowledge is no longer adequate in the world of work today. So to have a competitive advantage students need to develop their employability during their time in the university.

According to Associated Chambers of Commerce and industry of India Association ( ASSOCHAM) report, only 20% of graduates get employed. Of the 5 million students graduate every year, only 1 million gets jobs. Over 50% of country’s youngsters lack basic employability skills. The gross enrolment ratio for higher education in India is around 35%. These figures are enough to give us an idea of skill gap and raise awareness on the steps we should take to reduce the gap.

In our country students tend to like behind in these skills as the education system focuses more on academics and overlooks the need to develop employability skills. To solve this problem education institute, have to come up with a solution that would run along with the course and is easy for the students to understand.

India's education system and skilling programs work in isolation leaving a gap between the two and this results in unemployment among youngsters. We need to create a bridge that will connect the two parallel stream using available Technologies. Hence the primary focus of the educational institutions should be to encourage students to expand their skill set. In addition, they should take up continuous and comprehensive employability test that would assess their capabilities and enhance their skills over time to make them job ready.

Based on the current trend in the job market one question that every institution must ask are they preparing their students to learn, unlearn and relearn. Some of the major that Institute can take to do this includes- An Institutions should encourage change by introducing a modern approach of teaching. Teachers should be trained so that they can enhance other student’s employability capacity and skills program should be embedded in formal education as soft skills cannot be developed over night, institution must make an effort to introduce curriculum that would enhance the student’s soft skills. Institutions should provide an outcome driven learning system instead of input driven learning system. And students should be encouraged to practically apply the concept they have learnt. Allowing students to do the project can enable teachers to check their grasping abilities and Presence of Mind. Institutions should encourage students to acquire knowledge through a continuous learning process. Doing so will enable students to enhance their skills and polish their employability skills. Self-assessment should be given priority among students as It helps them asses critically and think objectively.

There is a need to transform education sector in terms of its approach and vision. The transformation should be such that it breaks into actionable areas and bring in a positive change that can bridge the skill gap. This can be done by introducing an assessment that evaluates student’s employability as per the market standard. Assessment program can be introduced with in the course structure. This helps students test their employability and improved over the course of time with regular evaluation and post assessment solution. With these aspects in mind, it is important to initiate change so that we can have highly skilled employees of the future.

In my view there is another important area which can contribute a lot in making skilled and trained nation is our parenting. Right from the beginning, we can inculcate many skills in our children at our home. The dignity of labour and need to work should be in the blood of each one of us then only we can inculcate it to our future generations. In all developed countries all the teenagers start working to meet their basic needs irrespective of their parents social or financial position. We need to learn those positive aspect also from others.

Skill Development initiative by the government of India has been a welcome move in this direction. And the New Education policy (NEP) recently announced by the government of India may be the turning point for future. Having visited all the continents and studied their education system, I also felt very strongly that our old education system needed total overhaul. In my previous articles, I have mentioned about it.

Needless to say, our more responsible parenting, more responsible schooling, more responsible Academics, our more responsible Government policies and our more responsible individual efforts and dedication, all can add to enhance and create future ready highly skilled and trained manpower for the growth of our country and to contribute in global growth. Remember growth and contribution are our responsibility, obligation and duty towards our family, society, nation and world.