World's Talent Orchestration Partner - Is India Ready?

India produces around 20 Million qualifications every year from its sprawling education system. 53 million Indians are unemployed whereas 60% of engineering graduates do not find a job. India is the world's 3rd largest education system behind the USA and China. But are there enough jobs for Indian graduates who earn their qualifications every year?

?If we were to believe a decade-old concept of the demographic dividend that India enjoys with the median age of her working population being around 29 - one of the youngest in the world, India will have an excess of 47 million people who can provide professional services. At the same time, an ageing world will have a deficit of 57 million people in the working age group. This means that India will be able to solve the deficit of professional services to the rest of the world.

But, does India have the ability to address this opportunity this demographic dividend offers? The answer sadly is a big NO. To start with, the employability of graduates in India is anywhere between 25% to 50%. Indian corporations have already been struggling to make do with the graduates. Many of these organizations that are particular about the quality of talent are creating their large 'Universities' where they train their graduate hires before they are placed on jobs. Other organizations make do with the talent at their disposal.

India has an opportunity and the potential to make it big. But we have to overcome the below challenges that India face?

• Diversity: Indian population is highly diverse. Many Indians are first-generation learners with very limited exposure. The Gross Enrolment Ratio of the country is around the 20% mark. Awareness of the need for education, the pressures to start earning early etc. make it difficult for the system to translate potential to reality
• The problem of Scale: While the scale is India's advantage, it is also a double-edged sword. The Indian education system needs to educate over 35 million graduates every year. This population is spread across a very diverse environment. This makes it very challenging for the education system to deliver high-quality and consistent outcomes.
• The number of Educational Institutions: the way the education system in the country is structured, India will struggle to meet its demands of education with its traditional brick-and-mortar system. India will need to evolve new models of education delivery to cater to its large needs.
• Future Jobs: The world will produce new jobs that currently do not exist. The education system needs to be able to develop talent that can adapt to these skills. The ability to provide these skills will depend on our ability to transform our curriculum in sync with the industry's needs. This will also need a complete overhaul of the current infrastructure - curriculum, faculty, research focus, Industry - academia partnerships etc.

To cater to future requirements, India will need its Online Universities to stand up and be counted. There is no doubting its ability to manage scale. The question will be on how it will maintain consistent high-quality outcomes for learners. Technology has the answers. The question is how soon will the technology develop to address these opportunities. More importantly, are we ready mentally to transform and adopt these new technologies in our age-old models that we have 'perfected' over the years.

If we look at the past records, we have reasons to worry and cheer. On the one hand, we have always been proud and comfortable with our traditions. On the other, we have been quick and early adopters of technology.

India.org should answer the following questions quickly

• How can we fast track technology into education
• How well we can decentralize education delivery

These are interesting times for India and its people. What do you think?