There is always a lag between the economic direction and the impact on jobs in the industry. The country’s political landscape experienced some upheavals in the first half of last year, but its impact was felt on the jobs landscape only in the latter half.

The phenomenon of jobless growth has hit the IT and IT-services sectors quite hard due to rising cost pressures and the threat of global competition from other economies including the Philippines. The sector is trying hard to rationalise their headcount costs by focusing on productivity. This sentiment seems to reflect in all the other sectors of the Indian economy and some of the largest recruiters are hiring very cautiously.

The financial services including banking sector, however, is seeing a different trend. Unlike other sectors, the organisations are creating jobs closer to the actual customer locations. As a result, the economy is seeing a number of jobs being created in places like Bihar, Gujarat and Jharkhand Also, these institutions are reaching not just Tier I and Tier II educational colleges for talent, but also Tier III and Tier IV institutions. The industrial sector, other than automobiles, will add jobs to the economy in the coming times as the government takes some positive steps towards calming the uncertainty. There is a great need to have the last-mile connectivity of the national skilling agenda with the industry. Sales, customer service and nursing are some occupations that are seeing a lot of employment demand, but skilling in these areas seems to lack last-mile connectivity.