Article: A beeline for B-Schools!

Talent Acquisition

A beeline for B-Schools!

In a sign that augurs well for the job market, B-Schools record very good placements; in some cases it was 100 per cent
A beeline for B-Schools!
 

At IIM-Bangalore, about 117 students received pre-placement offers, which is 20 per cent higher than the last year. About 41 students were offered international placements

 

XLRI recorded 100 per cent placement in just 3.5 days. About 103 recruiters, including 32 new recruiters, made 254 offers for a batch of 245 students

 

The recruitment sentiment has just taken a leap, especially campus placements. In what is a clear indication of the growth in the financial services sector, many financial and consulting companies made a beeline to the prestigious Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) and other top schools in the country. B-Schools witnessed the participation of the top recruiters across all sectors with renewed vigor.

IIM-Bangalore said the final placement season for the PGP class of 2012-14 was concluded within a record time of eight sessions spread across four days. It was quicker than last year when the business school finished the process in six days. About 388 eligible students participated in the placement process, while two opted out. As many as 150+ companies participated and made more than 425 offers across 200+ profiles from companies like Goldman Sachs Group Inc, HSBC Holdings Plc and LinkedIn to a batch of 388 graduates at IIM-B. In 2013, IIM-B received 415 offers from 150 companies to 367 students.

About 117 students received pre-placement offers, which is 20 per cent higher than the last year. The lateral placement season for candidates with more than 22 months of work experience broke all the previous records with 127 offers been made by firms in varied domains like strategy, leadership, product management, consulting and general management. About 41 students were offered international placements from various firms for global locations, while nine candidates chose to join social ventures in the final placements.

Global software services and consulting company Accenture Plc made 13 offers, the highest by any company, followed closely by McKinsey and Co., Boston Consulting Group, Amazon.com Inc and Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd, which made 11 offers each. About 27 per cent of the entire batch received offers in the consulting sector, which also included reputed names like Bain & Company, Booz & Company, A T Kearney, and Roland Berger. Another prominent recruiter in this space was EXL. KPMG and PricewaterhouseCoopers also recruited from the campus.

“The financial services sector has again recruited in large numbers, which is a reflection of how the financial markets are reacting,” said Sankarshan Basu, chairperson, career development at IIM-B, told in an interview to Mint. “I would tend to say that the job scenario is much better than last year.”

The other function that caught the fancy of the students was sales and marketing. Major consumer goods and services firms such as P&G, Hindustan Unilever, ITC, Mondelez International, Coca Cola, PepsiCo, Reckitt Benckiser, Asian Paints, Vodafone and Bharti Airtel.

In a press statement, Sachin Nandgaonkar, Partner & Director, BCG- India, said, “It is our pleasure to announce that we were the highest recruiters across IIMs (A,B,C,L) this year with a total of 44 offers made at the campuses. The IIMs are a very important source of top talent of our growing business in India. We continue to recruit in large numbers from these institutes to fuel our growth. We made 44 offers across IIM A, B, C and L and were happy to note that we continue to be the top preference for most students wishing to pursue a career in a global consulting firm.”

At IIM-Ahmedabad, the trend of consulting and financial firms continued. Accenture made the maximum number of offers at 18. Other than them, Reliance Industries Ltd was one of the top recruiters with eight offers. A total of over 110 firms participated in the summer placement process offering opportunities in various sectors and functions.

Among global investment banks, Goldman Sachs was the highest recruiter having made seven offers to students for roles in financial markets, investment banking and quantitative strategy. Aditya Birla Group and GE were the top recruiters amongst conglomerates extending 10 offers each to students for their management leadership programs. Johnson & Johnson made 9 offers to students and was the highest recruiter in the consumer goods and services sector. Amazon and Infibeam were jointly the top recruiters in the technology, internet and e-commerce sector having extended nine offers each to students.

The entire batch of IIM Calcutta’s PGP 2013-2015 program as the top management institute witnessed a 100 per cent placement of all the students of the batch in 3.25 days. Only 150 out of the 250 companies could present internship offers as the summer placement process completed ahead of schedule. Out of the total strength of 454 students 449 sat for the placement process as five students from the batch decided to opt out of the process which was held in the first week of November 2013.

At IIM-Lucknow, online retailer Flipkart was the top recruiter with over 20 offers. It was the first IIM to complete the process despite the economic slowdown and successfully placed the 436-strong batch in 207 companies. To guard against any problem in campus recruitment, IIM-L and IIM-Raipur said that they have broad-based their reach to companies and called more recruiters this year.

“The slowdown in the global economy that started 4-5 years ago reflected on IIMs’ placements only since the last two years. This year too, the placement mood is expected to be less robust than two years ago,” said Rakshit, chairperson, career development and placements, IIM-C.

Non-IIM schools also do well

Mid- and low-rung B-schools have also done far better than what they did last year. XLRI recorded 100 per cent placement in just 3.5 days. About 103 recruiters, including 32 new recruiters, made 254 offers for a batch of 245 students. HR students secured job offers across sectors be it consulting, FMCG, general management and other sectors in large numbers. BFSI and consulting firms recruited in large numbers with around 50 per cent of the business management students being offered roles in the finance and consulting domains.

Technology and e-commerce were the other highlights with some of the key recruiters being Amazon, EXL, Flipkart and Jabong.

“Contrary to anticipation, the economy is picking up, especially sectors such as information technology/information technology-enabled services, manufacturing and finance. This has resulted in better placements for us, compared to last year. In fact, we expect to wrap up placements sooner than last year,” S Balasubramanian, director, GRG School of Management Studies in Coimbatore, told Business Standard in an interview. K J Somaiya Institute of Management Studies and Research (SIMSR) have placed about three quarters of the 480-strong batch. PSG Institute of Management, Coimbatore, has seen a 10 per cent rise in the average CTC being offered at Rs 5.4 lakh a year as against Rs 4.9 lakh a year last year.

SOURCES: Mint, websites of respective schools, India Today, Times of India, Economic Times, Business Standard

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Topics: Talent Acquisition, Campus Recruitment, #Jobs, #Trends

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