How much skilled is India’s Labour force? | Skill vs Unemployment

There always has been a sharp contrast between the information provided in the educational institute and the information/skill required to fulfil the job requirement of the company.  Facing a practical problem a company would not need the theories or definitions, but the real implementation.  For educational institutes, academic tests are good on their part, but if we drag the same procedure on the recruitment process then it’s no surprise we are doing it the wrong way.

Elon musk revered as one of the greatest visionaries of our time, the founder of innovative companies like PayPal, Tesla, SpaceX, Solar City and Neuralink has a different approach of hiring his employees.  In a 2014 interview with Autoblid.tv, Musk gave the following answer when asked about what skills he looks for hiring:

“What I’m really looking for is evidence of exceptional ability. Did they face really difficult problems and overcome them? And of course, you want to make sure if there was some significant accomplishment, were they really responsible or was someone else more responsible. Usually, someone who really had to struggle with a problem they really understand it and they don’t forget.”

Musk’s policy could be adopted by the companies of our country too, and recruitment should be based on the strong –problem-solving abilities rather a written test. As the written tests are indicative of how much the candidate has prepared or studied but it is useless as it does not reflect the logical and problem-solving abilities of the candidate.

What most of us do in our jobs after getting recruited and after getting degrees can be done by a 10^th passed within 15-20 days of training.

But we have a job market that prioritizes degrees and certificates over skills learnt. Skill assessment tests are a reality check about the job seeker: his knowledge and skills.  Then why do companies recruit on the basis of resumes rather than skills when resumes lie and skill tests don’t? 

With a population of 1.366 billion (2019) and a GDP of 3.202 trillion dollars (2020), India is young. Half of the population here is under the age of 30 and less than one-fourth is age 45 or older. India’s demographic advantage of a youth population is both an asset as well as a liability. Asset if there is optimum utilization of their true skills and liability if we fail to utilize them.

To exploit the demographic advantage of a young population, we need an education model that is flexible, analytical, inclusive, sustainable and creative. But the current scenario isn’t so. We have problems with unemployment, underemployment, acute skill shortage and skill mismatch, where the demand for the market doesn’t match the supply. According to NSSO, 2004, only 5% of the total labour force in India has any formal training and about 80% of the job seekers registered with the employment exchange lack professional skill. Both low literacy and lack of skill training are the causes of this situation. We need skill training in order to produce a generation of skilled employees rather than just educated ones. These training sessions would be flexible, analytical and can serve as a driving force for innovation and growth.

The growing demand for a knowledge economy – “an economy in which growth is dependent on the quantity and quality” has made the need for requisite knowledge workers more evident than ever. We need an economy where there is a high proportion of skilled workers and where workers use knowledge to create goods and services. It’s high time that we pull our socks and create space for skill development so that we become capable of exploiting the opportunities created by globalization and acquire production and gainful employment.

<<<Also Read: The Unskilled but qualified section of Indian Population>>>

So, what is stopping us from achieving this? What are the challenges?

Challenges:

• To develop a sufficient number of highly trained, skilled and knowledge workers to meet the demands of global competencies and advance towards a knowledge economy.
• To improve the informal sector and make it more productive

Recommendations:

• Re-orient vocational education and training to incorporate the skill requirements
• Develop a national qualification framework for the standardization of certifications and accreditations
• Encourage school level skill development programs
• Restructure education policy

The recent announced of new education policy (NEP) on 29^th of July has somewhere stirred the cause. The NEP, if implemented properly will mean education for a job and skill enhancement. In an article by Tanushree Sharma, she has highlighted upon the key takeaways of the NEP, where she writes how NTA will be made responsible for conducting a high-quality common aptitude test as well as specialized common subject exam, twice a year, for entrance into universities and how the requirement of minimum qualification of teachers would be 4 years B-Ed degree.

The NEP promises a shift from rote learning to holistic and experimental learning. And as PM Modi said, it’ll be a paradigm shift from “what to think” to “how to think”. The credit bank system would provide students to leave a course in between and utilize them later when they want to resume their courses. It will be more like re-skilling and up-skilling.

Thus, making vocational education and training the pivot of the national policy is an urgent imperative for sustainable economic growth in India.

References:

(i) MOSPI PLFS Report
(ii) CMIE