Rolling, but not quite on a roll

With most traditional b-school recruiters freezing hiring or reducing intake substantially, placement committees across b-schools are having to contact newer companies that until now have been out of sight and out of mind of top b-schools. These companies are in sectors such as pharma, publishing, small and medium scale manufacturing, public sector and the startup landscape.

“We have sent SOS emails to our alumni seeking their help. Approximately, out of every 15 companies we contact, two agree to come to campus but take only 2-3 students among them,” said the MBA student of a prominent Pune-based business school requesting anonymity. With the stream of companies a mere trickle, b-schools have moved to an extended rolling process wherein recruiters visit the campus over a period of 2-3 months, and not 5-6 days as it used to be until last year.

“The students know that they have to make compromises this year. Students who still have high expectations are being told to voluntarily opt out of the placements process so that this nightmare ends. After a point, members of the student placement committee too will lose their enthusiasm and call off the institute-supported placements, since most of them have anyway gotten their jobs,” the student added.

According to a help-seeking email circulating between Xavier Labour Relations Institute (XLRI), Jamshedpur alumni last week, 60 of the 120 students in Business Management and 15 students of the 60 students from the Personnel Management and Industrial Relations (PM&IR) batches had not been placed.

About 75 pc of the 160-strong batch at Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT), Delhi has been placed, as compared to last year when the entire batch had been placed by February 8. “With all exams and classes being over, most of us are leaving the campus for good now, with or without jobs,” said a student at the institute.

Like at a lot of institutes, students at Narsee Monjee – Mumbai have been asked not to reveal anything about the progress of placements. A student however admitted that the situation was ‘far from good’. At the Indian Institute of Management (IIM) Kozhikode and IIM Indore too, the placements process is on but the institutes have refused to disclose any data about the students placed until now.

As we reported earlier, schools with small batch sizes are probably having it easier. MBA institutes such as Faculty of Management Studies (FMS) Delhi University, Shailesh J Mehta School of Management (SJM SoM) at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Bombay, Mudra Institute of Communications, Ahmedabad (MICA) have placed 70-90 pc of their batches by now. They are mostly in the last mile of placements, when the only students remaining without jobs are those with lower grades or weak pre-MBA profiles, and find few takers in companies.

If b-schools claim 100 pc placements this year, one may have to take in account that the base of students on which the 100 pc has been calculated would not include students who opted out or were forced to opt out of the placements.

Salaries plunge

The average salary at IIM Ahmedabad placements dropped 31 pc over last year. If that is a sign, it doesn’t augur too well for business schools lower in the pyramid.

“Companies are being very clear about the non-negotiability of salaries. Having a job in hand is more important for us than a great salary in such a bleak economy,” said a student at National Institute of Industrial Engineering (NITIE) Mumbai.

Companies on their part are doing their best to make the job proposition sound best to talent they wish to hire. A compensation package of Rs 15 lakh for example, could translate to a monthly salary of Rs 55,000. “Companies are promising perks such as a loyalty bonus, which they will pay if you stick around in the job for three years. There are many other variable components which will be paid to the employees after one year in the job and subject to a lot of conditions,” said the student.

“The reduction in the in-hand monthly salary may be anywhere between 30 to 50 percent this year,” he added.

Companies on dictating terms

With MBA students being the needy ones this year, companies are extracting the most of the recruiting opportunity by conducting interviews in multiple stages spread across weeks.

Mahindra & Mahindra for example, is conducting three rounds consisting of multiple group discussions and presentations at the IIFT Delhi campus. Students shortlisted in the third stage have to visit Mumbai.

At times, companies ask students to travel to another city on their own travel and stay expenses for the final round.

Similarly, Unicon India (Investment Solutions) is conducting two interview rounds at its own office.

Out of sheer compulsion, a lot of students are having to join startups or smaller companies with the promise of meatier roles than those that would be on offer in a large company. “People join b-school for jobs in companies with a brand name and good salary. But it’s just bad timing for everyone and we have to settle with what we have,” said a student at NITIE Mumbai.

Added later: Sharath N from XLRI Jamshedpur’s External
Linkages Committee just issued a clarification to PaGaLGuY.com refuting the
figures about XLRI placements in the article. Sharath said, “The email quoted above must have been
written a lot earlier, because our placement figures are way ahead now. Everybody knows that b-schools are facing the pressure of the economic slowdown, but we are doing much better than has been written in the article.” He however refused to reveal the current status of placements.

On general trends at XLRI placements, he said, “The salaries offered are definitely lesser than last year, The top recruiters are visiting, but they are making fewer offers. The number of companies on campus has increased.”