Recruitment Trends in India - What Employers and Job Seekers are Looking For

By: Jobs In A Jiffy

Like any other industry, the recruitment "industry" is cyclical. IT follows the cycles of other industries to a large extent. But the recruitment industry has a significant advantage because of the "products" it promotes - skilled manpower. For any organization, in any kind of economy, skilled manpower is absolutely essential.

In a booming economy, companies in India were offering high salaries and attractive incentive packages to attract the best talent to their payroll. However, as the economic downturn hit countries around the world, Indian companies suffered too. Lay-offs, salary cuts and deferred payments became commonplace. A vast pool of skilled, un-employed candidates was created during this recession.During this period, hiring was extremely limited and companies could cherry-pick from the cream of the crop.

Now that the economy, atleast in India, seems to have stabilised and started clawing back to what is was in 2008, some striking trends are being observed in the recruitment industry. These trends have their roots in the recession and it's effects on job seekers and recruiters. Some of the key trends have been discussed below.

Contract Hiring
Many companies that cut back to bare bones staff during the worst of the recession are now beginning to hire contract workers. Contract hiring makes sense when the economic situation is still volatile and a company does not want to commit its financial resources to a full-time permanent hire. Also, contract employees are usually brought on board with the idea of handling one set project or providing a select skill set. So the process of hiring a contract employee is usually a little more streamlined as well.

Just-In-Time Hiring
Today, the key focus of talent acquisition teams has changed from hiring generic skilled resources as strategic buffers to meet future ramp-ups to hiring just-in-time based on business demand. This ensures that lead times are reduced for new employees and costs are reduced for the company since they are not maintaining a bench. Just-in-time hiring is fast becoming the watch word in many companies and is a beneficial trend that is set to embed itself firmly into the recruitment industry.

Consulting / Freelancing
Becoming a freelancer requires a great deal of domain experience, commitment, integrity, flexibility and confidence. Though the going might be tough initially, returns can be very good provided a freelancer is good at the job and enterprising enough. To become and independent consultant, a person has to have a command over his field of experience and a relatively good network in the industry. Freelancing and consulting may form a small percentage of the recruitments in India, but recent trends show more professionals inclined towards them

About the Author

The author is Founder of an Indian job portal catering to SMEs and start-ups

(ArticlesBase SC #2564333)

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