India Inc hunts deeper, goes further, for talent

Firms dare to think beyond the crème de la crème

Rajiv Chaudhury, a 22-year-old pursuing a management course at a Kolkata-based business school wasn't very optimistic about getting placed with a big corporate house. This pessimism stemmed from the fact that he did not belong to an Indian Institute of Management (IIM). But contrary to his view, a leading private sector bank visited the campus and recruited him along with some of his batchmates.

For India Inc, IIMs and few other top management institutes no longer remain the only hunting ground for talent. With rising costs and geographical expansions across the country, companies are looking beyond the crème de la crème to hire from the Tier -II and -II institutes as well.

Take Deloitte, for example. Apart from the top institutes, the consulting firm also visits smaller ones. P Thiruvengadam, senior director, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu India, said they visit the other B-Schools (apart from the top ones), as their talent search is wide. "We require individuals from a wide demography and different backgrounds. Hence, we deliberately try to visit as many institutes as possible," he said. The firm hires about 60 per cent of its talent from Tier-1 institutes, and the rest from other B-schools.

Others too are also not shying away. Capgemini hires students from different leadership schools to fulfill their requirements. Rajesh Padmanabhan, head - HR, Capgemini India, said, "We review the campuses every year based on candidate performance history, joining rates and infancy attrition rates. Overall, we value institutes as long-term partners. Broad basing and adding more campuses add to varied experience but we look for optimal yields per campus so that it is a win-win association."

Padmanabhan added that Capgemini will continue to visit schools based on the above parameters and will look at renewed list year-on-year. Human resource experts said that with companies expanding to smaller towns, recruiting locally makes business sense, as costs are lower. "Large corporates now prefer hiring locally, as they can save almost 30-40 per cent on administrative costs and have confidence that the individual will not quit within a short period," said a senior official with a global HR consultancy.

Financial sector firms have also actively started hiring from other business schools. Jaydeep Chaure, head-HR, Bajaj Allianz Life Insurance, said the insurance firm visits B-Schools in Tier -II and -II cities for recruitment. He added that the objective for targeting these colleges is to create more opportunities and employability for the youth across the country, and not only in the top-20 cities or colleges.

Similarly, Bajaj Allianz General Insurance also hires from business schools across the country. "Bajaj Allianz General Insurance hires for B-schools for two of its programmes - management trainees from Tier-II and -II colleges, and executive trainees from Tier-III colleges. We have seen in the past that students hired from Tier-II and -II colleges are often more flexible and adaptable," said Roopa Kochhar, head-HR, Bajaj Allianz General Insurance.

HDFC Bank, too, is on the same track. Since almost 75 per cent of its branches are outside the top-9 metros, keeping the foray into deeper geographies, HDFC Bank has tie-ups with around 30 institutes. In the past four to five years, the bank has recruited about 2,000 people from the institutes with whom it had tied up. These recruitment could be for functions like branch banking, sales, relationship managers to name a few.

Private bank Ratnakar Bank went for campus recruitment for the first time, this year. Their choice of institution is based on what function we are recruitment for. Throwing light on experience at Tier-II and -III institutes, Rajeev Ahuja, the bank’s chief of strategy said, "They have much grounded level of expectations, are focused and show hunger for work."

Some human resource experts also said that corporates have now turned away from too much focus on the top B-Schools, as some have had experiences of students quitting within a year.

A senior HR official of a private sector general insurer said that they stopped visiting the Tier-1 institutes as students demanded astronomical salary packages and also did not show any commitment to be associated with us for a long duration.

"While it would be incorrect to generalise all students, it has been noticed that students from Tier-1 institutes have high bargaining power and often make unreasonable demands. This may not be favoured by corporates, especially at a time, when they are crunched for costs. Though, they have not shunned these top institutes completely, an equal emphasis is being given to the other institutes as well," informed the vice president with a human resource search firm.