Colleges optimistic of bumper recruitment on rise in pre-placement offers

Mid-rung engineering, management colleges see double-digit growth in offers, and a big rise in average pay packages

A double-digit increase in pre-placement offers (PPOs) and higher average pay packages at mid-rung engineering and management colleges have raised hopes of a bumper hiring season.

Led by information technology, product, engineering and consulting companies, PPOs at campuses like Visvesvaraya National Institute of Technology (VNIT) in Nagpur, PSG College of Technology in Coimbatore, and National Institute of Industrial Engineering (NITIE) in Mumbai have risen by 50-60 per cent so far this year, administrators said.

Final placements have begun at these colleges, and going by the trend in PPOs these institutes are optimistic of good hiring numbers.

For instance, Coimbatore-based PSG College of Technology has seen PPOs rise by 60 per cent to 128 offers for the 2022-23 batch, up from 78 last year. According to R Nadarajan, dean of placements and training at PSG, even the final placements process, which began in August, has seen 20 per cent more offers than in 2020-21 and 16 per cent higher than in 2021-22.

At Nagpur-based VNIT, the campus gets PPOs a year in advance. Hence, VNIT received 170 PPOs for the current 2022-23 batch last year. So far this year, the institute has already seen 120 PPOs for the 2023-24 batch with more offers likely to come in till at least December.

“With 120 PPOs already received for the next batch, buoyant hiring activity among recruiters, especially by technology and finance companies, mean it will be higher than the overall 170 PPOs received last year. Salary packages too have been on the higher side, which recruiters say is because of the opening up of the resilient Indian economy,” said Kishor Bhurchandi, associate dean of training and placement at VNIT.

In terms of sectors, while PSG hasn’t seen services companies arrive on campus yet, product companies, including start-ups, along with investment banks and IT companies have doled out PPOs in large numbers, said Nadarajan.

At Mumbai-based NITIE, which also has management courses, PPOs, which grew by almost 20 per cent to 158 for the previous batch, have already touched 150 and are expected to achieve a similar growth this year as well.

“PPOs are precursors to final placements as the candidate is evaluated in depth as compared to other recruiting techniques. We are expecting more PPOs as compared to previous year in all the sectors with increased CTC. In this regard, the institute has revamped its curriculum in line with NEP 2020, so that the industry gets more specialised managers as per their requirements,” Neeraj Pandey, NITIE’s associate dean of placements and branding, told Business Standard.

According to recruitment and staffing experts, unlike in the first couple of years of the pandemic, a lot of recruiters, especially in the technology and finance sectors, are looking to hire freshers over lateral recruits.

“Lot of companies are getting freshers rather than laterals due to cost optimisation. Hiring and skilling up freshers still tends to be cheaper than laterals. The Indian tech and finance companies have had to hire and bring in more manpower this year, especially due to the ‘Great Resignation’ and reopening of the economy,” said Neeti Sharma, president and co-founder TeamLease Edtech and senior vice president, TeamLease Service.

Institutes like SRM University, Visvesvaraya Technological University, and Vellore Institute of Technology did not respond to queries.

More offers

NITIE has also seen companies make more offers than in the previous year, with average offers per company ranging from five to 10.

With robust growth in PPOs, campuses are also looking forward to higher final placements this year.

“The year 2020-21 saw job cuts across sectors amidst Covid-19. However, the economy is on an upward path and all businesses need to fill backlogs in terms of manpower requirements and inclusion of cutting-edge technologies based on AI, ML and adoption of ESG norms. Therefore, consulting, FMCG, e-commerce, and BFSI sectors can hire good numbers,” added Pandey.

Salary bump

Average salary packages, too, have seen a decent rise if not a significant jump. For instance, while the highest package at VNIT so far this year is Rs 64.66 lakh per annum (pa), compared with Rs 64.1 lakh pa last year, average packages are already up more than 50 per cent from Rs 9.8 lakh last year to Rs 14.8 lakh so far this year.

At NITIE, while the highest offer made so far this year has matched previous year’s Rs 49 lakh pa, average salaries have risen by 11 per cent, it claims, to Rs 28.38 lakh pa so far this year, compared with Rs 25.41 lakh pa last year.

At PSG College of Technology, too, the average salary package has risen by 8 per cent so far this year, the college said, while that for the ongoing final placements process it has shot up by 70 per cent to Rs 14 lakh pa from Rs 8.2 lakh pa for the previous 2021-22 batch, the college claimed.

Meanwhile, with companies like Amazon, Flipkart, Accenture S & C, HUL, P&G, Mondelez, ITC, IDFC First Bank, ICICI Bank, Axis Bank, Paytm, Mckinsey, Deloitte, PwC, KPMG, and Coca-Cola, among others, making offers last year, NITIE expects marquee recruiters to continue to lead placements this year.