How to choose higher education wisely

Advise from HR

Just because I am holding a senior position in HR with L&T, I have been getting many requests from my relatives, friends,  acquaintances, to help their sons or daughters, who have freshly passed out from engineering college, to get job in L&T. The number of requests are huge. So many fresh engineers are unemployed, I could hardly be helped only a few of them to get job in L&T or in some other companies where I have contacts. I feel bad to say NO to many of the requests or for those whom I can't help. They get disappointed... I can understand. Parents invest their lifetime earned money just to see their sons or daughters in getting a degree in engineering.

They think that jobs are easily available for engineers. After interviewing many of them, I can't even tell them that your son or daughter do not even have minimum required technical knowledge. Getting first class or distinction has become so easy without having a fundamental knowledge of engineering. It's high time for parents to stop running behind engineering degrees.

USA produces around 1 lakh engineers per year for a $16 trillion economy.

India produces 15 lakhs engineers for a $2 trillion economy. 

The earlier mass recruiting sector was Manufacturing. It used to recruit from the core branches like Electrical, Mechanical, Civil etc. But, Manufacturing is relatively stagnant at 17% of the GDP. So the core branch placements have become very difficult.

The more recent mass recruiter was the IT sector. It grew from scratch to almost 5% of the GDP in a short time. IT Employed millions of engineers.

Now, IT is also saturating. Only good, skilled IT Engineers are in demand.

If you look at the sectoral composition of the Indian economy, most of the sectors do not need engineers. Tourism is 10% of the GDP, does not require engineers. The financial sector, Trade, Hotels and Restaurants do not require engineers. The requirement of engineers in Health, Education, Agriculture is also negligible.

More than 50% of the GDP has no role for Engineers. Still, most of the Indian youth are becoming Engineers. The situation is not sustainable.

Demand is low while supply is high. Over and above this, skill level of an average engineer is poor, almost its non-existent in many cases. If we leave aside the top 100–200 colleges, most fresh engineers have no idea of what they studied. Ask a fresh mechanical engineer, can s/he design a simple frame?

Today the situation is that most engineers are working in a field that has no connection to what they have studied in the college. This is a waste of resources.

The engineering degree does not come cheap. It costs about 10-15 lakhs. For poor parents, its a huge burden. When their son/daughter is not able to secure a job, they are devastated.

For the nation, you can calculate the loss. Leave around 1 lakh engineers that NASSCOM says are employable. The rest 14 lakhs have each wasted 10 lakhs of fees. That totals to around $20 Billion. Almost equal to the Government’s spending on healthcare. Over this, there is loss of human capital.

India needs to replan the whole engineering education system. Government need to cut down on the number of colleges and improve the quality in the rest.

Also, students should explore other career options than everyone becoming Engineers.

When it comes to education, a multitude of options are available today! From Aviation, to Hotel Management, Short Term Programs to big movie production courses, Data science, cyber security, Information Security, Cloud Technology Designing, Indian Armed Forces, Animation and VFX, Digital Marketing, Film Making, Technology Courses like SQL, PHP, Big Data, C, C++, etc. and much more!
For a majority of courses like these, there are entrance exams too, such as the NATA, CEED, NID entrance, NIFT entrance, NDA entrance, MBA Entrance, Hotel Management entrance, CET, NEET and many more! Here, the right training goes a long way in getting your child admission to their dream institute! Do you know what are the top career tracks of 2018 other than engineering?? See the following list.

1. Animation, VFX and Multimedia
2. Fashion Design, Event Management and Interior decoration.
3. Aeronautical and Aviation
4.  Film making, Script Writing and Acting.
5. Engineering computer, IT, cloud and data science.
6. Networking, information security.
7. Beauty, Modelling and Cosmetology
8. Fitness, dietitian and nutritionist
9. Foreign languages.
10. Music and Dance.

So, please share this with your relatives /friends / 12th pass students and r them in planning their education and career appropriately than madly running after engineering admissions!!

Thanks To

Dr. Sunil Jajit HR L&T

The Transition to DevOps

 Traditional Development Model

With the traditional Waterfall Development Model, the requirements for software are clear and well-defined in advance. The definition of the product itself is also stable. Developers program the software, after which, the operational teams handle its implementation.

But the world of IT is changing fast. Requirements change very often, and software must be developed at an ever-increasing pace. Not only must software and applications be marketed faster, but it must also be possible to constantly update them, easily add new features, and fix any bugs that are found. This is where the Agile Development Model really helps.

However, the team of developers is not the only ones who need to react quickly and efficiently. The operational team that must deploy and monitor new applications, should also react in a similar way with updates and add-ons. This leads to what is known as the DevOps approach.

While DevOps was created from a need in the early 2000’s, it has continuously evolved. In a recent finding from Puppet Labs in their 2015 State of DevOps Report, companies that adopt a DevOps culture experience “60x fewer failures and recover from failure 168x faster than their lower-performing peers. They also deploy 30x more frequently with 200x shorter lead times.”

So, what is DevOps?

DevOps is a movement that aims to improve communication, collaboration, and integration between the development and operations teams, whilst adopting the Agile methodology principles and practices throughout the Systems Development Life Cycle (SDLC). The aim is to improve software product delivery by reducing the time between development and deployment.

Are Agile and DevOps the same thing?

DevOps can be thought of as a branch of Agile. In a DevOps environment, the development phase of a system will adopt Agile practices and principles such as continuous improvement and rapid development. However, DevOps goes a bit further. It ensures that there is an extra focus on the development and operations teams collaborating closely, especially during the release/deployment and production support phases of the SDLC.

Here’s how an organization can transition to a DevOps culture effectively:

Start small: 

When shifting to DevOps, it is important to transition on a small scale. This can be done effectively by managing a low-risk, high-reward pilot project. It is important to get the development and operations teams in the same room and allow them to work together toward a common goal on the pilot project. Starting on a small scale ensures that any resistance to change is being catered for.

Eliminate the silo mentality: 

The silo mentality is where several departments or groups within an organization do not want to share information or knowledge with other individuals in the same organization. A DevOps environment thrives on collaboration. So, it is vital that the silo mentality and culture is eliminated. To eliminate this culture, a unified vision needs to be created within the organization. Employees of the company need to row in the same direction, but the executive teams must be engaged and in control of steering the boat.

Morph the mindset of the development and operations teams: 

Ensure that individuals representing Development and Operations are put on the same team and have regular meetings. There should be a point of contact representing development and operations in the same room at the same time. It is important to give this joint team a shared goal which will help to foster commonality.

Understand the shared tools strategy across development, testing, and deployment: 

The tool selection process often drives miscommunication within teams. A common selection strategy must adhere to a shared set of objectives amongst stakeholders. The strategy must also provide seamless collaboration and integration between tools. A key objective of the strategy is to automate as many processes as possible. Developers should be able to send new and updated software to deployment and operations with as little human interaction.

Use venture capitalist-style funding: 

Venture capitalists focus on value. They invest when projects hit milestones and when they need more funding to reach the next goal. They stop funding projects that aren’t working. Agile companies are now adopting this approach. Teams set delivery targets with the business, which are reviewed on a rolling basis against commitments (see our recent blog article on Benefits Maps and how these can aid in keeping projects on track). Goals are updated throughout the year and funding is released as needed.

Thanks to - Jasmine Scott