AP government spearheads ITeS education

Srinivasa Rao Dasari / Hyderabad

The Andhra Pradesh government is making concerted efforts to train manpower to cash in on the ITeS wave. From state-wide promotion of English language to providing ITeS-specific training in rural areas to setting up a virtual university to train three lakh students by 2010. The state has been in the forefront, along with other southern states like Kerala and Tamilnadu, to prepare the present and future generations for the job. While government efforts are not lacking, the challenges are aplenty, mainly stemming from the attitude of candidates who need to make serious efforts to stay on the job.

English speaking manpower is a key prerequisite for the ITeS/BPO sector. One of the key initiatives made by the Andhra Pradesh government is its committed programme to improve the quality of English communication skills in the state’s education system. It has also initiated a teacher training programme for improving communication skills. In fact, the curriculum and evaluation methodology has been suitably changed to promote communication skills. All graduate colleges have already been shifted to the revised curriculum. More than 12,000 English teachers have so far been trained. This apart, the government has already recruited 2,400 English teachers in the last academic year and plans to re-designate another 5,600 more as English teachers.

Training in rural areas

The Institute of IT Enabled Services Training (IITEST) is going to rural degree colleges to make students employable by providing a comprehensive training in English communication skills. AP State Council of Higher Education (APSCHE) has set up this institute with an objective to provide training to fresh graduates to meet the demands of the sector.

AP Council of Higher Education Department is currently actively considering the proposal of starting ITeS training courses in major and small towns in the state very soon. “A pilot study done by the state government indicates that though there is an abundant talent to leverage job opportunities, there is a need for building soft skills,” says C Subba Rao, chairman of APSCHE.

IITEST has centres in Hyderabad, Warangal, Vijayawada and Visakhapatnam, and plans to tie-up with local degree colleges in Rajahmundry, Tirupati, Guntur, etc. It has trained so far about 700 students. A hundred more students will be completing their course by March. The institute focuses on fluency in spoken English, accent neutral pronunciation, correct usage of grammar and clarity in speech.

Voice-based ITeS comprise inbound and outbound centres and non-voice-based centres handle functions like data conversion, e-mailing, chatting, etc. Global majors like HSBC, GE-IT, GECIS, have already established their centres in Hyderabad and domestic companies such as ICICI, Ispace, Nova Solutions and Care Technologies are expanding their activities here. About ten major ITeS companies have approached the IITEST for recruitment.

Graduate Employability Test

The Graduate Employability Test (GET) assesses whether students are positioned to get a job in the ITeS industry. If the GET result shows poor performance by a student, the IITEST offers Communication Proficiency Enhan-cement Programme (CPEP). It is a course in communication skills offered by APSCHE, along with its training partners, for candidates appearing for jobs in ITeS companies. Students can join the CPEP after going through the GET. This course is aimed at grooming aspirants in business etiquette and training them in English, apart from fine-tuning various skills.

CPEP is an 11-week course costing approximately Rs 5,500. IITEST has tied up with the State Bank of Hyderabad (SBH) for providing loan to eligible candidates (upto Rs 4,000 under the Udyog Bandhu Loan Scheme). The institute is also collaborating with Linguaphone of UK to provide world-class course material. An audio-lingual kit developed by Linguaphone will be given to the candidates.

The challenges

Most candidates trained at IITEST, have been reconsidering taking up jobs at call centres as they have to work in night shifts and are worried about career growth. Consequently, after getting trained, a majority of them have been switching over to other jobs or prefer software development-related careers.

To counter attrition, many medical transcription companies insist on signing a bond for two or three years and keep the original degree certificate as a surety. This practice puts candidates in an embarrassing position and affects the healthy work culture in an organisation.

“Though the response is very good, there is a problem in the attitude of the candidates. Of the total trained candidates, only 60 percent were placed and the rest did not turn up for work. During classes also most of them do not attend regularly and that is the reason we are looking out for candidates who are serious about their career. Unlike Bangalore, some companies are very particular about the age group criterion in Hyderabad. In other cities, ITeS companies consider candidates in the age group of 18-50, but here it is mostly restricted to 28. Anyhow, it depends upon the HR manager who recruits the candidates,” informs Murali Krishna Govindu, a consultant with IITEST.

He adds, “We find that this 11-week course is not sufficient and a long-term course is needed. During the past one-and-half-a-year, about 15,000 students took GET. From April onwards, we are going to implement a full-fledged course and are planning to decrease the course fee also.”

Virtual university

The state government is in the process of initiating a series of measures to train about three lakh students by 2010. Of this, about 10,000 are planned to be trained by 2004. The virtual university will have representation from both academia and industry and will be responsible for ensuring that the curriculum design, certification methodology, etc, are in line with industry needs and support marketing of the programmes to end customers.

Besides this, the departments of English of various state universities will act as nodal agencies for ITeS courses run in the university colleges. The move is aimed at treating this as a vocational course.

Hysea plans course on communication skills

To meet the ever-growing demand for trained manpower required for this segment, the Hyderabad Software Exporters Association (Hysea) is planning to introduce a six-month short-term course, involving the state government and academia. At present, logistics are being worked out, and after taking feed back from the pilot projects, it will launch a full-fledged course, hopefully from the next academic year. This course focuses on English accent, telephone etiquette, apart from communication skills.

“We have many talented people with real-time experience, but they are unable to convey the message of how their capabilities are useful for an organisation or for a given project, when they face technical interviews. We have a number of graduates coming from engineering, commerce and arts streams. Many of them are not efficient at communication skills, but they are extremely good at academics. The one aspect of lacking communication skills puts them behind in their career opportunities. Our course will train the students to communicate in a better way and they will be in a good position to convey the message of their capabilities,” says Shakti Sagar, president of Hysea.

The association is also putting forth the proposal of including communication skills in school curriculum right from class sixth. “This programme aims at a long-term strategy to mould the students from their childhood to gear up for meeting future challenges. Students with good academic background should not be deprived of career opportunities because of poor communication skills,” adds Sagar.

MoU with Microsoft

Meanwhile, Microsoft India and Andhra Pradesh government have signed an MoU to take up ‘Project Shiksha-Empowering the Future’ in the state. As part of this MoU, the state government aims at reaching more than four lakh students and two lakh teachers in government schools, in five years. This is Microsoft’s second MoU with any state government for Project Shiksha, the first was signed with Uttaranchal.

“This project would herald a new era of empowerment for the youth, particularly among the student community in rural, tribal, and backward areas of the state,” states N Chan-drababu Naidu, chief minister of Andhra Pradesh.

Microsoft will set up its academy to run and facilitate teacher training in the state. The centre will be equipped with an IT lab.

“As part of our long-term vision for the cause of IT education, we have a comprehensive India Education programme, wherein we are working closely with the academia, universities, developer community, as well as the state education departments for ensuring IT adoption in the education process at all levels. We believe that early access to technology for students can contribute significantly towards creating an IT proficient next generation,” says Rajiv Kaul, managing director of Microsoft India.

It was in November 2002 that Microsoft chairman, Bill Gates launched Project Shiksha in the state. With $20 million investment, the project is geared to benefit 3.5 million students and 80,000 schoolteachers across all government schools in India in the near future.

Microsoft India is setting up its academy in Andhra Pradesh to make every student IT literate and ensure an IT proficient next generation.