Day 4: IT industry offers 1.1 million jobs

MUMBAI: A Nasscom survey on industry employment indicated a growth of 24.4

percent in 2002-03, to touch 650,000 IT professionals from previous year’s

headcount of 522,250. Of these 205,000 are working in the IT software exports

industry, 160,000 are employed in IT Enabled Services, 25,000 in the domestic

software market and over 260,000 in user organisations.

The survey also highlighted the potential shortfall of 235,000 people by 2008

if current trends of intake of technical talent into the IT workforce continue.

The demand for software professionals is expected to be approximately 1.1

million people by 2008, however the supply of software professionals, based on

current trends, is projected to be 885,000 by 2008.

According to Kiran Karnik, Nasscom is trying hard to remove this geographical

disparity, especially with regard to the east and the northeast. In the offing

are plans to hold an annual Nasscom event in the eastern part and to make

Kolkata as the hub for the IT activities of the entire eastern and north-eastern

regions.






Considering that the overall median age of the software professionals was about
26.5 years, Karnik also revealed plans about discounts and incentives to

companies to send younger representatives to the Nasscom sessions. 79 percent of

software professionals in software companies were men, whereas 21 percent were

women.






This role was however totally reversed in the ITES sector where the ratio of
males to females was 35 to 65. 42 percent of the software professionals

possessed over three years of working experience which reinforces the need for

the industry to hire professional who can scale up the activity and address

issues quickly to reduce turn around time.






There was an average of 8 percent rise in basic salary during 2002 with most
companies increasingly adopting the variable pay concept in order to link pay to

revenues, and control costs. Hiring of new IT professionals was highest in south

India at 44 percent and lowest in eastern region at 6 percent.






The survey also revealed that 76 percent of all software professionals had a
graduate degree or above ­ 13 percent were M.Tech, MBA, CA, ICWA, 62 percent

were B.Tech, BE or MCA and 23 percent were diploma-holders or graduates.