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Old professions never die; they just lose currency. In other words, they don’t pay. The horse-and-buggy driver, Theodore Levitt tells us, is today’s cabbie. The chimney sweep has moved underground and become a sanitation worker.
Some occupations, however, don’t command the respect they did in the past. Take finance. After the excesses of Wall Street and the ethical question marks over finance professionals, US B-schools have seen a decline in the numbers majoring in this discipline. Some have even decided to go over to the other side of the fence, to join the investigators and regulators. Academics report a frequent question in classes: How do we retain our moral compass in a world where making money is top priority?
In India, there has been no such backlash against finance; but for a few scams here and there, there has never been the seduction of making really big money.
Or take information technology. For a couple of decades now, it has been a goal much desired by jobseekers in India. No longer. Top companies like Infosys have issued letters and then delayed hiring. Salaries — though still comparatively high — have stagnated. Business isn’t booming. And getting to the US and staying on there has become more difficult. Besides, as people have begun realising, the quality of life is much better in India. It was the quality of remuneration that was the big negative factor.
According to a survey by HR consultancy Mercer, Indian IT managers earn about $25,000 annually. The countries that have the highest pay are Switzerland ($140,960), Denmark ($123,080), Belgium ($121,170), the UK ($118,190), Ireland ($108,230) and the US ($107,500). When the chances of going abroad come down, the IT profession takes a knock.
Like IT, marketing is going through a metamorphosis. Today, in India, the markets are in the villages. Anybody with ambitions of climbing the corporate ladder must have first-hand experience of rural areas. Like doctors who have to mandatorily serve a rural stint, marketing professionals have to spend time amid rustic charms tweaking distribution models and price points. The days of handing over supplies to a distributor are over. Not every wannabe CEO is at home ruminating with the cows or travelling cattle class.
Incidentally, marketing in the US is also changing its hues. In many cases, it’s a mature market and the biggest thrill is in gaining 1 per cent marketshare from your rivals. That’s why many American executives are headed to India and China to put a BRIC experience on their CVs.
Medicine is another profession that has changed. The humble GP has all but vanished. The expert with blinkered vision has become commonplace. But without a GP, you don’t know which specialist to go to. That’s why companies like Modern Family Doctor, a Bangalore-based healthcare venture, and NationWide Primary Healthcare Services, a similar chain, are growing apace with venture capital funding.
The change has perhaps been most evident in the engineering profession. This year’s placement at the top colleges didn’t see students making a beeline for the traditional companies — Larsen & Toubro, Tata Motors, Maruti... Instead, many of them have headed for startups. They won’t even do coding there as they did at the IT companies. They will simply be selling. Most of them will jump ship to do an MBA — to help them sell better — in a couple of years.
“In the past, careers were stable, linear and singular,” says a presentation by cultural strategy company Sparks & Honey. “People chose one path and pursued it over the course of their lives from college to retirement. Careers are now complex, fragmented, specialised, collaborative and ever evolving.”
You shouldn’t be surprised if a doctor becomes a wealth manager or an engineer a subeditor.
STARTLING NEWS
Startups recruiting at IITs this year
Edudigm
Flipkart
Housing.com
Moojic Myntra
Naukri
Quickr
Snapdeal
Snapstick
Wooqer
Unbxd
ZeMeSo
Zomato
Source: Placement offices and the Internet
