Featured Only 10% of IT Graduates Are Employable in Pakistan: Gallup

[Ahmad Saleem]

Pakistan’s IT companies that produce high-value products has found that only 10 percent of graduates from lower-tier universities are employable. However, software houses with low-end IT services employ 50% of the graduates of these universities.

Pakistan should focus on human capital related to technology innovations by filling the skills gaps which are essential for the digital economy and are required by the IT and ITeS industry, according to a study by Gallup Pakistan.

This gap signifies the lack of suitable and contemporary programming skills in Pakistan. Also, weak English is identified as a major drawback stemming from a lack of qualified teachers and a modern curriculum at all levels of education.

According to an estimate, Pakistan’s universities produce around 25,000 IT graduates but merely 5,000 get employed at leading local IT companies. The other graduates do not meet the selection criteria of the companies because of their irrelevant or outdated education. In this regard, the Ministry of IT and Telecommunication has been working to set up an authority to revamp curriculum on IT education on par with global standards and requirements however the present government has not come up with an institution in the past two years.

First, the Higher Education Commission (HEC) in Pakistan, universities, and other stakeholders should collaborate and agree on a curricular update to tackle the country’s professional and technical needs.

Second, the IT industry needs to identify and communicate the necessary learning requirements and missing skills, including soft skills.

Third, a mechanism to improve the integration of lower-tier universities with industry is also required.

One option to speed up the process is to facilitate and encourage hiring coders from the private sector to teach courses in universities. Finally, HEC and universities need to start recognizing credit from online courses (e.g. online coding courses from Coursera and EdX that have the necessary quality accreditation). This will allow students to improve their skills rapidly in a more efficient way.

In the context of the COVID-19 crisis, this has become even more relevant and urgent. In the case of Pakistan, there are significant skills gaps among computer science engineers and professionals that need to be tackled to ensure the future growth of the sector including:

• Inability to code in contemporary technology platforms,
• Weak English skills,
• Poor comprehension readiness to address foreign clients’ concerns,
• Inadequate soft skills, namely communication and teamwork,
• Poor knowledge of corporate culture, e.g. reporting, compliance, escalations, email etiquette, and protocols.

Graduates from top universities in Pakistan are fully employable by the industry and higher in demand, the study said.

There are 6 specialized universities for the field of computer science and IT and over 20 universities offer various degrees in the discipline of IT and computer sciences as per HEC.

Source: https://propakistani.pk/2020/07/15/only-10-of-it-graduates-are-employable-in-pakistan-gallup/

 

[Joe Shearer]

Welcome to the club.

 

[I S I]

Welcome to the club.

India is better in I.T. Far better.

 

[Joe Shearer]

India is better in I.T. Far better.

You don't know what you are talking about.

I have been in IT from 1985 onwards, from 1995 at GM level or higher. I have employed through my IT career about 15,000 people (not at a time, but in all). For four years after that, I crossed over and tried to correct things at the teaching end.

The problem is 20 times, a 100 times worse than you can imagine.

India is better in I.T. Far better.

It is a cruelly exploitative system, where people's parents mortgage or sell their real estate to give their children a grounding, and at the end of four years, or five years, their son or daughter goes from door to door, paying out even more money to vultures who call themselves HR consultants, trying to get a break. They don't get that break.

If you look at the figures for graduates from these shit colleges and institutions (not the IITs) and the final proportion who get employed, you would weep. As a human being, watching this sordid drama is the cruelest punishment that can be suffered.

India is better in I.T. Far better.

I should mention that I employed (a handful) of Pakistani kids as well, and found them just as good - in the same proportions as Indian kids. Not much difference, except that they were very cagey and withdrawn at the beginning, wondering how an Indian employer would treat them. When they thawed out, they were just the same, except for a few insisting on time off for prayers.

 

[Iltutmish]

• Inability to code in contemporary technology platforms,

• Weak English skills,

• Poor comprehension readiness to address foreign clients’ concerns,

• Inadequate soft skills, namely communication and teamwork,

• Poor knowledge of corporate culture, e.g. reporting, compliance, escalations, email etiquette, and protocols.

The first thing I check when a Pakistani, Bengali or Indian developer wants my money are their comprehension skills. If they cannot repeat my requirements (I tell them to take notes) properly, they don't get the gig. Also I know how long a good developer needs to implement specific requirements (IT guy myself). There are some black sheep exploiting "rich" clients from abroad (buyer beware!), but most of the time I had good experiences with developers from the subcontintent, especially Pakistan, which really surprised me. But unfortunately they only implement requirements, they don't do consulting. If a customer wants a website without responsive design and totally in black, they would just give them that and wouldn't give advice in that matter. A good coder must also be a good consultant, once I asked a Bengali developer about his opinion regarding my class diagram and the draft of the website. He just said "perfect sir, I will do it, yes, sir, very good, sir!". Some are afraid if they give good advise they customer will leave, but this not true...

 

[Jf Thunder]

wait, so the Ministry of IT has to do something about this?
what is the HEC doing? just waiting for budget raises.
Its great the IK cut the Budget of a useless institution like HEC.
Everyone cries for the education budget increase, but they dont give a damn about where the Budget already allocated to education actually goes.

 

[Joe Shearer]

The first thing I check when a Pakistani, Bengali or Indian developer wants my money are their comprehension skills. If they cannot repeat my requirements (I tell them to take notes) properly, they don't get the gig. Also I know how long a good developer needs to implement specific requirements (IT guy myself). There are some black sheep exploiting "rich" clients from abroad (buyer beware!), but most of the time I had good experiences with developers from the subcontintent, especially Pakistan, which really surprised me. But unfortunately they only implement requirements, they don't do consulting. If a customer wants a website without responsive design and totally in black, they would just give them that and wouldn't give advice in that matter. A good coder must also be a good consultant, once I asked a Bengali developer about his opinion regarding my class diagram and the draft of the website. He just said "perfect sir, I will do it, yes, sir, very good, sir!". Some are afraid if they give good advise they customer will leave, but this not true...

Yes and no.

Usually the problem in this industry is with the sales team, the biggest effing morons to be born during the whole of human existence. They overcommit, sometimes quoting time frames that are 40 to 50% lower than feasible (the money doesn't matter, as anyone who has been in this racket knows; it's about the time committed).

Then there are the requirements. Whatever mess the sales team agrees to (they are the ones standing behind your developers shoulders, whispering to him to say yes to everything, including building a ladder of matchsticks to the Moon), the client then destroys with requirement creep; this is one week at a time, one change at a time. Finally the suits; when the time for delivery looms ever closer, they insist on short-circuiting every safety mechanism and on delivering beta products.

I could go on and on and on.

wait, so the Ministry of IT has to do something about this?

Do what?

The Indian industry famously grew because the Government did not suspect that we were an industry, and ignored us, so we built something, taking full advantage of the Y2K scare, and then let the babus into the secret.

Yes, some of them did help. L. K. Jha was actually the father of Indian IT, and not the names that are tossed around.

 

[jamahir]

It is a cruelly exploitative system, where people's parents mortgage or sell their real estate to give their children a grounding, and at the end of four years, or five years, their son or daughter goes from door to door, paying out even more money to vultures who call themselves HR consultants, trying to get a break. They don't get that break.

When I got out from my IT learnings from NIIT the underlined was called "Real time projects", pay something like 5000 rupees or more to do some module of some vaguely set up project so as to get an experience certificate.

By the way, what is it about the non-White races that they have not been able to design the two fundamental things in computing, namely the microprocessor and the operating system ? When a civil engineer or architect is expected to be able to build or design a house or office or public space I don't see why a computer engineer should not be able to design a microprocessor and OS. Even the massively-resourced Chinese don't have these two of their own.

I have been designing a processor for some years. Also, one Pakistani PDF member has taken the initiative of creating a team to design a Pakistani OS. This is the FB page.

 

[Joe Shearer]

When I got out from my IT learnings from NIIT the underlined was called "Real time projects", pay something like 5000 rupees or more to do some module of some vaguely set up project so as to get an experience certificate.

By the way, what is it about the non-White races that they have not been able to design the two fundamental things in computing, namely the microprocessor and the operating system ? When a civil engineer or architect is expected to be able to build or design a house or office or public space I don't see why a computer engineer should not be able to design a microprocessor and OS. Even the massively-resourced Chinese don't have these two of their own.

I have been designing a processor for some years. Also, one Pakistani PDF member has taken the initiative of creating a team to design a Pakistani OS. This is the FB page.

I'll come back to you on this in the evening. This is fascinating, and needs detailed discussion.

 

[313ghazi]

These failures fall at the feet of the universities, others are the fault of schools.

• Inability to code in contemporary technology platforms
  
• Weak English skills,
• Poor comprehension readiness to address foreign clients’ concerns,
• Inadequate soft skills, namely communication and teamwork,
• Poor knowledge of corporate culture, e.g. reporting, compliance, escalations, email etiquette, and protocols.

However some of it, the Employers have to pick up the slack on. If you employ a graduate, you have to accept that they're not the finished item. For many it's their first professional role. Have some job based training.

It wouldn't hurt if universities had a module on the bare basics of this, but I learnt it all during my part time jobs as a student. Arriving on time, not clock watching, customer service, how to word emails etc - picked up the basics of it whilst working part time. Many youngster don't - i've had to train loads myself, sometimes they're raw.

 

[Iltutmish]

Usually the problem in this industry is with the sales team, the biggest effing morons to be born during the whole of human existence. They overcommit, sometimes quoting time frames that are 40 to 50% lower than feasible (the money doesn't matter, as anyone who has been in this racket knows; it's about the time committed).

The sales guys are the worst, that's true... A few years back as I started my career in IT we had a Senior Key Account Manager promising everything to our customers. Everything can be done ASAP was his sales pitch. We developers worked day and night (I still remember the day where I had a sleepover in the office because no train service after 12:00 AM...) and didn't get that much money from it (ok, we were mostly startes, but we got the job done!). The Sales guy had a 9 to 5 job, was the favourite of the boss and got plenty of commission for doing next to nothing. Sorry, but saying: "yes, next week, no problem." is not a skill, it's a scam.

 

[Joe Shearer]

The sales guys are the worst, that's true... A few years back as I started my career in IT we had a Senior Key Account Manager promising everything to our customers. Everything can be done ASAP was his sales pitch. We developers worked day and night (I still remember the day where I had a sleepover in the office because no train service after 12:00 AM...) and didn't get that much money from it (ok, we were mostly startes, but we got the job done!). The Sales guy had a 9 to 5 job, was the favourite of the boss and got plenty of commission for doing next to nothing. Sorry, but saying: "yes, next week, no problem." is not a skill, it's a scam.

The best salesman is the developer. Or at least the development team head. He can talk reality to the client, not the "....Yes, next week, no problem..." types.

 

[Hareeb]

This is so true. I knew a person from Islamic University Islamabad in 2013. While in 1st sem, we, at FAST, were tasked to code a 10-level brick and ball game with different difficulty levels as semester project and the man at IIUI didn't even had his hands on keybaord yet. What else to teach when you don't teach then how to code.

 

[fitpOsitive]

Pakistan’s IT companies that produce high-value products has found that only 10 percent of graduates from lower-tier universities are employable. However, software houses with low-end IT services employ 50% of the graduates of these universities.

Pakistan should focus on human capital related to technology innovations by filling the skills gaps which are essential for the digital economy and are required by the IT and ITeS industry, according to a study by Gallup Pakistan.

This gap signifies the lack of suitable and contemporary programming skills in Pakistan. Also, weak English is identified as a major drawback stemming from a lack of qualified teachers and a modern curriculum at all levels of education.

According to an estimate, Pakistan’s universities produce around 25,000 IT graduates but merely 5,000 get employed at leading local IT companies. The other graduates do not meet the selection criteria of the companies because of their irrelevant or outdated education. In this regard, the Ministry of IT and Telecommunication has been working to set up an authority to revamp curriculum on IT education on par with global standards and requirements however the present government has not come up with an institution in the past two years.

First, the Higher Education Commission (HEC) in Pakistan, universities, and other stakeholders should collaborate and agree on a curricular update to tackle the country’s professional and technical needs.

Second, the IT industry needs to identify and communicate the necessary learning requirements and missing skills, including soft skills.

Third, a mechanism to improve the integration of lower-tier universities with industry is also required.

One option to speed up the process is to facilitate and encourage hiring coders from the private sector to teach courses in universities. Finally, HEC and universities need to start recognizing credit from online courses (e.g. online coding courses from Coursera and EdX that have the necessary quality accreditation). This will allow students to improve their skills rapidly in a more efficient way.

In the context of the COVID-19 crisis, this has become even more relevant and urgent. In the case of Pakistan, there are significant skills gaps among computer science engineers and professionals that need to be tackled to ensure the future growth of the sector including:

• Inability to code in contemporary technology platforms,
• Weak English skills,
• Poor comprehension readiness to address foreign clients’ concerns,
• Inadequate soft skills, namely communication and teamwork,
• Poor knowledge of corporate culture, e.g. reporting, compliance, escalations, email etiquette, and protocols.

Graduates from top universities in Pakistan are fully employable by the industry and higher in demand, the study said.

There are 6 specialized universities for the field of computer science and IT and over 20 universities offer various degrees in the discipline of IT and computer sciences as per HEC.

Source: https://propakistani.pk/2020/07/15/only-10-of-it-graduates-are-employable-in-pakistan-gallup/

Now these extra guys will be thrown out of country.
Maraingy kch karaingy. Pak govt ko kia.

 

[Ahmad Saleem]

Yes and no.

The Indian industry famously grew because the Government did not suspect that we were an industry, and ignored us, so we built something, taking full advantage of the Y2K scare, and then let the babus into the secret.

Yes, some of them did help. L. K. Jha was actually the father of Indian IT, and not the names that are tossed around.

Why babus are a problem in the subcontinent and why IT industry and other industries hate them?
These civil servants are top guys from top universities so what turns them into monsters? or they are just scapegoats?