‘Clarity of Purpose’, ‘Passion to Learn / Grow’ and Intent towards being a ‘Value Addition to the Society’ are the three most important self-faculties for an individual’s holistic learning & development.
Today we have the luxury of talking about ‘Pursuing your Passion’ versus few decades ago, when people considered themselves lucky to even have a decent job.
The IT boom has surely made many lives and continues to do so but in the process, has also made majority of the people blind towards other career opportunities. In this mad rush of making a career in the IT sector, we see many students succumbing to the peer pressure and ending up making compromised career choices.
No doubt, it is a wonderful feeling when you become the reason for celebration of your family & friends. However, one should also understand that every profession is good, if we are good with it and opportunities will always be available for those who have the competencies to grab them.
We are witnessing many interesting developments in our country. Initiatives like ‘Make in India’ need qualified core Engineers. However, companies repeatedly flag their concern on dearth of competent Engineers even in some of the so called premier E Schools. In fact, many Engineering colleges have chucked away core Engineering streams and have only Computer Science students. We can’t blame them; they are practising the demand-supply theory.
Of course, ‘Money’ will be of utmost priority in the value system of people in a developing economy. Parents of an Engineering graduate would obviously focus on the ‘Return on Investment’. For most of them, it is a simple and straight forward formula : ‘More is the salary, better is the stream / career’.
However, in this marriage with profession, if you are not emotionally connected with it, you can never really be happy with it. Hence, understanding and building awareness of various career options is highly important before making a career choice and one should know to make a fair comparison before taking a decision. For example, learning ‘Coding’ and ‘Machine Designing’ are two different things. One may learn coding in few months and perform on the job, which is not the case with core Engineering streams like Mechanical Engineering where in; one needs to be strong with the fundamentals of subjects like Physics / Strength of Materials and considering the vastness of the stream, most of the learning happens on the job with experience.
Let’s remember, in the pursuit to become competent professionals and to run through the 40+ years of professional marathon strongly, our ‘Attitude’ plays a major role along with ‘Knowledge’ and ‘Skill’. The power of self-belief is such that, what appears impossible to others, will be a possibility for those with conviction and confidence. If one is clear about the “What” & “Why” about their career, one will automatically start exploring the answers for the “How”, “When”, “Where” and any other related questions.
The Career Awareness & Counselling Programs for students should ideally happen during the Higher Secondary / Pre-University Schooling and during Engineering, the students should be exposed to domain specific Career Awareness Programs.
For example, at ‘Birla Institute of Technology & Science (BITS), Pilani University’, the management has always nurtured the process of holistic learning & development of the students and has ensured that the ‘Industry-Academia’ interaction has become a part of the overall learning culture. The students who join this highly prestigious and premier institute are admitted on the basis of merit and not reservation. These folks are the crème de la crème of our country and are a treat to any Recruiter coming for Campus hiring.
The Placement Unit of BITS Pilani University, lead by the Chief Placement Officer – Mr. Balasubramanian Gurumurthy, has always given impetus to the passion of students. The University has a dedicated Training Wing as part of the Placement Unit to deliver customized training programs, in-sync with the industry requirements.
Our motto is ‘Knowledge is Power Supreme’ and we are glad to share our best practices with other Institutes and students through professional forums like ‘Company CSR’, so that they too can learn & develop on similar lines.
