If you join an MBA course at any of India’s top business schools, chances are you may land a job a little more than a year into the programme.
Companies are increasingly giving pre-placement offers (PPOs) to students of top B-schools based on their performance during summer internships. At this rate, the 30-minute final placement interview — the traditional method of campus recruitment — may soon become the second most-preferred way for hiring future managers.
Estimates from several Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) and other top B-schools such as MDI Gurgaon and XLRI show that up to one in every three students in the class of 2020 is likely to be recruited through PPOs.
Consulting and consumer biggies are leading the charge with a flurry of preplacement offers, in the process ensuring that more students have a job in hand before the final placements even kick off in what institutes expect to be a strong placement season.
Pre-placement offers usually go on till January. This year, just a couple of months into the process—and more than four to go—most IIMs have already notched up 60-80% of last year’s total PPO tally.
IIM Bangalore has already received over 100 PPOs this year, against a total of 155 PPOs the previous batch managed to attract by the end of the academic year. IIM Calcutta has 80-plus PPOs (last year’s total was 133) while IIM Kozhikode has so far got at least 61offers against 79 in the whole of last year.
At MDI Gurgaon, the PPO tally has crossed 71, a nearly 122% jump over the 32 offers it had at the same time last year. XLRI-Xavier School of Management students have notched up over 81 offers against last year’s total of 122.
CONSULTING, CONSUMER COS LEAD WAY
Sapna Agrawal, head, career development services, IIM Bangalore, said strategy consulting, general management and FMCG companies are normally early with their pre-placement offers. “The finance firms will confirm their PPOs later,” she said.
Global management consultancy BCG India has already made 50-plus pre-placement offers across the country’s top B-schools. “Over the last few years, our internship numbers have increased dramatically given our overall strong growth and intent to shift towards sizeable PPO hires,” said Sumit Gupta, partner & recruiting head at BCG India. Hiring through PPOs is aimed at giving both the parties a chance to experience each other and bring out the best results, he said.
Bain & Company, too, will continue to double down on PPOs across experienced consultant roles, its partner Megha Chawla said. The global consulting firm runs its summer programme at IIM Ahmedabad, IIM Bangalore, IIM Calcutta and IIM Lucknow. “It’s an indispensable part of our recruitment process,” Chawla said, adding that about 75% is the typical conversion rate of interns landing pre-placement offers.
Consumer companies too are going strong. Hindustan Unilever, Procter & Gamble, and Reckitt Benckiser are among consumer products companies that have made PPOs at IIM Calcutta, said Abhishek Goel, chairperson, career development and placement office, at the institute.
At IIM Kozhikode, Aditya Birla Fashion and Retail, Asian Paints, BCG, Deloitte, EY, HUL and Nestle were among those who have made offers, its placements chairperson Shovan Chowdhury said.
Godrej offers internships and hires full time for all its key businesses in human resources, supply chain, sales, marketing, strategy and business development. This time, it has made 26 PPOs from summer internships for students graduating in 2019. Besides scaling up hiring from regulars such as IIFT, MDI, FMS, IIM Ahmedabad, ISB, SPJIMR, NITIE, SIBM, SCMHRD, IRMA and XIMB, it has also explored some new schools like IIM Trichy for the Godrej Agrovet business, and IIM Calcutta, for Godrej Properties..
Sumit Mitra, head-group HR and corporate services at Godrej Industries and associate companies, said 37 of the 41 management trainees who joined the group in 2018 were through the PPO route. “We believe it is a smarter strategy to hire someone who we have observed closely over a two-month summer internship, rather than to go back to campus for full-time placements and make hiring decisions about people who we have never met before, after 30-minute long interviews,” Mitra said.
COMPANIES QUICKER TO ROLL OUT PPOS
This year many companies are quicker in extending PPOs to talent they have tried and tested out, institute officials said. “This year, nearly double the number of companies (27) have rolled out pre-placement offers during June-August in comparison to 14 last year,” said Kanwal Kapil, dean, continuing education, consulting, alumni and placements, MDI Gurgaon.
The highest offer so far at the institute is Rs 28 lakh offered by P&G. “At present, many of the technology companies including ACT Fibernet and Intel have started offering PPOs,” Kapil said. “New companies which came for summer placements like P&G, MARS and Bajaj Auto have also offered PPOs,” he said.
Sourced from The Economic Times - written by Sreeradha Basu