A top TCS exec explains what companies are looking for from campus hires this year

Thinking of making your next career move or want to join your dream company in 2020? Updating the resume, presenting your best projects will not be enough. As companies compete to hire the best talent, embrace digital transformation and globalise, following trends will reimagine the campus hiring process in 2020.

• Campus Hiring to get Democratized: Many large corporates with substantial hiring numbers are expected to leverage technology to conduct a common national test for hiring. It will allow all eligible students to participate irrespective of the location and educational institute they come from. A common national test will allow companies to hire the best from a large number of candidates from multiple campuses. TCS pioneered this in India and many will follow suit.
• Prepare yourself for such common national tests being run in your city. They provide a good opportunity to get yourself qualified for a job interview. Your institution gets notifications of such recruitment tests.

• Multiple Interventions instead of Single Selection Test: We predict that the companies will move towards a selection process that is based on multiple interventions for hiring freshers instead of a single selection test. This approach will avoid the one-bad-day syndrome and offer students multiple opportunities to prove their capabilities. These multiple interventions could be in various forms such as a coding contest, a test, a hackathon etc.
• Your collective performance across all such interventions will determine the final selection. You no longer have to get nervous about the big day while chasing your dream company. Selection basis multiple interventions presents an opportunity to keep improving your performance and showcase relevant skills to prospective employers.

• Practical Experience over Theoretical Understanding: More and more companies will give higher weightage to hands-on experience over theoretical subject knowledge. 2020 will be largely about candidate’s ability to demonstrate practical knowledge and experience to increase chances of being selected.
• Your ability to demonstrate your practical skills will be critical in addition to the domain knowledge. So, make sure you take it upon yourself to build your hands-on application skills, and there are various ways of doing that. You can take up courses that offer hands-on skilling, do an internship or work as a freelancer even while you are studying.

• Digital Skills as a Horizontal: Every industry is getting disrupted. Digital technologies are playing a key role in this change. Employers will prefer candidates with foundational knowledge of digital technologies. In TCS, candidates with strong digital skills are placed at double the salary at the entry level itself.
• It will be critical for you to have a basic understanding of digital technologies irrespective of your stream of education. Take advantage of the various online learning platforms to upskill yourself.

• Soft Skills can make or break: A majority of candidates excel in their subject skills but lack soft skills like effective articulation skills, interpersonal skills, communication skills, etc. Past data indicates that nearly 50% of candidates who demonstrate superior performance in the initial qualifier test do not cross the interview stage, which can be attributed to a lack of soft skills Together, knowing and expressing will be important for future selections.
• Develop your soft skills and put your best foot forward. Friends and team members are your best critics and advisors. They can give you important tips and advice to improvise presentations, communication skills, body language, etc. To increase your confidence, participate in social gigs, events or group discussions happening around you.

• Social Footprints Matter: In the world of social platforms and millennials presence in them, employers will increasingly review candidates’ social media footprints for both positive and questionable actions. This will be an additional parameter for evaluation in the selection process.
• You need to be responsible and ensure adequate care to build a positive image in social media. Use social media platforms judiciously considering the sensitivity. Your comments, photos and social media participation indicate your personality, opinions and personal preferences to prospective employers.

• Additional Competencies vs Academic Qualification: Developing additional competencies beyond the core academic qualifications will give a clear edge in selection. This will also help candidates to pursue careers of their choice. Increasingly, companies will look for candidate’s prowess in more trending areas beyond the academic curriculum.
• As a young jobseeker, you must start building your profile with competencies that are trending and of interest to employers, beyond academic curriculum. You are studying civil engineering but have mastered coding or started an online marketplace for vintage goods while studying? Brownie points to you. Pursuing your passion, following a hobby or learning skills beyond your academic curriculum can bring the job of your interest a step closer to you.

• Foreign Language and Globalisation: Today, many businesses aspire to address the global market needs and hence operate across geographies. Corporates prefer candidates who clear the basic selection criteria and also demonstrate linguistic skills in a foreign language.
• It is recommended that you develop interest in any one foreign language and attain a minimum level of proficiency before the interview process. Sign up for courses teaching foreign languages like German, Spanish, Mandarin, Japanese, and etc. to build your linguistic competency.

• Credible Internship: Internships provide candidates with a good initial exposure to the corporate world. A strong recommendation in an internship provides a gateway for corporate hiring. Companies will increase the count of hires from the internship channel in the next few years. For companies, this reduces the risk of wrong selection.
• You should find an internship opportunity in a credible company and put up a stronger profile in front of the employers. Utilise free time between semesters to gain credible internships.

• Personalised Salaries: Conventionally, corporates have fixed salary bands for freshers. But this will change fast as companies are finding individual candidates with differentiated competencies and hence are willing to compensate them differently. Candidates possessing industry trending competencies and skills can command higher annual packages.
  

Go ahead and personalize yourself and differentiate yourself to the employers. Prepare yourself with the above hiring trends in mind. Our wishes for you to get selected by your dream employer in the year 2020.

This article is written by Venguswamy Ramaswamy, who is the Global Head of TCS iON.