Year of Initiatives

Dearth of telecom professionals inspires new initiatives, but the industry still has a long way to go.

If not a watershed, the year 2000-01 was nevertheless, a significant one for the Indian telecom training and education sector. The realization that the Indian telecom industry desperately needs trained professionals was complemented by a number of industry initiatives at establishing training institutes. And these initiatives were unlike the product-specific training courses that have largely dominated the telecom education landscape in the country. The year also saw the British Council assessing the opportunity for British organizations to provide training and education services to the rapidly developing telecom sector in India.

The telecom training market in India would generally fall in two broad categories—one catering to the in-house training requirements of the telecom companies and the other, catering to the needs of the different segments of the industry. A third category could be the training needs of telecom professionals working in different vertical industry segments.

As the market is not mature and organized enough, it is really difficult to assess its size in terms of value. The Department of Telecom is reportedly spending around Rs 100 crore through its Advanced Level Telecommunications Center and various regional training centers on training and skill upgradation of its employees. Approximately, the same amount is being spent by the private sector on training its employees, including new recruits. This spending is largely accounted for, both by the vendor-specific training on products as well as training in new and emerging technologies. A very small fraction of this is also being spent on non-technology training areas like marketing and customer care.

No doubt such industry initiatives as the Bharti School of Telecommunications Technology (in collaboration with IIT, Delhi) and the Usha Martin Academy of Communication Technology (with IIT, Chennai) cannot be termed as an industry-wide trend. However, they do point towards a growing awareness in the industry, of the need to provide training to employees as well as potential recruits.

It is projected that at a 20-25 percent growth in the telecom industry, the market for telecom training and education would be in the region of Rs 350-400 crore in the near future. A study by Arthur Anderson (commissioned by the British Council) estimated that in the near future, the market would be around 55 million pounds. This assessment takes into account the continued pressure on admission to premier institutions as also the growing realization among corporates of the need to train their employees, in order to take on competition.

The study pointed out that there is continued pressure on admission to premier institutions. To be easily absorbed in the industry, graduates from other institutions would need to undergo training in order to gain knowledge and build specific skill sets. Thus, it is the quality of manpower that will primarily cause the manpower demand–supply gap in the telecom industry—hence the need for training.