Employability improves from 45.97% to 46.2% this year – India Skills Report 2022

• Internet Business, Software Hardware and IT, Pharma , BFSI  will capitalise the Job Market in the post-pandemic period
• 88.6 % Graduates are seeking Internship opportunities
• Gender Gap in Employability improves

New Delhi, 10 December 2021: India Skills Report 2022 by Wheebox, in partnership with CII, AICTE, AIU, Taggd, Sunstone Eduversity and UNDP is a report on the talent demand and supply. According to ISR 2022, Overall 46.2% of the youth were found to be highly employable against last year’s employability of 45.97%, which is a significant improvement. Women employable pool is steadily increasing which is 51.44% of females while 45.97% of males were found highly employable. Another trend which has picked up is that 88.6 % Graduates are seeking Internship opportunities.

The survey found out that candidates from Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Kerala had the highest employability as compared to last year which was Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh and Karnataka. Among these, B.Tech graduates and MBA graduates were found to be the most employable talent from the various domains. Pune, Lucknow and Trivandrum were the cities with most employable talent and the most preferred cities for work by graduates wereBangalore , Kochi and Chennai.Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Kerala, and West Bengal were employing the youth talent.

Speaking on this occasion, Nirmal Singh, Founder & CEO, Wheebox said,“The pandemic has shown us that remote learning and remote work, are going to become the new normal for many sectors across IT, Business Consultancy, Financial Services, and very specifically one industry leading the game, the Education Industry.”

He added that we have observed in the last few years that students who ranked Higher on Critical Thinking and Numerical Ability in the National Employability Test grew faster in profiles such as Sr. Analyst and Big Data Engineering roles. So, there exists a direct correlation to the fact that employability skills are the key for larger success for students’ jobs.”

The demand for qualified and skilled professionals will be driven by sectors including IT/ITES, Pharmaceutical, E-Commerce and, BFSI. The hiring in these sectors is expected to increase by 20% for freshers in 2022 compared to 2021. Technology as a skill set will continue to be in demand across industries.

India will be hiring most in the Internet Business, Software Hardware and IT, Pharma and BFSI  sectors. Additionally, companies across India show a hiring intent of 35.96% for the demand forecast of 2022.The study revealed that there has been a significant change since last year, with a positive hiring intent of 35.96% for the demand forecast of 2022.

The report also pointed out the courses most in demand in 2022, will be B Tech and MBA with the most employable talent at 55.15 % and 55.09 % respectively. IT, CSE, ECE are the most employable engineering domains.

Leverage the highly employable women resources.

Compared to the 36% of women participation in the workforce last year, this year has witnessed a similar participation with 32.8% of women employed in the workforce across diverse industry verticals. Though, 67.2% of men make up the larger portion of employed professionals, women participation in the workforce is being encouraged by more companies with an intent to hire more female.

Telangana was found to have the highest being 39.42% of job-ready females, Karnataka state followed with 35.44%. Most female participation was found in the Internet Businesses sector, with 54.5% of female participation. The highest number of male workers were recorded in the Retail sector with 95% comprising men, followed by the Manufacturing sector with 88% being men, and then the Automotive industry with 80% of men in the workforce. Female workers in the IT & Tech businesses were projected at 52.67%, followed by the Pharmaceuticals sector with 35% comprising women and then BFSI with 30% women participation. With the inclusion of remote work opportunities and hybrid models, a more distributed workforce is expected in many of the industries.

The India Skills Report, report is a combination of an assessment of 3 lakh candidates across India, who appeared for the Wheebox National Employability Test (WNET), and 150 corporates across 15+ industries who participated in the India Hiring Intent survey- Early Career Edition. The Wheebox National Employability Test (WNET) survey sheds light on the employability of the youth of India. Some of the key dimensions assessed during the survey were Business Communication, Critical Thinking and Numerical Reasoning.