印度大学毕业生多 适合录用者少

來源：【华尔街日报 中文网】2011-04-07

经营呼叫中心的印度公司24/7 Customer Pvt. Ltd.正在急切招募那些能通过电话或电子邮件回答客户问题的新员工。它想今年招到3,000人。但在印度这个拥有12亿人口的国家，这却像是一个不可能完成的任务。

印度能够用英语有效沟通的高中和大学毕业生是如此之少，而没有掌握阅读理解等学校所教基本技能的人又是如此之多，以至于每100名向24/7 Customer提交求职申请的人中，达到该公司录用标准的只有三个人。

印度一直有着这样的国家形象：每年“出产”数十万名受过良好教育的学生，他们对西方薪资更高的中产阶级雇工构成越来越大的威胁。美国总统奥巴马(Barack Obama)曾将印度学生的数学能力称作美国面临竞争性挑战的一个原因。

然而24/7 Customer的经历却揭示了一个与上述形象大相径庭的印度。由于在印度招到合格的员工越来越难，这家公司不得不将招募范围扩大到菲律宾和尼加拉瓜。其8,000名员工目前绝大部分都在印度以外工作。

“离岸外包”这个词因印度而变得家喻户晓，然而24/7本身却因缺乏人手而不得不将业务安排到海外。

这家公司的创始人纳贾拉简(S. Nagarajan)说，凭印度的人口规模，招募员工本来应该容易得多，相反我们却在仔细搜寻所有的角角落落。

印度的经济扩张本应让千百万人得以有机会摆脱贫困、接受教育并找到不错的工作。但1991年印度在实行数十年的社会主义制度后开始进行经济自由化时，却未能改革受到严重束缚的教育体系。

商界管理人士说，学校受到专横的官僚主义阻碍，同时只注重机械性的学习，而不重视培养学生的批判性思维和理解能力。政府保证了学费的低廉，令更多的学生得以上学，但同时教师薪资和教育预算水平也很低。教育界人士和商界领袖还说，大多数地方的课程都已过时，与现实社会脱节。

新德里人力资源公司NIIT Ltd. India的首席执行长塔塔尼(Vijay Thadani)说，微薪养蠢才。这家公司还针对缺乏相关技能、难以找到好工作的大学毕业生开展职业培训。

令形势更为复杂的是，表面上看印度大学毕业生的数量有了极大增长，似乎已经满足了对更高教育程度工人的需求。行业组织印度全国软件和服务企业协会(National Association of Software and Services Companies)的数据显示，印度工科院校目前可容纳150万名学生，差不多相当于2000年时39万人的四倍。

但印度全国软件和服务企业协会进行的评估测试显示，75%的专科毕业生和85%以上的综合性大学毕业生都无法受雇于印度高增长的全球性行业，如信息技术（IT）企业和呼叫中心。

致力于提高穷人教育水平的非政府组织Pratham每年都对印度1.3万所小学的教学质量进行调查，结果发现印度大约一半的五年级学生没有达到二年级的阅读水平。

这种情况将威胁到印度保持经济增长、同时维护其经商环境低成本优势的能力。印度经济今年预计将增长9%。

考虑到印度人口比美国、欧洲和中国更为年轻化，这种挑战尤其显得紧迫。据印度政府估计，印度一半以上人口的年龄在25岁以下，未来10年预计每个月会有100万人加入求职者行列。令人担忧的是，如果这些年轻人未能接受足够的训练，无法分享印度引人注目的新经济成果，他们可能对印度的稳定造成威胁。

班加罗尔的人力资源招聘和培训公司Teamlease Services Ltd.的董事总经理萨巴哈瓦尔(Manish Sabharwal)说，经济改革的意义不在于土大款能一掷千金买奔驰轿车。如果我们不能让下一代找到工作，20年的改革就一文不值。

然而在政府和商界领导人承认劳动力短缺之际，教育改革却远未得到立法保障。举例来说，一项让学校在设计课程方面拥有更大自主权的法案预计将于未来几周在内阁进行讨论，今年晚些时候才会提交国会。

23岁的辛格(Pradeep Singh)是去年从RKDF College of Engineering毕业的。该校是博帕尔市(Bhopal)最古老的工程学院之一。辛格说，我对找工作根本毫无准备。他已经参加过五次面试，没有一次成功找到工作。为了增加自己对潜在雇主的吸引力，他参加了NIIT举办的为期五个月的电脑编程课。

辛格及其他数名工程专业毕业生说，他们很快就知道有些课不必费劲去上。辛格说，老师很随便，学生也很随便，好像他们都一致认为不用太操心。他说，他每周都要翘几天的课，期末只要花上三、四天时间临时抱抱佛脚考试就能过关。

其他人说，作弊（通常与阅卷老师合谋）现象非常普遍。现年26岁的沙玛(Deepak Sharma)就读德里市外的顶尖工程学院ITM University时，有好几次考试都没过，直到他终于发现了窍门：在考卷上写上他的手机号码。

他在计算理论课考试中就是这么做的。他说，不久后，阅卷老师就打电话给他，说如果他和朋友每人交一万卢比（约合250美元），就让他们过关。他和另外四个朋友凑了钱，他们都通过了考试。

沙玛说，我几乎可以百分之百的肯定，如果我没有交钱的话，我考试肯定还会不及格。

ITM University的副校长纳卡拉(BC Nakra)在接受采访时说，他们学校没有作弊问题，如果有人被发现作弊，是会坐牢的。他说，自己在报纸上看到过一两起作弊事件，在极少极少的情况下，有些地方可能有人作弊，如果夸大作弊问题，会影响整个社会。记者无法找到阅卷老师置评。

Wipro Technologies的人力资源高级副总裁高维尔(Saurabh Govil)说，除了要解决作弊问题外，印度教育制度还需要把整个方向转到以学习为重点上。按销量计算，Wipro是印度第三大软件出口商。该公司说，难以找到熟练工人。高维尔说，你如何才能改变知识只是一纸文凭这一思维模式？这是个大问题。

不久前一个下午在24/7 Customer的员工招募中心，有40个人正在满是带靠背座椅的大厅内填写表格。而在一个有着玻璃墙的会议室里，一位负责人力资源事务的公司管理人士正在同时面试七位求职者。其中六人是不久前刚毕业的大学生，其中一人说他读的是通信专业学位。

这些人一个接一个地用磕磕绊绊的英语作着自我介绍。面试官打断了一名年青男子的话语，说他讲得太快了，人们难以听清他在说些什么。这个年青人被告知要让自己平静下来，再重新讲一遍。他试着再说一次，可语速仍然是那么快，第一轮面试后他就被淘汰了。

另一位名叫库马尔(Rajan Kumar)的应聘者说，几年前他获得了工程学方面的学士学位。他说，自己的业余爱好是看板球赛，他的强项是守时。面试官指出了他拥有工程学学位这一事实，然后问他为何想在科技行业得到一份工作。库马尔回答说，他正好赶上了。面试官不认为这是个合适的回答，库马尔也被淘汰。

还有一位名叫达什(Chaudhury Laxmikant Dash)的22岁男性应聘者，他去年毕业，也拥有工程学学士学位。达什说，自己是电视有奖竞猜游戏节目的获胜者，他的业余爱好是去国外旅行。但在面试官的追问下达什承认，直到现在他还没有旅行过。不过他还是与其他两人通过了首轮面试，这两人一男一女，男子在填写应聘表时只写上了一个名字──鲁宾逊(Robinson)。

初试过关者的下一道挑战是在一分钟内打出25个单词。女性应聘者打满一页纸后被告知，她打字的速度太慢，每分钟只能打18个词。达什用尽浑身力气去打字，汗都流出来了，但他两次尝试都未能达标。

只有鲁宾逊闯过了第二轮考试，第三轮考试的测试题是阅读理解一段有关核战争的文字，这段文字后面附有三道多项选择题。鲁宾逊只是两眼直呆呆盯着电脑屏幕。由于他们未能通过阅读理解考试，同一批进去面试的这七个人全遭淘汰。

在24/7 Customer公司负责为印度业务招聘员工的希拉达(Satya Sai Sylada)说，印度一般大学毕业生的阅读理解和对话能力非常低，这是我们面临的最大挑战。

Geeta Anand

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India Graduates Millions, But Too Few Are Fit To Hire

Call-center company 24/7 Customer Pvt. Ltd. is desperate to find new recruits who can answer questions by phone and email. It wants to hire 3,000 people this year. Yet in this country of 1.2 billion people, that is beginning to look like an impossible goal.

So few of the high school and college graduates who come through the door can communicate effectively in English, and so many lack a grasp of educational basics such as reading comprehension, that the company can hire just three out of every 100 applicants.

India projects an image of a nation churning out hundreds of thousands of students every year who are well educated, a looming threat to the better-paid middle-class workers of the West. Their abilities in math have been cited by President Barack Obama as a reason why the U.S. is facing competitive challenges.

Yet 24/7 Customer's experience tells a very different story. Its increasing difficulty finding competent employees in India has forced the company to expand its search to the Philippines and Nicaragua. Most of its 8,000 employees are now based outside of India.

In the nation that made offshoring a household word, 24/7 finds itself so short of talent that it is having to offshore.

'With India's population size, it should be so much easier to find employees,' says S. Nagarajan, founder of the company. 'Instead, we're scouring every nook and cranny.'

India's economic expansion was supposed to create opportunities for millions to rise out of poverty, get an education and land good jobs. But as India liberalized its economy starting in 1991 after decades of socialism, it failed to reform its heavily regulated education system.

Business executives say schools are hampered by overbearing bureaucracy and a focus on rote learning rather than critical thinking and comprehension. Government keeps tuition low, which makes schools accessible to more students, but also keeps teacher salaries and budgets low. What's more, say educators and business leaders, the curriculum in most places is outdated and disconnected from the real world.

'If you pay peanuts, you get monkeys,' says Vijay Thadani, chief executive of New Delhi-based NIIT Ltd. India, a recruitment firm that also runs job-training programs for college graduates lacking the skills to land good jobs.

Muddying the picture is that on the surface, India appears to have met the demand for more educated workers with a quantum leap in graduates. Engineering colleges in India now have seats for 1.5 million students, nearly four times the 390,000 available in 2000, according to the National Association of Software and Services Companies, a trade group.

But 75% of technical graduates and more than 85% of general graduates are unemployable by India's high-growth global industries, including information technology and call centers, according to results from assessment tests administered by the group.

Another survey, conducted annually by Pratham, a nongovernmental organization that aims to improve education for the poor, looked at grade-school performance at 13,000 schools across India. It found that about half of the country's fifth graders can't read at a second-grade level.

At stake is India's ability to sustain growth岸its economy is projected to expand 9% this year岸while maintaining its advantages as a low-cost place to do business.

The challenge is especially pressing given the country's more youthful population than the U.S., Europe and China. More than half of India's population is under the age of 25, and one million people a month are expected to seek to join the labor force here over the next decade, the Indian government estimates. The fear is that if these young people aren't trained well enough to participate in the country's glittering new economy, they pose a potential threat to India's stability.

'Economic reforms are not about goofy rich guys buying Mercedes cars,' says Manish Sabharwal, managing director of Teamlease Services Ltd., an employee recruitment and training firm in Bangalore. 'Twenty years of reforms are worth nothing if we can't get our kids into jobs.'

Yet even as the government and business leaders acknowledge the labor shortage, educational reforms are a long way from becoming law. A bill that gives schools more autonomy to design their own curriculum, for example, is expected to be introduced in the cabinet in the next few weeks, and in parliament later this year.

I was not prepared at all to get a job,' says Pradeep Singh, 23, who graduated last year from RKDF College of Engineering, one of the city of Bhopal's oldest engineering schools. He has been on five job interviews岸none of which led to work. To make himself more attractive to potential employers, he has enrolled in a five-month-long computer programming course run by NIIT.

Mr. Singh and several other engineering graduates said they learned quickly that they needn't bother to go to some classes. 'The faculty take it very casually, and the students take it very casually, like they've all agreed not to be bothered too much,' Mr. Singh says. He says he routinely missed a couple of days of classes a week, and it took just three or four days of cramming from the textbook at the end of the semester to pass the exams.

Others said cheating, often in collaboration with test graders, is rampant. Deepak Sharma, 26, failed several exams when he was enrolled at a top engineering college outside of Delhi, until he finally figured out the trick: Writing his mobile number on the exam paper.

That's what he did for a theory-of-computation exam, and shortly after, he says the examiner called him and offered to pass him and his friends if they paid 10,000 rupees each, about $250. He and four friends pulled together the money, and they all passed the test.

'I feel almost 99% certain that if I didn't pay the money, I would have failed the exam again,' says Mr. Sharma.

BC Nakra, Pro Vice Chancellor of ITM University, where Mr. Sharma studied, said in an interview that there is no cheating at his school, and that if anyone were spotted cheating in this way, he would be 'behind bars.' He said he had read about a case or two in the newspaper, and in the 'rarest of the rare cases, it might happen somewhere, and if you blow [it] out of all proportions, it effects the entire community.' The examiner couldn't be located for comment.

Cheating aside, the Indian education system needs to change its entire orientation to focus on learning, says Saurabh Govil, senior vice president in human resources at Wipro Technologies. Wipro, India's third largest software exporter by sales, says it has struggled to find skilled workers. The problem, says Mr. Govil, is immense: 'How are you able to change the mind-set that knowledge is more than a stamp?'

At 24/7 Customer's recruiting center on a recent afternoon, 40 people were filling out forms in an interior lobby filled with bucket seats. In a glass-walled conference room, a human-resources executive interviewed a group of seven applicants. Six were recent college graduates, and one said he was enrolled in a correspondence degree program.

One by one, they delivered biographical monologues in halting English. The interviewer interrupted one young man who spoke so fast, it was hard to tell what he was saying. The young man was instructed to compose himself and start from the beginning. He tried again, speaking just as fast, and was rejected after the first round.

Another applicant, Rajan Kumar, said he earned a bachelor's degree in engineering a couple of years ago. His hobby is watching cricket, he said, and his strength is punctuality. The interviewer, noting his engineering degree, asked why he isn't trying to get a job in a technical field, to which he replied: 'Right now, I'm here.' This explanation was judged inadequate, and Mr. Kumar was eliminated, too.

A 22-year-old man named Chaudhury Laxmikant Dash, who graduated last year, also with a bachelor's in engineering, said he's a game-show winner whose hobby is international travel. But when probed by the interviewer, he conceded, 'Until now I have not traveled.' Still, he made it through the first-round interview, along with two others, a woman and a man who filled out his application with just one name, Robinson.

For their next challenge, they had to type 25 words a minute. The woman typed a page only to learn her pace was too slow at 18 words a minute. Mr. Dash, sweating and hunched over, couldn't get his score high enough, despite two attempts.

Only Mr. Robinson moved on to the third part of the test, featuring a single paragraph about nuclear war followed by three multiple-choice questions. Mr. Robinson stared at the screen, immobilized. With his failure to pass the comprehension section, the last of the original group of applicants was eliminated.

The average graduate's 'ability to comprehend and converse is very low,' says Satya Sai Sylada, 24/7 Customer's head of hiring for India. 'That's the biggest challenge we face.'

Geeta Anand