Certificates indicate overall understanding and depth in a subject. Certificates elevate chances of getting interview calls. Achieving couple of certifications in parallel to academic is a matter of passion, not the challenge of time.
Q: No. of external technical certifications you achieved?
10%
2
0%
Certifications
To put the story short, certificates elevate chances of getting interview calls.
Certificate is one way of indicating the depth and overall knowledge of particular competency.
Generally, institutions and students do not have orientation of achieving certifications (in the goal area) during academics itself.
If students are sparing little time in parallel to academics to understand the pattern of certifications, it is a feasible task to achieve certification along with academics
No product can be called complete unless met NFRs (Non-functional Requirements) like Performance, Security, Accessibility, Supportability, etc. At industry, NFRs become one of the exit criteria to release the product in to market.
Q: No. of Non-functional areas you are familiar with?
5%
2
0%
Non-functional requirements
No product can be called complete without meeting non-functional requirements like Performance, Security, Accessibility, Supportability, etc.
At academic, this may not be given focus and may not be covered also.
But in the industry, non-functional area becomes on one of the EXIT CRITERIA for release.
At industry, tools will be mandated to increase productivity and to control quality & cost. ‘Tool Usage Index’ is one common metric. Students take considerable time to adopt tools in the project environment. Open-source tools can be explored from first year itself to master few tools.
Q: Number of tools you are familiar with?
5%
4
0%
Tool Usage Index (SMART WORK) - Usage of Open source tools
One of the common words heard in the industry is smart work.
To ensure productivity, and to control quality and cost, industry enforces to explore and adopt applicable tools for the entire cycle of product development and product support.
Matured systems follow a critical metric called Tool Usage Index for the whole development cycle and mandates a minimum index say 70%.
In academics, the exposure to commonly used tools may not be provided and students when get into real time projects struggle to scale to the new environment of tools.
There are many open source tools easy to use from first year itself. For example, Wireshark tool which monitors the network traffic is easy to install but gives exposure to network protocols.
An important goal of education is to gain the expertise of solutioning. Reading weekly/monthly magazines in the given domain/technology will help to understand on how subject is applied to create solutions.
Q: No. of hours spent on reading/watching Domain/Technology Magazines/Videos. (Weekly 1 hour -Target; 104 hours in 2nd & 3rd years).
5%
104
0%
Technology Hours
The ultimate goal of education, in the long run, should be solutioning.
Academics will set the context of subject, but students should be exposed to how this subject is applied to solutioning and latest trends in those subjects.
This can be achieved by reading weekly/monthly/quarterly magazines in the given domain/technology.
This will also help to understand the subject better in terms of concepts and design.
Suggesting students to spend one hour per week on magazine reading to raise the exposure and confidence also.
Guide plays critical role in: Creating awareness on opportunities, setting goals, challenging the potential; Effective planning, monitoring and reporting; Minimizing Rik of Failure; Nurturing strengths and areas of improvement; Overall, better return of investment for the TIME (Time, Intellect Effort and Money) spent by student.
Q: No. of months, your guide reviewed your Monthly Status Report?
7.5%
24
0%
Guided Path - Goal setting and monitoring:
Most of the students have ambition to get selected in the campus. Whereas few students will have a comprehensive goal with specifics to domain, technology, company, salary levels, etc. Students may not have orientation to take stretch goals to challenge their potential continuously.
Lack of Guidance: This may be because they have not mandated to work under a Guide/Mentor for whole engineering period. Even in the cases of stretch goals taken, effective modes of monitoring may be missing. It was observed that students who made it practice sending weekly report have smoothly succeeded in achieving their goals.
Few parameters like Category, title of task, Priority, Target Date, Revised Target date, Risk of Failure, Status gave good exposure to project management principles and efficiency, in achieving goals in predictable manner.
World has reached to the current comfort by passion, hard work and sacrifice for generations. You want to be a Consumer or Contributor?
Q. Number of Concept Notes you submitted or Proof of Concepts you demonstrated from your own ideas?
(Concept Note: Problem Statement, Impact, Various Solutions, Solution Suggested, Effort & Timelines, Budget, Risks, Output & Outcomes)
5%
1
0%
Innovation / Concept Note
World has reached to this stage of comfort because of passion and hard work by many passionate individuals for generations.
Their inventions have helped to the standard of living and pleasure of life of mankind.
Next to invention, Innovation plays role to bring in efficiency in the systems.
Two key factors (finance terms) of industry are top line and bottom line (more business and better profits).
In this context, it is important to realize the basic and simplest definition of efficiency. “More with less” Delivery more with less resources and time.
For achieving this, orientation of continuous thought process is needed to explore all feasible areas.
This may not be orientation at student level. But when challenged, students can raise their thoughts to come up with solutions.
Most of the students may not transforming an idea to products.
Most of the students may not know a term called concept note to present the problem, impact, various feasible solutions and the better solution proposed.
Industry is the place of integrating the potential and resources to offer optimized solutions to problems (or requirements) of customer. More output with less time, less cost, better quality, and better usability are the demands at industry.
Q. Number of internships you have done at industry?
7.5%
2
0%
Internships: Outcome - Faster onboarding to customer projects
Industry is the place where needs of customer and perspective of customer’s customer to be understood and addressed in less time, less cost, better quality, and better usability.
Industry also stands for an important definition like Integrating the potential. Execution methodologies (Project Management, RAID…., ) best practices, etc. Internship will help student to become productive faster and faster onboarding to customer projects
This is the third level of maturing the competency. Learning academics, teaching, and then presenting in technical events. Facing audience beyond the homogeneous environment and questions will help raise the thought process, competency and boosts the confidence.
Q: Number of presentations given in Technical Events?
5%
2
0%
Presentations in Tech. events – Sharp the competency and confidence
This is the third level of maturing the competency.
Learning academics, teaching, and then presenting in technical events.
This will sharpen the learning as time given will be less and expectations will be high.
Facing audience beyond the homogeneous environment and questions will raise the competency and boosts the confidence.
Ability to analyse situation / environment, identify root cause, explore options, identify optimum solution. Hiring manager’s favourite is, problem solving skill.
Q. Number of Analytical model papers you solved with score greater than 75%?
5%
10
0%
Life is a continuous Analysis
The next stage of competency is to apply it to solve the problems and introduce new solutions.
Ability to analyse the situation plays the role here. This is matter of orientation, exposure to various situations to identify appropriate technology to provide solution. If applied to the industry, understanding the customer perspective is especially important.
Say whether it is requirement gathering, a problem raised by customer, understanding customer environment issues, configuration issues, etc., all matter of ability to analyse.
Recruiters only want those on their team who are quick on their feet and have problem solving abilities.
This cannot be taught in classrooms; this can only be attained through practice.
No regrets for missing to answer known things in the interview. SMIs help to reduce anxiety/nervousness in the interview. “Script Readiness": Be ready (and practice) with at least 25 questions you expect in the interview and prepare at least 5 sentences answer for each question.
Q. Number of mock interviews you practiced which scored minimum 8/10?
7.5%
10
0%
Self and mock interviews (Preparation for Exam vs Interview) (Questions and script readiness)
If we compare the ratio of, Outcome vs self-potential in the interview, in most of the cases it is generally low. Compare the preparation for exam vs interview. For exam, there are lots of questions listed and preparation goes till the last moment.
How many students are ready with probable questions for the interview?
How many students have script ready for the questions identified?
How many students practice interview questions in mock mode?
We haven’t reached to handle an interview like a timebound exam.
This is leading to “transmission loss of potential” in the interview.
Identifying at least 25 questions, making script ready for each question (around 10 sentences), doing 5 self-interviews and 5 mock interviews will raise the probability of success in the interview.
Mock interviews help a candidate prepare for the worst.
It helps them reduce their anxiety and also gives them a fair view of possible obstacles during an interview.
Constructive feedback after the interview provides the candidate with certain points to practice and master.
This way, the candidate can overcome any apprehension that he may have.
Indication of: Your Empathy; Gratitude to Society; Ability to work in teams and lead team(s); 1. Association or membership with Academic/professional orgs; 2. Volunteer and service activities; 3. Program Management of events; 4. Cross Culture/Heterogeneous events (beyond campus); 5. Arts and sports;
Q. Number of categories from the above list, you worked with?
5%
5
0%
Extra-curricular activities
Volunteering and managing programs scale-up attributes of hard working, servicing, teamwork, which will help higher productivity at workplace.
It also stands symbolic of a candidate’s wholesome development throughout his graduation.
Job Readiness Index is Copyright by Narasimha Raju Kesipeddi, a Senior Software Professional.
**Disclaimer - JRI is a framework aimed at enabling students realize their tentative level of employability.
One can't take JRI number in absolute terms of comparison in winning a particular job.
