A Bargain, Until It Doesn't Work Well

You know the old saying that 'you get what you pay for'? It still applies. And US techies are paying for it with un- and under-employment.

[Bangalore, India] 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...

That's not all.

...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.--WSJournal

IOW, the engineering "degree" isn't worth spit.

The Indian BigBoys of computer consulting--Wipro and Tata--have problems, too. And they export them to US companies who, frankly, buy on price. But these folks simply cannot speak English well which WILL lead to problems when designing and writing complex computer programs for those US customers.

But hey, even if the system doesn't function--it was delivered at the right price!!

HT: Monty/AOSHQ