The Year 2015 can be marked as the year of growth in IT sector owing to a boost of startup activity in India. This change has created numerous opportunities for job applicants and is marked by significant hiring trends.
Generic hiring trends within the IT industry
The India skills report 2015 states that the hiring trend in India is on an upward trajectory, and a large chunk of the numbers favour the IT sector. The report however also throw light on the gaps in gender diversity within this sector. According to this report, while IT is a favourable career choice for 68% of men, only 32% of women are gainfully employed within this sector. Nonetheless, on the whole tech hiring will continue to dominate job growth in the country.
Shift in focus - Peak in IT hiring within startups
India has over 3100+ startups, which is 4th highest in the world, according a report published by NASSCOM. In 2015 alone over 450 funding events have been disclosed, providing these companies with financial power to compete for the best talent. Large numbers of professional from established companies such as MNCs and IT services firms are seeking challenges at fast-growing startups. Most startups prefer to hire from other software product companies, or freshers from top schools like IITs and NITs.
Various factors are driving the demand for talent at startups:
1. Competitive salaries: Companies are willing to pay a significant premium for top-notch talent. It is not uncommon to see 100% salary hikes for niche skills such as mobile app developers and UX designers. In addition to high salaries, most startups are offering ESOPs to software engineers, although the amount of ESOPs offered is still significantly less than what is offered by startups in the US.
As the founder of Instahyre, an online hiring platform that has more than 200 funded startups as clients, we have access to some interesting data on salaries offered for IT roles within startups.
2. Surge in the mobile first companies: This has led to a classic demand and supply imbalance. Mobile apps being a relatively new phenomenon, few software engineering have prior experience in developing them, while most consumer startups in India are focussing only on Android and iPhone apps. Newer, open source technologies like Javascript, Python and Ruby are also in high demand. This is far from the hiring that happens in established companies, which typically use older technologies.
3. Significant opportunities: With the growth in the start-up segment, there’s a considerable increase in team leading roles like technical architects and engineering managers with 6 or more years of experience. Funding deal sizes are also increasing, resulting in a greater fight for talent.
4. Emergence of make in India: The Make In India campaign has given a tremendous boost to the startup sector that is observing newer opportunities in both large and emerging cities. Bangalore has the highest startup activity and the highest concentration of talent. However, NCR as a whole matches Bangalore in terms of the number of funded startups. About 75% of funded startups are based in these two cities alone. Mumbai is increasingly becoming a startup hub due to a tightly knit culture from IIT Bombay and now comprises more than 15% of startups. Hyderabad, Pune and Chennai, though home to some large MNCs, are seeing relatively low activity in the space.
Even when the hiring trends look positive, finding the best fit and the right job remains the biggest challenge within this fraternity. Soft aspects like building relationships with the applicants and giving them a personalized experience are territories that are explored very rarely and should be an area of investment for IT companies. A platform like Instahyre allows companies to find the best talent available and reduces time to hire.
(Author Aditya Rajgarhia is CEO and Founder of Instahyre.com)
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