NRI Career question: Is it tough to get a job in India after returning back from abroad with international work experience?

This was a recent question that came to me from an online forum. My response follows

Yes, I won’t sugarcoat it. It is certainly tough if you are job-hunting after returning from abroad with “international work experience.” I say this from my experience after returning back to India (link to another post).

Here’s why it may be “tough” to get a job after returning back, and what you could do

• Sheer population in urban-India with lot more educated and experienced workers looking for better opportunities, and intense competition for high-end (high paying) positions.
• You might over-value your “International work experience,” but recruiters don’t. A lot of Indians, especially in Info-tech sectors have such international experience and you will find it hard to stand out just on that account.
• If you have spent an extended period abroad, you may not have a network of peers in the local market who can make introductions or give referrals to openings
• Ageism - In the west, many professionals continue to be ‘hands on’ even as they gain experience in a field. This is true for hi-tech workers too. However, in India, hi-tech workers get ‘promoted’ to management positions early in their career and those skills are as valued in experienced professionals. If you happen to be a 40-something IT programmer, you will certainly find it hard to find an IT-programming job in India.
• Lot of ‘returning NRIs’ move back as they are unable to accept changes back in India. Employers may be hesitant to hire such NRIs if they are not likely to stick around.

So, what do you do?

• Focus your job search at organizations where you think your specific skills and experience are going to be in demand 
• Revive your network. Use social-media tools like LinkedIn to re-connect with old friends and peers and seek their help in getting you referrals and opportunities
• Don’t downplay your “international experience” but show how this, along with your current skills can help prospective employers 
• If you plan a long-term tenure in India, you should demonstrate such commitment to prospective employers.

You may also check out an earlier blog of mine - Is LinkedIn a useful platform for Job hunting ?

IT Career advice from Mohan

Here is a recent question from an online forum: What would you advise to a CSE undergraduate from India in the current scenario when Indian IT companies are laying off lots of employees?

My response follows -

Having spent the past couple of decades in the vibrant field of IT, my advice to CSE undergrads is simple: Be prepared to reskill yourself while staying grounded on the fundamentals.

Advise like “re-invent yourself” and “constant reskilling” is an oft repeated mantra, so much so that it starts to sound clichéd.

For instance, I started as a Windows developer (back when computing was ‘client server’) and switched to programming on mainframes (MVS, CICS, DB2 etc), learnt EAI, Integration and TIBCO and later moved to web-servers and middlewares before I morphed into an Enterprise Architect and continue to observe and learn about ERPs (SAP) Cloud platforms, SaaS customizations, integrations etc etc.

Did I have to ‘reinvent’ myself every-time? NO. I was merely adding to my experience.

If one has strong grounding in the fundamentals of computing, most of what one continues to learn is incremental and doesn’t necessarily involve a ‘reboot.’ For instance, the database-101 skills I used in DB2 are just as relevant as I review SQL and Big-data.

What this means to you is the same: try to get a very good grounding in the fundamentals of computing because this is what you will continue to build on during your career.

Q&A on Enterprise Architecture and IT careers

Here are a couple of recent question from an online forum that I answered:  

What is enterprise system? What are the differences between digital platform and it?

Let us start with Enterprise system - Wikipedia

“Enterprise systems (ES) are large-scale application software packages that support business processes, information flows, reporting, and data analytics in complex organizations.”

The term Enterprise Systems generally refers to an application platform used across the enterprise. Examples would include systems serving the needs of ERP, Manufacturing and Supply chain, HR, Finance etc used across an organization or by multiple business unites

Wikipedia - Digital platform : Integrated Digital Platforms is a generalized term for multimedia platforms that perform various business functions. An example of such a function is collecting and analyzing marketing trends and patterns

Back to your question: What are the differences between digital platform and ES? The differences are subtle, and would vary from one organization to the next. One can argue that all ES are also “digital platforms” However, most business users would think of ES as “internal corporate systems” while “digital platforms” could also be external facing.

ps: check out my Pulse post on the topic of Digital Strategy execution and the Executive update on Cutter (if you have access to it)

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How many years a software engineer can survive in IT industry in India?

As for now I haven’t seen any retired software engineers in India. So, I was just thinking, like other jobs(Banking sector, Lecturers, teachers) can a Software Engineer survive in IT industry till his retirement age.

Years ago I worked with Stephen Butler, one of the smartest Software Engineers I have known. He was about 61 or 62 when I met him.

He was the kind of hands-on guy who thrived on challenges like de-compiling complex and obscure code. In my engagement, he was tasked with decompiling an old Forte 4GL application used to run a retailer’s payment engine. He was happy being a hands-on software engineer, happy to learn new languages and platforms while continuing to be updated on newer techniques.

Stephen was also a proud guy. A new new grandfather, proud as hell to be living in a nice single-family home in the Bay Area that he had paid off in three decades spent there.

I got a call from Stephen’s wife one day informing me that he had died. He was 64, and his wife said he died the way he would have wanted to - a sudden cardiac arrest while at his home-office debugging some code!

His LinkedIn profile continues to live in perpetuity.

Have I seen any 50 or 60 year old Software Engineers in India? No.

Does it mean a Software Engineer cannot survive in the same role till s/he decides to retire? One can probably survive if one wanted to, but most opt to follow the Dilbert Principle of being promoted to their level of incompetence.

What do you do if your employer is in news for takeover or M&A?

We wake up to news and rumors of mega-mergers almost every day; and in many cases, it is just news that we comment or exclaim about before going on with our jobs in the corporate world. I am not going to try to link to the ‘big’ M&A news since that is bound to be old-news by the time this is published. J Occasionally, however, such ‘news’ or rumor may hit closer home, especially if one happens to be working for a company that is an acquisition target, or has announced a merger with another (similar sized) company.

Jobs, roles and employees are bound to be impacted by any M&A. If the corporations are to realize the benefits of a merger or acquisition, they will have to “consolidate operations” and “streamline redundancies” and get rid of duplicate operations, processes and systems. People are an integral part of the equation, but the decisions, even those impacting jobs and careers can be very impersonal. The impersonal nature of corporate decisions has been captured in endless movies and documentaries (my favorite is “Up in the Air” featuring George Clooney as the corporate "Downsizer").

Although people are just ‘resources’ in the context of corporate planning and M&A, impact to individuals can be very personal. Therefore, the smallest news or rumor of an M&A can, and generally will be discussed in “informal” communication network between employees, contractors and others in communities impacted by the companies in question. Thanks to ubiquitous access to social media – blogs, tweets, discussion forums on Linkedin and Facebook - such informal communication may also get amplified, making it harder to sift through fact against rumor or gossip.
All this happens while the merging companies’ own “corporate communications” groups continue to work overtime trying to manage and ‘control’ communications.

What is at play is obvious: individuals seeking answers to a simple question “how will this impact me?” Employees and contractors may begin wondering if, when, and how their jobs will be impacted.
The answers to this question may not be obvious. In fact, will certainly not get answered till a deal is inked, decisions on the implementation of the ‘strategy’ are taken, and the process to execute on it set in motion. So, what should individuals (you and I) do while the wheels of corporate change continue to churn in the background?

Prepare to embrace change: when it comes

• Prepare for a slow pace of fast change. Initial planning of a merger or announcement may appear to be in slow-motion (and happen in background) but will probably be executed fast.
• Be prepared with your personal what-if analysis. No point in being caught like a deer in front of a headlight. A while ago, I was musing on Free Agents in the corporate world. I wonder if wearing a free-agent hat in our corporate careers may help soften the blow if we are impacted.

Try to avoid contributions to the rumor mill

• There is enough speculation out in the social media. There may be wisdom in keeping your views to yourself

Minimize conversations on “Scenario planning” and “What if analysis” with peers …. unless this is expected of your role

• Most of us are better off leaving experts (and external stock market speculators / investors) to do the “what if” analysis of M&A rumors

Bottomline: don’t worry about continually sifting through M&A rumor in an attempt to find nuggets of reality. Newswire reports and ‘news’ is increasingly mixed with rumors, headline grabbing and “quoting some unknown executives,” especially when it comes to M&A. Deals may or may not get inked, and even speculators in the stockmarket may not have the complete picture till a deal is announced and signed.

(cross post from my Linkedin Pulse post)