Articles 1 to 15 of 35
Physical Education and Sports Make Inroads in India's Schools
A new chapter is unfolding in Indian schools. As administrators and parents realize the importance of sports in academia, entrepreneurs are pitching in to offer professionally managed sports and physical education programs. Experts tell India Knowledge@Wharton that this trend is in keeping with India's economic growth, but caution that schools need to sharply monitor outsourced sporting activities.
India's Demographic Dividend: Asset or Liability?
India is getting younger as the rest of the world is graying. By 2020, the average Indian will be only 29 years of age, compared with 37 in China and the U.S., 45 in Western Europe, and 48 in Japan. This means an increase in the working-age ratio and a "demographic dividend." But, as a recent panel discussion held at the University of Pennsylvania's Center for the Advanced Study of India pointed out, the big challenge is getting these young people ready for the modern job market.
India Learns the Value of the Chief Learning Officer
Today more than ever before, organizations are facing learning and development challenges among their staffs. For emerging economies like India, the role of the chief learning officer (CLO) is becoming more critical as organizations struggle to keep pace with change in their new global environments. At the same time, annual CLO events are becoming richer in their diversity. India Knowledge@Wharton reports on the latest meeting, held in Mumbai recently.
Aegis’s Sudhir Agarwal: Mastering the Softer Side of M&A
Sudhir Agarwal, president of global M&A and business transformation at Aegis, an outsourcing services firm, says acquisitions typically fail because not enough attention is paid to the "softer" aspects of integration. In a conversation with India Knowledge@Wharton, Agarwal discusses current trends in the outsourcing industry, what his company has learned from past acquisitions and why integration after a merger is, above all, about dealing with the emotions of the employees.
Importing Efficiency: Can Lessons from Mumbai's Dabbawalas Help Its Taxi Drivers?
On a superficial level, Mumbai's taxi drivers and its dabbawalas -- organized porters who carry cooked lunches to office workers -- seem to have a lot in common. Both come from marginalized socio-economic groups. Their average education is up to the eighth grade. They belong to a low-skill, working class category and service the city’s middle class. Why, then, are their reputations so radically distinct? While taxi drivers are constantly in the news for reports of bad behavior, the dabbawalas have been cited as a case study of efficiency. Can best practices from the latter help change the taxi drivers' working conditions -- and their image?
Wooing the Next Generation of Indian Academics
Can campuses be cloned? The Indian higher education community is grappling with that question as the government opens up additional locations of the Indian Institutes of Technology and Indian Institutes of Management. Critics say that the move will dilute the colleges' brand equity, noting that the institutes are only as good as their faculty. Meanwhile, a new study shows that Indians living in the U.S. are increasingly interested in careers in academia in their home country. But matching these men and women with available faculty positions in India could be tricky, the study's authors say.
Salaries on the Rise: Globalization Brings New Pressures to India
Salaries in India are expected to rise more than anywhere else in the world, according to several recent surveys. One reason is that globalization has helped to level the playing field. Other influences include increased domestic demand and a shortage of the right talent. These factors are causing a reassessment of compensation practices and are exerting some pressure on bottom lines, experts tell India Knowledge@Wharton.
Preparing the Underprivileged: Do Super 30 and Other Coaching Classes Make the Grade?
Competition for places at the Indian Institutes of Technology long ago spawned an industry of coaching classes, some of which have attracted private equity investments. Super 30, a hard-driving class in Bihar, has won acclaim for its success in preparing the underprivileged for acceptance to the institutes that typically admit one in 60 applicants. India Knowledge@Wharton looks at what Super 30 and others have accomplished, and why some critics say coaching classes inadequately prepare students for the real work ahead of them.
TeamLease's Manish Sabharwal on Taking Training -- and Jobs -- to the People
Manish Sabharwal, co-founder and chairman of India's largest temporary staffing company, TeamLease Services of Bangalore, recently entered into an agreement with the Gujarat state government to set up India's first vocational education university. The TeamLease University will set up 22 community colleges across the state. In a discussion with India Knowledge@Wharton, Sabharwal talks about the rationale behind this venture, the business model and how it creates incentives for all participants.
Is India’s Demographic Dividend a Liability?
More than half of India's population is younger than 25, and the entry of this group into the working population over the next few decades is expected to spur the country's economic growth. But this will be possible only if the youth are employable; if not, the situation will lead to wide social unrest, according to Kartik Hosanagar, professor of operations and information management at Wharton. In this opinion piece, Hosanagar discusses the dangers of India's demographic dividend.
Labor Backlash: Multinationals Feel the Heat of Worker Dissatisfaction in India
Multinational companies (MNCs) operating in India were drawn to the country by a cheap and educated pool of workers. But some of these firms view the Indian workforce as argumentative and unwilling to accept the regime ushered in by the MNCs. Facing a spate of strikes, agitations -- and, at times, violent uprisings -- what can MNCs do to get labor relations back on track?
HCL's Vineet Nayar: Winning More Business in a Recession Means Putting Employees First
HCL Technologies CEO Vineet Nayar responded to the recent global recession by placing employee satisfaction ahead of customer satisfaction. The result was a bounty of winning ideas that translated into more business at the expense of competitors. In an interview with India Knowledge@Wharton, Nayar shares his insights into how companies can innovate as buyers' preferences are changing, among other topics.
India's Next IT Upgrade: To Better Align Employee Performance with Rewards
During the high-growth phase of the Indian information technology (IT) industry, human resources management was all about hiring in large numbers and lowering attrition. The recent slowdown, however, has made organizations more demanding of their employees. The focus has shifted to building competencies and increasing productivity, and employees are now being evaluated more stringently on the value they bring to the table. But experts warn that with the economic recovery gathering pace, the lessons of the downturn could soon be forgotten.
Bridging the Talent Gap in India's 'Demographic Dividend'
The aging population profile in developed countries will place huge demands on India's relatively younger workforce in the coming decades, experts predict. A recent Washington, D.C., conference attempted to size up the task of creating the necessary educational and training infrastructure in India to meet global employment needs, and ways in which the United States could help in that effort.
TeamLease's Manish Sabharwal on Fixing India's People Supply Chain
Since Bangalore-based TeamLease Services was launched in 2002 to be a pioneer in temporary staffing in India, it has located jobs for more than half a million Indians. But according to Manish Sabharwal, a co-founder and chairman of TeamLease, the company could be finding work for many more unemployed by addressing a key constraint: the skills deficiencies of its candidates. In an interview with India Knowledge@Wharton, Sabharwal discusses India's job environment, the problem of "unemployability" and the company's strategy to prepare people for work.
