[March 17, 2010: Karachi, Pakistan] The CIO-P@SHA Campus Conversations took place at the main campus of FAST today. Attended by more than 80 students, the 2-hour session was the first of a nation-wide initiative to bridge the gap between the industry and the academia. The panelists from the industry were: Jehan Ara, President P@SHA; Ashar Zaidi, Country Manager Intel Pakistan; Yusuf Jan, Head of MIXIT Technologies; Rahim Lalani Head of TRG Tech; and Danish Nafay, Deputy Manager SBS at National Foods Limited.
From the academia side, the representatives included, Professor Zafar Nasir, Head of Department (CS), Dr. Zubair Sheikh, Director FAST Karachi Campus, Amna, Ravendar Laal, Taha Rafiq and Sohaib Qamar.
The session began with members of the industry briefly introducing their companies and what they saw to be a challenge in working with the academia. The academia and student reps, in turn, responded by identifying their challenges in speaking with the industry.
A recurring question and concern that students had for the industry revolved around the fact that though organizations wanted to hire students with experience, perhaps the same organizations were unable to provide them with the adequate training or ready internship experience for them to use as part of their CV. And there was a great deal of concern as to the role of the CV and GPA that students had when going in for interviews. Rahim Lalani started right off the bat, by saying, “We want to hire graduates that are smart and yes, amongst other things, we also look at their GPA. We are looking for problem solvers.” While some students in the audience nodded in constant agreement, others stood up and questioned the sole importance given to the Grade Point Average.
But let’s put things a little into perspective. There has to be a qualitative measure of the 4 years an individual puts into his/her education. The only mass qualitative measure is the GPA. Is it an absolute assessment of the quality of the student? No. Does that mean that the GPA system should be done away with? Probably not. Ashar Zaidi and Yusuf Jan both stressed on the fact that there needs to be an overall assessment of the individual. But if we are to put things into perspective, there is that little thing called the ‘first impression’. No matter what, CVs that make it to the potential employer’s desk, has to make an impression. If you have a low GPA but strong in Community Involvement and Extra Curricular activities, chances are strong that the entire resume will stand out. If you have nothing to balance out the IQ issue.
Dr. Zubair Shaikh took the inverted pyramid approach and presented the industry with solutions. The Final Year Project debacle where the gap between the choice of FYP has no input from the subject matter experts, resulting in little or no commercial opportunity and kills the project before it starts. FAST proposes two things: one – to reach out to the industry a little earlier in year and invite them in to brainstorm and guide the projects and two, setting up a fund for the Computer Science faculty and encourage those projects towards incubtion, which seem to have long-term viability.
Jehan Ara stood up and offered the industry as mentors and to plug the students and the University into a Mentorship network. She also talked about establishing a P@SHA Student Chapter at FAST with the help of 5 volunteer students and support of the CS Department.
Issues such as lack of RnD opportunities, structured and formalized internet program, the lack of clear and measurable industry goals, and a general lack of understanding a clear career path that meets industry standards, were all issues that came up during the discussion.
The Building Blocks
Here’s a question that’s still up for grabs – Who’s responsibility is it to make all this happen? Is it the industry’s job to publicize jobs and then hand-hold students towards the internship and then the job process? Is it the University’s job to take the first step to talk to the industry and get them involved in the syllabus? Is it the Student’s responsibility to identify and plan the careerpath?
According to Dr. Zubair Shaikh, Pakistan has 20,000 IT graduates entering the job market each year. And while some may think this number to be ‘inadequate’ and the quality to be ‘unsubstantial’, have we stopped to assess what the absorption capacity is for these graduates? Does the local industry have enough jobs? What’s the standard? The benchmark? How much work has been done in identifying the needs? The education institutions will continue to churn out students. If they aren’t being absorbed, why isn’t anyone doing anything about the solution?
The fact of the matter, it seems, is that everyone has a role to play, if we expect anything to happen. And it will take time, but well.. SOME change has to be seen for the perception to change for the better. It seems that everything boils down to 3 things:
- The Industry has to identify its requirements along with its roadmap. How many jobs are available? What kinds of skills will be required 3 years down the line? Is there more focus on services or products? What are salary benchmarks like and what should specific requirements expect?
- The University has to figure out what it needs from the industry. Is the syllabus in alignment with the ‘light at the end of the tunnel’? Do the skills match? Is enough emphasis being given on experience and if it is, then are students being given hours or credit to make the extra effort?
- The Students need to learn all this and more. Call them the bi-products or the future, the students for any institution will inherit the industry and the market. But while they are hitting the books, they also need to access information about the local market. From all the stakeholders involved, the Students have undoubtedly the most difficult task.
All this happens with discussion. With Conversation. The Campus Conversation we initiated at FAST-NU, was just one step. We don’t claim that everything will be okay after the session ended, but we did achieve something. Something small, but it was something.
Commitments
So here’s what was committed by each Industry representative at FAST:
- National Foods – Danish Nafay, also a FAST Alumni, has offered to be available to FAST students for 3, 3-hour long sessions to talk them through the practical experience of implementing SAP in an organization. National Foods will also work on aligning their corporate Internship program with FAST internship opportunities.
- Intel Pakistan’s Ashar Zaidi has offered to come and engage in knowledge-share with students. Ashar has also requested FAST to help get the alumni more engaged with the students.
- Rahim Lalani of TRG Tech is already aligned with FAST students through their various programs and simply reiterated that the world had some great expectations for the fresh grads.
- Yusuf Jan also offered mentoring sessions for the students, starting in April 2010 and will have his senior management come and talk to the students.
- Jehan Ara announced the inclusion of students into regular mentoring programs as well as setting up a P@SHA Chapter at FAST.
There is one underlying theme that has to be understood. We’re all selfish. Every stakeholder that participates in any activity, expects a return. While businesses will invest in students and universities where they see potential for hiring Human Capital. Students also have the selfish expectation of wanting to get the ROI from the time they spend interacting with business.
Many thanks to all the panelists and everyone at FAST for allowing this discussion to start. Special thanks to Ms. Nida for her time, commitment and dedication to making this possible. And yes, I’d also like to take the opportunity to thank Ghulam Murtaza (GM) and my timekeeper for the first part of the session. I’d also like to extend my sincere gratitude to DELL, TRG Tech, PSEB and TiE for their support.
Feel free to leave your questions, comments and feedback below this post.
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[...] first Campus Conversations session was held at FAST. You can read about how things went off here, and watch the first part of the video in this post. In order to make it slightly easier for you to [...]
[...] first Campus Conversations session was held at FAST. You can read about how things went off here, and watch the second part of the video in this post. In order to make it slightly easier for you [...]
Indeed its a great effort by the IT industry specialists towards academia. Similar efforts are also being done by some local telecom gurus. Zumbeel.net is at the forefront of this matter and conducting live forums at edu / non-edu locations for professionals and students alike.
I am really glad that P@SHA and CIO Pakistan are trying to fill the gap and I am really looking forward to a more strong relationship between the industry and the academia.
This is a great initiative by CIO and PASHA! Take my word, this really was the best seminar sort of talkshow, ever to be held at FAST NUCES Karachi!
A hearty congratulations on its success!
I hope all the commitments get fulfilled and things really get done, instead of getting forgotten with the trailing sands of time.
When we will have follow-ups on the points we have agreed upon?
Thanks.
@Atif – Soon… Mixit had promised to conduct a knowledgecamp-type session at FAST in April.. Are you a student at FAST?
[...] first Campus Conversations session was held at FAST. You can read about how things went off here, and watch the third and final part of the video in this post. In order to make it slightly easier [...]
[...] the full details at http://ciopakistan.com/2010/03/campus-conversations-goes-to-fast/ Categories: Pasha, Technology Comments (0) Trackbacks (0) Leave a comment [...]
No doubt its a great initiative for making a good industry-academia relationship which is beneficial for students. But it will come to fruit when some practical steps will be taken .
In the end thanks CIO and PASHA for conducting such a unique program.
Wow Faruukh! Many thanks! Let’s hope we can keep things moving along… Let me know if you need anything further for your own post..? The Internet never forgets… and we hope use that as a reminder to, well… not forget!!
Oh absolutely. The conversation only hopes to give everyone a chance to identify the issues and then propose solutions… In experience, it’s always advisable to break down the BIG problem into a small pieces that can be resolved…. these are the minute pieces. Mentoring, Internships, Sessions….. At the end of the day, it has to benefit everyone involved… and most certainly pave the way for students to be PART of the industry while they are still in Universities, rather than wait for this relationship to begin post-graduation… Lots to do, so let’s get to it.. Thank you for taking the time to go through the post and share your thoughts..
[...] I will not go into a blow -by-blow account of what was said, and by whom, because that is all available in the videos that have been uploaded at the CIO Webstudio. However, I just wanted to mention some of the highlights. A more complete coverage with photos is available at http://ciopakistan.com/2010/03/campus-conversations-goes-to-fast/. [...]
LOL @ the last line
Make sure you see what people said about you on my blog!
Here’s the link in case you haven’t seen:
http://farrukh09.wordpress.com/2010/03/17/campus-conversations/
P.S. Thanks a tonne for the collaboration.
@PASHA : You have initiated the best thing ever for students of Pakistan. Why i would say this the best initiative? because in Pakistan we are lacking in IT industry. Well i hope no one will agree with me. But the point is , Does IT industry means only the bunch of people doing coding all the time ? making software for other companies and so and so. Well with saying these kind of activities, Pakistan will not succeed whether you introduce thousands of IT companies or etc. The reason is, we always opt to be servant. Frankly speaking, but very hard to be passionate about this point. Why not produce Computer scientist instead of Robots sitting in front of dummy machine all the time ? as a computer science student, our aim is to have computer science approach in a scientific school of thought. But today all these so called IT industries are pushing us towards machine age. Hence we agree to be servant for ever.
I would rather raise the point to the IT industry Why don’t you initiate research work in IT universities in Pakistan ? where students are let to expose their creative thinking and approach towards technologies of the age. I am sure what i have heard from the head of PASHA is their mind set too, that what initiative we take, at the end of the day, our business counts too. Well the best way is to invest in the research work in universities by building board of research in IT.
[...] the first session at FAST, the journey of the CIO-P@SHA Campus Conversations continues and we carried a panel from the [...]
[...] a 3-minute audio podcast that gives you an update about what Campus Conversations did at FAST-NU. More about Campus Conversations? Click [...]
Hello, I just wanted to ask from Madam Rabia Gharib that Campus Conversations goes to NED, goes to FAST y not to University Of Karachi????
We also have a department of IT and computer science which is Umaer Basha Institute Of Technology (formerly known as Department of Computer Science).
Just asking to know the reason no harsh feelings
Salaams Waqar Ali Khan Sahib.. Madam Rabia Garib will be more than happy to come to University of Karachi if you can help organize the event.. We contact each University and some agree to let us conduct the activity, others refuse and some keep sending us to different people… If you can help organize, we’d be more than happy to bring Campus Conversations to University of Karachi. No harsh feelings from our side either..
Some fantastic points raised by Dr. Zubair. I’ll definitely contribute
towards a few of them soon, as I already have done by “Postgraduate in
Careers Guidance” from London, UK and I’m now in Karachi.
Also, I know the IT industry quite well, being a graduate of FAST
and Masters from SZABIST.
A good point raised by Atif about follow-up. It’s always helpful to have
a follow-up.
Finally, brilliant session.
regards,
Amin Saleem
Postgraduate in Careers Guidance (London, UK)
Thanks Amin – Now that we’ve completed two sessions, those conversations are now in the follow-up phase so we’ll keep posting updates on them as and when the panelists begin with their engagement process..
Also, if you’re in town for a bit, we should try and see if we can get you to join us at Szabist.. As an alumni, it might be interesting to get your perspectives! Many thanks again!
[...] through NED and FAST, CIO Pakistan landed at IBA today to bring the budding youth of yet another institution at [...]
[...] will host the first of the CIO Mentor Nashta series on his office premises today. 7 students from FAST-NU, based on their attendance of the Campus Conversations session that was conducted there, have [...]
@Rabia Gharib : What so ever is the condition of the software industry in Pakistan, But i do see bright future in software industry through your and P@sha Initiative. But Please try to understand that P@sha has to support the institutes at best of its tools, Because industry can grow well when every student feels independent and free to participate in research project.
I agree, sir.. But two things: One, the support has to be mutually aggressive and sustainable and two, the market conditions aren’t bad.. they are just unknown. Unknown variables create uncertainty. By engaging everyone in a discussion, we’re trying to quantify the unknowns to something so that there IS a bit more certainty by the time students are ready to be in the job market.. But I agree… the support has to be there…
[...] up on their commitment to increasing their link with the academia, National Foods will be conducting a 2-hour session today at FAST-NU to talk about “Gaining [...]
great work danish and ashar you guy rip that little shit lalani ass nice and clean great work and hands off for that
It has always been a privilege to be an audience of CIO campus conversation at FAST. And as always, CIO has always been helpful in bridging the gap between the industry and the academics. One things that has remained consistant realting to my conclusion at the end of every CIO conversation is that; its the lack on our side, the industry is always willing to help