The Business of IT: Campus Conversations Goes to Preston University

The Group shot with some students at Preston University

July 22, 2010: One might not be what one appears to be. Of the many nouns this holds true for, Preston University is definitely one of them, as it was the tenth destination of Campus Conversations. Accompanying us on as panelists representing the industry were Shoaib Nizami, CEO of Corporits, Amir Hassan, Director of IT Support at TRG Tech, Abdul Karim, HR Head at Etilize, and  Nabeel Nawaz, VP at Abraaj Capital and Head of IT at KESC and Jehan Ara, President of P@SHA. Raising an intelligent discussion on concerns that are not necessarily academic, the student body of Preston University did manage to make the three hour discussion productive for themselves.

Moderated by the Editor-In-Chief to CIO Pakistan, the discussion started with an introduction to the initiative being taken up by CIO Pakistan, followed up by an introduction of the companies being represented to the group of business students seated. Corporits, an IBM Partner provides messaging, information collaboration and business process management solutions whereas, TRG Tech facilitates Business Process Outsourcing enabling the client business to directly affiliated with KPIs only. Etiltize on the other hand, is involved in electronically managing product data. Its core business is to taxonomically categorize information on products purchased online following certain standards so that product data to e-retailers like eBay etc., helps enhance customer experience with the product. Of the product data management companies, Etilize is the only Pakistani company and is quite proud of it. Abraaj Capital is a private equity fund with KESC being one of the investments. Last but not the least, P@SHA is an association of 400 software houses that is not only an employer but also, an institutional benchmark over many other employers.

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Does the IT Industry Need A Magnifier?
Given the size of the IT Sector of Pakistan that is of USD 2 billion with many commendable businesses to its credit such as PostAmazers, PixSense, what is the biggest challenge for the IT Industry of Pakistan at present? Yes, it is scalability. And in an attempt to bring it, the need of business graduates who can fill middle management and project management positions is always undermined.

What concerned the students most was visibility. As pointed out by many, TRG is the only IT Company that advertises in newspapers which is what other IT companies should also follow as the first medium or probably, the most common medium of looking for jobs is still the newspaper. As pointed out also, newspaper is still considered to be the most authentic medium for job-hunting. Addressing the queries, the panelists justified the reason behind not advertising in newspaper and instead choosing to take out three hours of their day to interact with the students at Preston University personally, which is probably 25 times more expensive in terms of the opportunity cost of it. Furthermore, the targeted employee force of IT Companies is not a newspaper reader but instead is a tech-savvy individual who is on Facebook, LinkedIn and various other social/professional networking forums.

Exemplifying Etilize,  Abdul Karim mentioned that Etilize carries out a hiring of 200 people atleast on an annual basis. Agreeing into the previously stated points, Shoaib Nizami mentioned that Corporits has  never advertised in a newspaper since the past 6 years of its existence despite an ongoing hiring process.

A Clear Head Is the Point of Parity
Throwing a question into the audience of what is it that the students aspired to do post BBA, a sweeping majority nodded into doing an MBA. Not exactly sure of how would it value-add to their CV and themselves with respect to an ROI on the total spend their education so far had cost them, one of the students quite confidently pointed out that it might not always be the need of the student but it definitely is the need of the industry. As per a generalized notion related to hiring that favors an MBA graduate over a BBA graduate and an experienced individual over a fresh graduate, the students seated did appear concerned of the thin number of opportunities out there for them that are up for grabs.

Although many of these concerns weren’t invalid but the panelist did correct the students seated on materialistic weighing that is often presumptuously assigned to each candidate before even applying for a work opportunity whether be a job, or an internship, which is not always entirely true.

Looking at oneself as a checklist of degrees to be considered potentially viable for an interview undermines the intellectual promise of the candidate which is essentially what takes any individual ahead in life, at least in today’s day and age.

Covering another important detail on the importance of CVs and cover letters, Abdul Karim highlighted the fact that it is always CV that gets the individual recognized at all. If is not picked up once, chances are it might never  get picked up and/or might be pushed down purposefully.

Elaborating on the point, Jehan Ara informed the students of another common mistake that students are most likely to make, which is bulk-mailing that often ends up getting spammed. Businesses carrying out hiring are not interested in being one of the many others that the incumbent is interested in working with. Companies preferred customized cover letters instead indicating the level of incumbent’s emotional attachment with the company and how extensively has it been researched by the candidate. A candidate applying for an open position that has taken the trouble of researching on a particular problem area of KESC after studying the various business departments and has come up with a process-based solution is likely to get hired over any other graduate. Other than a mandatory follow-up, graduates are expected to offer solid value addition to the company that will translate into a possible hiring.

For many, the value addition comes with merely having an MBA degree. As pointed by out one  student , an MBA grad going into the job market is considered as fresh as a BBA grad going into the job market making it wiser to gain some work experience before going for an MBA. However, a sense of generalized ambiguity existed when students were asked of any intrinsic satisfaction sought from an MBA degree.

Nabeel Nawaz added here that what students should be most inclined towards is using the time at hand to gain as much learning as possible. As part of his job, when he was transferred to KESC, his job profile came with bearded employees in their 50s, and therefore, one of the biggest challenges KESC faces is to bridge differences in people, processes and systems where the expertise of a business analyst comes in. Accordingly, an optimal candidate desired at KESC now, is a business graduate who is willing to learn IT and various other business drivers to bridge organizational gaps and that the institution around bit by bit. Contrary to many, Public Sector Institutions like KESC are change-phillic given presence of a similar attitude at the other side. That is where the attitude coupled with the aptitude makes a difference.  Jehan Ara mentioned at this point that there are only a few MNCs operating in Pakistan that cannot hire all business graduates as Brand Managers. Wording it better, Nabeel Nawaz quoted that designing a business solution for a utility company sounds much better in formal and informal networking sessions than selling soaps after all, which shouldn’t be undermined. There are many local set-ups with Engro being one of them that are doing much better work than MNCs like Nestle.

*What Are the Companies Offering?*
A concern to many students was how can business graduates gain IT knowledge, to which Ms. Jehan Ara and Mr. Amir Hassan responded that many companies offer short internships of 2-3 months long, training the incumbents on the various programs/softwares used. However, with respect to an ever-present time constraint and a budget constraint, only a few are taken forward that are intellectually promising. Mr. Abdul Karim exemplified JIST.com that can be visited for career counseling, and Project Chi, which is a training program to be started by Etilize committed to development, training and grooming of tomorrow’s business leaders as initial training post hiring by any business takes 4 to 5 months for any business as a must, before any profit starts coming out. Mr. Abdul Karim also mentioned what might have not been known many that the budgeted IT spend of all businesses globally is approximately USD 3.5 million, when IT in itself takes up 3-4% of the total business OpEx and CapEx, indicating the importance of the investment in driving the business.

Similarly, it is also important to understand as stressed upon by the panelists that the business person never reports to the IT person, as it is always the other way around, Of the seated panelists, none of them had an IT background academically indicating the importance of the business angle in IT operations of a business. Exemplifying the instance of a pharmaceutical company, Mr. Shoaib Nizami mentioned how the same processes that were paper-based before were automated under the services extended by Corporits that reduced the time lag that went into a process, from 7 days to a few hours! It is essentially the same processes automated that were once on paper and in the minds of business people! IT is essentially in place for streamlining purposes to restore efficiency into a business.

*Who Actually Lags Behind?*
Asking the students to volunteer designations they would want to opt for other than marketing/brand managers, a dearth of fictitious and non-fictitious designations were volunteered indicating the level of adrenaline and interest within the seated students, of which the most interesting was a BUM, or rather put, a Business Unit Manager that won a T-Shirt!

Observing the situation from both ends, students lag behind by not wanting to seek internships, and not trying long enough to reach out to the right kind of people, and not opting to intern until the 4 years of education are completed. Amir Hasan mentioned at this point an Intern who had started under core IT with TRG Tecch, making a switch eventually to Business IT Coordinator with respect to his domain of interest and his domain expertise.

Nabeel Nawaz exemplified an assignment the students were given to work on during his academic years at NCI under which, each student had to write about what he/she’d want of himself/herself to be written about in the TIMES magazine 20 years down the line. The idea was to visualize it and work backwards from there.

Other areas of concern pointed out were hobby cultivation, a passion-driven involvement in outside academia activities, and the tech-savyness of the students seated. Uploading videos of outstanding work on youtube, does wonders in standing one out from the crowd. Another student raised a point on the comparison of India’s IT Industry to Pakistan and is it not the case if as per the panelists, Pakistan’s IT Industry is doing better work in certain spheres. Editor-In-Chief to CIO Pakistan mentioned at it point that India’a IT Industry has the academia on board and a lot of self-led individuals which is why  IT is everywhere in India with media following it. It is not always fair therefore to try and make a comparison when resources are not at parity. Resource Development on the other hand is not always in terms of  a promotion but often better training and job enrichment.

To thin the lag, the panelists seated suggested the students seated to take an open-approach towards career development by being passionate towards one’s work. On an ending note, Shoaib Nizami made an interesting observation that he was advised at age 24 to start his own business and not let anybody else exploit his energies and shift to a job at age 30 if he fails!

That surely is quite contrary to the prevailing mindset that is an under an attempt to be reprogrammed by CIO Pakistan.