Five decades of independence has increased the literate population in the country. But only a handful of the literate populations able to fetch a gainful sustainable employment. The changing world economies and global market trends/forces at a rapid pace, reducing productive age of the employed population and the increased levels of competition are some of the triggering factors for such a situation. No longer are the pools of knowledge and expertise acquired during initial years of education are sufficient for the “new work order”. What is now required is in addition to the academic qualifications the ability to put that knowledge and expertise to use in unfamiliar circumstances. In the given changing scenario the responsibility of higher education system has increased manifold. The focus has to be shifted now on the capacity enhancement of unemployed and underemployed youth instead of mere production of literate population and degree holders. Youth unemployment almost always goes hand in hand with a wide range of weaknesses which cause the key competencies of these young people to deteriorate. Some of these shortcomings are deficient cognitive and educational competencies, a lack of social skills, minimal integration into contact networks, a lack of the capacity to deal with, face and propose efficacious solutions to problems, and lastly, deterioration in the competencies because of low self-esteem and the search for self-development. In the given scenario the role of higher education has to be extended to fill in the gaps between the qualifications acquired and missing skills/traits to get one placed in the job market enhance productivity at work place and skills to sustain the acquired jobs. These skills and capacities are not the one time acquired knowledge; these are the ever evolving trait which needs to be upgraded along with the changing work environments i.e. external market forces and the internal work environments. Enough has been written on “employability skills” and the deficient skills amongst the students. It is essential for any job aspirant to have skills to meet the hiring needs of current business world. As per the report by NASSCOM, a mere 10% of fresh graduates are actually employable. Similar surveys done on Engineers and MBAs it has been found that a vast majority of professionally qualified people are also not ready for work. Changes in the world of work require much more flexible approaches to work design and management of people.
The only thing which is constant in this universe is the change. The global change across the world has affected all aspects of life including work life, to meet these challenges and global changes one has to equip oneself with the skills to meet them. The perception towards work has also changed from the earlier times to the present.
