Altair India

HyperWorks - A Launchpad for Career Development

Stakeholders discuss opportunities and challenges

G.V.Surya Kumar, Vice President - Quality, Sierra Atlantic:
Employability and skill gap: some of them are my personal experiences from when I was a fresh graduate from college and some of them are from the IT industry. Since I (also) have a background in the CAD/CAE industry I can contrast the IT with the Engineering Services industry: that's the whole purpose of my presentation today.

If you loook at the "skill gap", at the employability of the NCGs ("New College Graduates"), are all the stakeholders on the same page .... The academia, the colleges, the industry and the students themselves? All these (three) stakeholders: are (they) all sharing the same context, do they have the same understanding of what the industry needs?

And the context is:

Today, what is it that the IT industry is looking at from NCGs? What is it they want from NCGs ("New College Graduates")? They are clearly looking for analytical abilities - I think all the speakers so far have confirmed that. They are loooking for technical skills. They are looking for process knowledge. They are looking for communication, typically it more or less gets translated into fluency in English. And soft skills - by soft skills we mean the individual traits (like ability to negotiate, integrity ...) to convey their honesty and sincerity about what they do. These are some of the soft skills.

Now what is so new or different about this? If you really look at it, all of these things were there 20 years ago too. When I was an NCG myself, when I was at college, they looked at all these attributes. I went through interviews for technical abilities, process knowledge, we used to have group discussions, we used to have interviews, softskills - at that time the term soft-skills was not that popular but essentially people like us, 20 years ago, were analysed, interviewed and assessed (more or less ...) on all these dimensions that I put forth earlier.

But if I were to look at my experience (as an NCG) at that time, why was I selected by this company in a certain area? - Let me begin by sharing some of my experiences in this area.

I am a mechanical engineer. In fact I see my professor there - good evening to you, sir, Professor V.V.Satyanarayana. I was an average Mechanical Engineering student. I probably got about 74 or 75%. I don't claim to be a great mechanical engineering student.

I was reasonably OK in my analytical ability, quite decent on communication skills, OK on soft-skills, but when it came to technical skills, when people talk about theoretical abilities, theoretical concepts like Strength of Materials, I was about average. I don't claim to be an authority on Strength of Materials. For example if someone were to ask me to calculate the Moment of Inertia today I wouldn't even remember what it is!

But why was I selected?

At that time, when we were in the final year, when we were asked to do projects, people in Mechanical Engineering at that time were always looking at things (projects) like: let me make a Special Purpose Machine Attachment, .... a spherical lathe attachment, ... some design, ... all kinds of things were done. The focus was on creating things - something physical. Nothing in the virtual world, the kind of digital simulation that Altair talks of today was non-existent.

That was the time, in 1988, that was also a time of change. Autocad was launched, and was just getting popular. Autocad Release 2 had a command line interface - you had to type "L I N E", enter "from-point", "to-point" info to draw a line!

I was interested in programming but I wanted to do programming in a mechanical engineering context (AutoLISP of AutoCAD provided that). I thought this (AutoLISP) was something nice, interesting, but not very high up in the value chain of the Mechanical engineering professors of that time.

It was not that I was aware of all these things at that time. It was the glamour, the seduction of a CAD system, a graphics system, learning a new technology and applying a bit of programming to my Mechanical Engineering Discipline: that was all that I had in mind. I didn't have any big notions about being a theoretical wizard. I just wanted to play with computers (... apply them for Mechanical Engg). That's all I wanted to do.

I went ahead and did a project using AutoLisp/Autocad. I wrote a small parametric program for the design of a gearbox or something like that. In fact, at the time of my viva voce, the external faculty looked at me and said "Are you sure this is a Mechanical Engineering Project?" I could see that he was not very happy with my project. I could see that this was not to his liking, ... to his taste. And I mumbled weakly ... I said "Sir it is about computers, graphics ... about programming .. (applied to Mechanical design)".

I don't want to say that I was very articulate (with the viva professor) in justifying what I did at that time. I did it simply because I was interested in it (AutoLisp programming).

But that (project) helped me when I went for the job interview. How did it help me in the job context?

When I went for the interview, all the others ... they were very strong mechanical engineering candidates. Much better than me - theoretically, academically, marks-wise - they were ahead of me. But why this particular company chose me was not because I was great. But I had done a project of immediate relevance to their business, their industry. They'd just invested in a CAD system. They need someone to operate it, make it productive (immediately).

That is the situation we are in today. Today the industry really wants people to be productive immediately. More precisely, to be billable ASAP, on day one. I am not justifying the situation, I am also not coming here and trying to say that the curriculum is not good. I think the curriculum is pretty decent. It gives us sufficient appreciation of what Mechanical Engineering is all about.

But if you look today and see what has changed in the last 20 years? Nothing? The skill sets are all the same, the dimensions you (NCG) will be assessed on or evaluated upon are the same.

But what has changed is really "the billable person hour". We (industry) need people. I have a project starting today and I need people. I dont' have them. And every hour I lose, I lose 15$ an hour, 20$ an hour, 25$ an hour. This is the basic business problem.

On one hand we are drumming up business, we are growing at the rate of 30% or even more, but I don't have people. And when I say people: my company, my industry, they don't want wizards. Let us be honest with ourselves. They don't want people to know everything about finite element analysis. To begin with, they want somebody to know meshing. It's as simple as that.

Or maybe they just want the guy to do CAD work. It may be to the liking of the student ....it may "not" be to the liking of the student.

But the fact of the matter is: the industry requires people with tactical skill sets, technical skill sets, tool knowledge. They need not be too great!

Now I have a question. (The previous speaker) mentioned that candidates (today's NCGs) do not have a knowledge of the bending moment (or strength of materials). But still you're hiring them. Why? It is because you have a billable project. You need to staff it. You have no choice. That's a fact of life.

This is what we really need to understand. This is what I mean by saying "Are we operating in the same context? Are we all sharing the same context?"

So the change is in the billable person hour. In the magnitude of the business we are getting and the sheer size of the business itself.

Luckily for us, luckily for the software industry, the masses that we hire do "blue collar" work at the entry level. Let us face it - there is a commoditization (of services) that is happening. There is nothing wrong with commoditization - you don't have to sneer at it. Commoditization is essential if the country, and the company have to make money. And it's good for individuals too!

For every 10 (finite element) "meshers" you need 1 designer, 1 analytic (FEA) guy - you don't require 10 analytic guys! That's how business runs.

Some points to ponder for the engineering services business (when contrasted with IT services):

Are you imparting process knowledge to the students? This is somethign that has to be done. We need it immediately in the curriculum. Teach people "top-down".

Do projects have to be only in the final year? Projects need not be very big, very large. They need not be complex. Why can't we do quick-and-dirty projects that explore only concepts? Even partial exploration of concepts is fine, because we are able to do it cheaper, it costs less!

Use tools - virtual prototyping tools - there are many tools, including HyperWorks, or any such product you may want to use! Use the tools to explore Design Concepts. Do some quick-and-dirty projects. Why wait till the final year to do a project? And you can use case-studies as alternatives to projects. A good project is essential at the end of the day, but before that, does your curriculum have enough case studies?

A demonstration like this (what Altair has shown just now on upfront CAE) can clarify so many more concepts to the student, as opposed to an academic, theoretical discussion. You do that first, and then take them "down" to the theory and the principles!

View the Videos: Part 1 and Part 2        

Other Speakers:

Professor R.Ram Reddy

Dr.Ramajeyathilagam

Mr.P.Balaji

Faculty Opinions:

How important are fundamentals?

Can Mini-Projects be offered?

CAE should be "floated" into the curriculum!

The Curriculum and sale-ability