ABSTRACT

• The current education system doesn’t equip

youngsters with the desired knowledge and skill sets
needed to excel in the practical professional life. 
• At present, the fresh pass out students hired by
industries are given training at the level of their
induction either through product-oriented training
programme or through in-house training programme
organized by a few industries. In-house training is
limited to a basic orientation, because vendor-based
training is expensive and equipment specific.
• Finishing School is a new concept in which
curriculum is developed for students to
prepare them for requirements of industries.
The finishing school aims to provide skills both
technical and soft skills to people to facilitate
their employability and play a part in the
supply side issues (of talent) of the industry.
• 1996 Review of Engineering Education, Australia-It stated
that engineering graduates, while needing a “sound base
of mathematics and engineering technology” also must be
equipped as communicators, with a broad understanding
of, and ability to interact in the broader society in which
their profession operates.
• AC Nielsen’s report (2000) - Employer Satisfaction with
Graduate Skills, in particular notes the following “skill
deficiencies in new graduates: Creativity and flair, oral
business communication and problem solving.” The report
also cites employers’ dissatisfaction with graduates’
“communication skills, interpersonal skills and an
understanding of business practice.”
• Survey- Outlook 2005 in US- Top qualities employer want from
engineer communication skills (written and verbal), interpersonal
skills, teamwork skills, analytical skills, presentation skills.
Employers say new graduates lack: Communication skills, business
etiquette, work ethics etc.
• An independent study conducted on CEOs, by Stanford Research
Institute and Carnegie Mellon in the US-In this study found that
long-term job success depends 75 percent on people skills and only
25 percent on technical knowledge.
• Study done by Harvard University- Another study done by Harvard
University had even more startling results— 85 percent of jobs
and promotions happened because of the candidate’s attitude and
only 15 percent due to the facts and figures he packed under his
belt.
• KPMG study on ‘Global Skills for Graduates in Financial
Services’ - KPMG’s recent study has found that financial
services firms in both the UK and India are experiencing
difficulties in recruiting the right people with the right skills,
and that a “soft skills gap” is making itself increasingly
apparent. This report attempts to highlight the gaps and
provide direction for employers and educators looking to
bridge this gap between the expectations of the financial
sector and the current talent availability.
• MeritTrac study- According to the MeritTrac report, only
23% of all MBAs from Tier 2 and Tier 3 institutes are
employable.
• AC Nielsen Survey - More and more IITians are now turning
towards Management consultancy follows IT/Software.
• Understanding of Private Higher Education in India: A
FICCI Survey-The survey reveals that students of
private HEIs are less satisfied with the course curricula
than the students of public HEIs. The employability is a
greater concern for today students.
• Mckinsey&Company survey: Universities and colleges
in the region graduate roughly 25,000 engineers a
year, of whom about 25 percent are likely to be
suitable for work in multinationals. That will not be
enough to meet demand for engineers at current
growth rates. Demand for engineers will surpass
suitable local supply as early as 2006 and reach 138
percent of supply by 2008.
• India Vision 2020, Planning Commission 2002-Currently
only 5 per cent of the country’s labour force in the 20-24
age category have undergone formal vocational training,
compared with 28 per cent in Mexico, 60 to 80 per cent in
most industrialized nations, and as much as 96 per cent in
Korea.

The urgency of the need for inculcating good soft skills can
be understood from various surveys conducted recently
which concluded that presently only 15 to 20 percent of
engineering and other graduates being churned out every
year in India were employable in the IT industry. Sadly, of
the large number most are unsuitable because of lack of
soft skills.
The concept of Finishing School programme is a
pre-employment training programmes for graduating
students from Engineering/ Polytechnic Colleges
offering different specializations to cater to the needs
of different industries.
Finishing School is a supplementary training school that
attempts to make-up for deficiencies of students providing
specialized training in technical fields such as Computer,
Tele-communication, IT, Networking and also in soft skills.
• The Finishing School aims to provide skills
both in technical and soft skills to students to
facilitate their employability and play a part
in the supply side issues of the industry.
• The aim is to "sharpen some of the social,
presentation and communication skills in which
many Indian engineers are found wanting when
they interact with clients and colleagues from
other cultures," Kiran Karnik, president of
National Association of Software and Service
Companies (NASSCOM).
• Finishing School is needed to bridge the gap
that existing between the needs of the
industry and the academic curricula.
• Through Finishing School, the students will get
an opportunity to acquire and reinforce
industry-specific knowledge, skills and
competencies delivered by trained faculty and
practicing managers from industry.
 OBJECTIVES
• To enhance the employability of engineering students.
• To enhance the standard of fresh engineering graduates so that they become
acceptable to the industry.
• To cater to the needs of the industry.
• To create a platform where the students can work towards accessing the skills
required to get into industry.
• To bridge the gap between industry and educational institutions.
• To provide both technical and soft skill to people to facilitate their employability.
• To meet the needs of unemployed and non-employable engineering graduates
and to improve their communication as well as I.T. skills.
• To reinforce the students skills and acquire industry–specific knowledge from
trained faculty and experts from industries.
• To offer suitable candidates to different industries.
• To help young graduates to find jobs through appropriate training.
• The Human Resource Development Ministry,
in consultation with AICTE, Department of
Information Technology, seven NITs/IIT
Roorkee and NASSCOM has taken up of
offering Finishing School for from May 2007.
• Finishing School programmes are conducted as
per the directives of HRD in NITs at Kozhikode,
Durgapur, Kurushetra, Jaipur, Surat and
Warangal, IIT Roorkee during May to July.
• The popular ones in the I.T. domain are the
Mysore based Raman International Institute of
Information Technology, a division of Raman
Computers and Bangalore based Purple Leap.
These schools cover technical skills as well as
communication and problem solving skills. Other
Finishing Schools attempt to make up for the
deficiencies in the secondary education system
with regard to maths and science education and
bring the student up to the level necessary for
attending University and gaining admission.
• All NIIT inductees come down to the School of
Employee Education and Development (SEED), in Delhi,
during their induction programme when certain
generic skills for people across all divisions are taught.
• A wing of TVS Group of Companies, in association with
Indian Institute of engineering graduates, from the
next academic year. Engineering graduate students will
have an opportunity to equip themselves with skills
that are relevant to modern engineering practices in
leading industries nationwide and worldwide.
• Global software and outsourcing giant Accenture has joined
forces with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to
train its employees.

• Dale Carnegie Walchand Finishing School has been started

in October, 2007 in Ramnagar, around 20 kilometres from
Bangalore; it aims at making candidates industry-ready.

• In Wipro, weekly communication workshops on vision and

business plans, continuous communication and Web
training to new recruits, extensive verbal and documented
communication to line managers and intensifying efforts to
add to the current robustness of people processes is done.
• Indian Institure of Information Technology (IIIT),
Allahabad finishing school - the objective of
school is to meet the immediate trained human
resource requirements of the IT industries, to
improve the quality of engineering graduates to
enhance their employability, to impart
knowledge and skills as required by the industry
for matching of jobs. The finishing school shall
provide an opportunity to graduate students of
different engineering colleges to develop soft,
managerial and communication skills in addition
to technical skills.
• The Government of Kerala has taken the first step towards this by
way of setting up the Model Finishing School in the capital city of
Trivandrum. The Model Finishing School is a joint initiative of IT
Department, Government of Kerala and Institute of Human
Resources Development (IHRD), with the support of Infosys. This
school for the kerela students, who in spite of academic and
technical brilliance are not able to get employment in adequate
numbers, commensurate with their skills.
• Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) Finishing school at
Ernakulum, Kerala a joint venture of Kerala State IT Mission and C-
DIT. The need of the school is to reduce the gap between the non
availability of FOSS based software tools and trained manpower in
FOSS. The Development Centre cum Finishing School in FOSS
becomes a reality in the end of November 2008
• The recent boom in the Indian Economy has enhanced the need for
such Finishing Schools.
• The Commissioner of Technical Education has stated that it is
hoped that the offering of Finishing School initiative would help in
bridging the manpower supply-demand gap by atleast 30 to 40%.
Offering different technical courses along with soft skills through
the Finishing Schools will definitely increase the employable
working population by 40%. The graduates securing jobs in vain due
to lack of employability, communication skills and entrepreneurship
quality will be over come by offering Finishing Schools. With
complexities of business increasing with time, the need for trained
IT related professionals along with soft skills is growing. With
computers and internet becoming a way of life, there has been a
manifold increase in the development of networking components
and technologies, thus resulted in a need for Finishing School
Programmes to be offered for all branches.
• The finishing school programme will enhance the employability of
20,000 students per year and to train students to better fit in to
the industry and enhance students technical skills as well as soft
skills and request the Government to pass orders on the
proposal to establish the “Finishing School” programme in
Government, Government Aided and Self-financing Polytechnic
Colleges from May 2008 onwards.
• The Government permit the Commissioner of Technical Education
to establish Finishing School programme in Government,
Government Aided and Self-financing Polytechnic Colleges from
May-June 2008 onwards with a minimum strength of 50 students
and maximum of 100 and above in each institution for a period of 5
weeks every year, without any additional expenditure to
Government.
• According to experts in the IT sector, the need for the finishing schools is
immense. The IT industry which saw a Rs 6,750 crore turnover last year,
has around 25,000 direct vacancies at present. However, the need of the
hour is a trained professional, a product experts feel only an IT finishing
school will be able to turn out. There are 4,00,000 engineers graduating in
the country every year, but only one in four is employable in the IT sector.
The finishing schools are the need of the hour -- a recent survey showed
that nearly 30 percent of the engineering graduates aspiring to enter the
IT sector are not in employable positions, as they need to upgrade their
skills.
• The growth of IT industries is highly dependent on the supply of the talent
pool. The academic institutions of the state have a tradition of producing
quality talents which are necessary for IT industries to grow. In view of the
huge manpower required to cope with the IT/ITeS growth projection in
the State during next four years’ time, we need to set up more finishing
schools in India to fulfil the future needs of efficient quality professional.
• Government of India, Ministry of human resource
Development in 8th editors’ Conference on social
sector issues (ECSSI – 2008), New Delhi has
recommended to repeat the Finishing Schools
programme for Engineering Graduates in the summer
of 2008, and other centrally funded technical
institutions are also being advised to start it from this
year, that were conducted on pilot basis during May-
July, 2007, in seven central technical institutions (one
IIT and six NITs). The aim of the programme was to
enhance the employability of engineering graduates
through appropriate training so as to make suitable
candidates available to IT industry.
1. The Commissioner of Technical Education, Chennai 25, LetterNo.5294/
Y3/SO(CDC)/2008, dated 12.2.2008. – Establishment of “Finishing School”
in Government, Govt. Aided and Self-financing Polytechnic Colleges.
2. KPMG study on ‘Global Skills for Graduates in Financial Services’
3. MeritTrac study on employability of MBAs from Tier 2 and Tier 3
institutes.
4. FICCI Survey on emerging skill shortages in the Indian industry.
5. Understanding of Private Higher Education in India: A FICCI Survey.
6. 1996 Review of Engineering Education, Australia, engineering graduates
skills.
7. AC Nielsen’s report (2000) on “skill deficiencies in new graduates”.
8. Survey- Outlook 2005 in US for “Top qualities employer want from
engineers” and “Skills employers say new graduate lack”.
9. An independent study conducted on CEOs, by Stanford Research
Institute and Carnegie Mellon in the US on job success skills in the
workplaces.
10. Study done by Harvard University on factors for the promotion in
the workplaces.
11. Mckinsey& Company survey done on demand for graduate
engineers in India.
12. India Vision 2020, Planning Commission 2002 report on labour
force undergone Vocational training in India.
13. National Association of Software and Service
Companies(NASSCOM) Assessment of Competence – Technology
(NAC-Tech) for IT / Engineering candidates.
14. Government of India, Ministry of human resource Development in
8th editors’ Conference on social sector issues (ECSSI – 2008),
New Delhi(6.3)
THANK YOU ALL.