Home > News & Trends > P-Analysis - December 31, 2009, by Sam

Recap: Recruitment Outlook in India 2009

The recruiting business faced a mixed response in year 2009. We have faced ups and downs through out the year. In the first half of this year India faced the brunt of recession. There was recruitment freeze on many firms across industries. Many headed to schools to beat recessions blues. Placements were down and the demand for H1B visas were down.

This analysis is based on the data provided by JobSpeak (Job Index) from Naukri.com. Based on the graph below the worst month for recruitment was May (Job Index of 664) and the best month was February. The data for December 2009 is not released yet. We have a taken an estimate of 720 due to year end holiday season.

The recruitment was slow from Mar to May. It picked up in June and maintained a steady index of 700+ through the rest of year.

Government Jobs

The year 2009 also saw many candidates rushing for government jobs and bank jobs due fear of layoff in private sector. When private companies were busy in laying off employees government/PSU institutions were busy hiring. According to the data from Careers 360, around 1.71 lakh vacancies were reported in 2009 across various sectors in Govt/PSU. Banking Sector in India was booming in 2009 with over 51,000 job vacancies reported. The jobs in security stood second with over 35,600 openings reported.

Back to School

The year 2009 also saw many candidates applying to schools (read MBA/MS) in abroad and India. Many wanted to beat the recession in 2009 and be ready for better job by the time they pass out from school. There was a steady increase of applicants for GMAT/GRE as well as for colleges.

Thumbs down to H1B

This year also marked the lower demand for H1B Worker visas for USA. This is primarily a refection of the ground situation in US. The 65,000 quota for visas was not filled after many years.

If you like this post you may want subscribe to P-Analysis via email or RSS. P-Analysis will bring you insight on how internet is shaping up Education, Career and related business in India.