Placement officers from at least four colleges in India have hinted that diversity hiring for the batch of 2025 has risen from last year, in addition to the general recruitment of engineering students.
German engineering company Robert Bosch GmbH, software provider IBM Corp, and Noida-headquartered Coforge Ltd have engaged in diversity hiring on campuses this year, ranging from people across genders to those who are differently abled. Placements for students at engineering colleges generally start in the seventh semester, the first of the final year.
“Companies are looking to hire more women for mechanical engineering roles because the number of women is less in that field,” said Ranganath D, dean of placements at R.V. College of Engineering in Bengaluru. “A total of 26 students have been recruited under the diversity category. At least 15 companies have approached us till date.”
A second placement officer said diversity hiring has increased as companies seek to narrow the gender gap in their workforces.
“Diversity hiring has become more regular now compared with last year as companies want to increase their gender ratio,” said Savitha Rani M, training and placement officer at Ramaiah Institute of Technology in Bengaluru.
Ramaiah has received 800 offers for the current batch of students and anticipates a surge in diversity hiring this year. The college got about 1,300 job offers for the batch of 2024 and expects the number to rise this year.
“Last year, there were around 14 companies going for diversity hiring but this year, we have already gotten more than 20 companies and eight more are expected,” said Rani.
Beyond mere hiring
A third placement head said gender diversity hiring had increased for niche roles.
“IT companies are all gung-ho about gender diversity hiring this year and we are seeing this trend mainly for niche roles in software and mechanical engineering roles,” said Sridhar K S, dean of placement and training at PES University in Bengaluru.
PES University has more than 1,600 students seeking placements this year, of which about 60% have already secured jobs.
College placement officers said companies were offering ₹6 lakh- ₹12 lakh for roles ranging from software development to manufacturing and mechanical engineering. But hiring is not all that companies are doing to encourage diversity in their organisations.
Mercedes-Benz Research and Development India (MBRDI) awards scholarships to a handful of female students pursuing mechanical engineering in the second and third years. They can then apply to MBRDI for permanent jobs and go through the entrance processes as usual upon completion of their education.
Information technology companies too have sought to increase diversity within their workforces over the past few years.
Tata Consultancy Services, India’s largest software services company, had 612,724 employees at the end of September 2024, with women making up 35.5% of the total, the company said in its Q2 earnings statement on 10 October.
“While we have a 36% women workforce in the company, we would like to increase that further and also we would like to see more women in the top layers of the company, so the efforts are on,” Natarajan Chandrasekaran, chairman of Tata Sons, said at the TCS annual general meeting in May 2024.
At IBM, women made up a third of the 282,200 strong workforce at the end of 2023. IBM has had a third of its headcount made up of women since 2020.
“We continue to attract talent with relevant skills from all backgrounds, irrespective of gender. To create a truly inclusive and dynamic workforce, we focus on long-term career development for women,” IBM said in an emailed response toMint’s queries on Wednesday.
Brand enhancement
At Accenture, the world’s largest technology services firm, women made up 48% of the 733,000 headcount in the 12 months ended August 2024, according to its annual report. The share of women in Accenture increased from 45% in August 2020 and the company aims to have its workforce split equally by men and women by 2025.
Emails sent to Accenture, Bosch and Coforge on Monday went unanswered.
Placement officers also said companies are hiring more differently abled people for internships and permanent roles.
“Companies have been increasingly looking to hire candidates with physical disabilities, hearing and visual impairments this year for various engineering roles, including those of software engineers,” said Anjani Kumar Bhatnagar, head of campus placements at Amity Education Group. At least 30 differently abled students at Amity were hired this year, according to Bhatnagar.
A staffing firm executive attributed the increase in diversity hiring by companies as a way to enhance their brand.
“Companies with strong diversity initiatives are seen as forward-thinking and responsible, which helps influence investor confidence and public perception, thus enhancing the employer branding,” said Krishna Vij, vice-president for IT staffing at TeamLease Digital. “Investors typically look at the ESG (environmental, social and governance) criteria, which helps them to evaluate the sustainability of a business.”
“Companies engage in diversity hiring mainly to have a good environmental, social, and governance report card and to show investors that they are faring well on the social front,” said Shriram Subramanian, managing director of proxy advisory firm InGovern.
The trend in India is a contrast to what’s happening in the US, where some companies and universities are scaling back their diversity, equity and inclusion policies, apprehending that such practices may violate anti-discrimination laws. Walmart became the latest major US corporation to scale back its DEI efforts, following JPMorgan Chase and Starbucks,Reuters reported on 10 December.
