There's space for realty education

 

Publication: The Times Of India Chennai;

Date: Jul 12, 2010;

Section: Education Times;

Page: 31

 

WITH THE REAL ESTATE MARKET BOOMING IN INDIA, STUDENTS NEED NOT LOOK AS FAR AS SINGAPORE AND AMERICA TO BECOME PROFESSIONAL REAL ESTATE AGENTS, AS SIMILAR COURSES ARE BEING OFFERED CLOSER HOME. SHIVANI BAIL AND ANJANA RAGHU RAM TAKE A LOOK…

    According to a study conducted by international auditing firm, PricewaterhouseCoopers, in association with the Urban Land Institute, a non-profit education and research institute, India leads the pack of top real estate investment markets in Asia for 2010. Despite all this attention, the Indian real estate industry still lacks a formal structure. This lack of structure is best illustrated by the fact that there are only a handful of real estate management courses in the country.     For starters, there is the MEASI Academy of Architecture that offers a postgraduate course in real estate development. The twoyear course is open to students with a background in either engineering or architecture. Director of the Academy, N Altaf Ahmed, says, "Real estate education is of immense significance from an economic perspective. Students are taught to make important decisions about real estate and how space is managed." He also highlighted the relevance of this course from an environmental perspective, as buildings affect and are affected by the environment.     Professor K R Thooyavan, Head of the Department of Real Estate Development at the Academy, stresses on the critical nature of this course. He points out that this course is for those who are seriously considering a career in the real estate sector. "This course has been approved by the Council of Architecture and is affiliated to Anna University. Students are also taught to accurately assess the economic viability and the space evaluation of every real estate project. In their second semester, they are also provided a detailed understanding of the legal underpinnings of real estate projects." Some of the components of the course are urban design, sewage management and development regulation." Three-D models of ideal sites are also used to help demonstrate the nature of real estate sites.     Also up for grabs are a variety of courses at the National Institute of Real Estate Management (NIREM). However, for those wishing to apply at NIREM, Director Sumit Jha says, "We do prefer people with a basic background in the real estate." The Institute offers courses in real estate management, finance and investment. The Director continues, "While other institutes in the country offer MBA courses which touch on real estate management, ours seeks to impart training exclusively in this field; it is a specialisation." NIREM also offers these courses by post; and both MEASI and NIREM offer campus placements.

    For those already in the profession, the National Association of Realtors - India, is looking to streamline the Indian real estate industry. The Chennai Real Estate Agents Association supports this and encourages its members to complete the course. "As part of the course, we invite experts to address brokers and agents. Our basic aim is to educate people already in the industry and to bring them on par with their international counterparts," says Abdur Ravoof, President, Chennai Real Estate Agents Association.     Will courses like these find any takers? "This is the first time I’m hearing about this qualification," says Abdul Halim, Human Resource Manager, ETA Star Property Developers, Chennai. "However, training new recruits is quite expensive and if we could hire someone who already had an extensive knowledge of the industry it would definitely benefit our organisation," he adds. The MEASI Academy had only six students last year. This year, they boast of 20. With companies looking for students with specialised knowledge of the various facets of property development and space management, real estate courses, it seems, are here to stay.

Educated, unemployable

By Garima Pant 

A yawning gap

Why must Infosys (INFOSYS.BO : 2627.5 -27.5), one of the biggest names in the IT industry, which recruits the cr me-de-le-cr me of professionals from the best institutes in the country, spend $184 million on training programmes annually or invest up to 30 weeks of residential programmes on engineers it hires? The answer is simple the need to build employee competency levels. Says Srikantan Moorthy, VP and head, education & research, Infosys Technologies, "We recruit people on the basis of their learning ability. The investment is a non-negotiable. Besides training we conduct residential programmes to enable our engineers to meet client requirements. The need of the hour is not just for individuals to have strong conceptual knowledge, but also strong application capabilities." His information is, perhaps, an indicator of how inadequate India's education system is when it comes to preparing an individual for a job.

While unemployment cannot be brushed under the carpet, youth employability is no less a nightmare. A lot can be blamed on the education system. As many as 90% employment opportunities require vocational skills, but 90% of our college and school outputs are just cram experts, rendering no less than 57% of India's youth suffering with some degree of unemployability, reveals a recent TeamLease Labour report.

So, if you were looking at the bright side of the picture that just 8% of the youth in India are unemployed, there's hardly a reason to cheer, because 53% of the rest suffer from some form of skill deprivation. That sets back the demographic advantage India could hope to enjoy in future.

"India is coming into its dividend as an unusually young country in an unusually ageing market a young, fresh-faced nation in a graying world," Nandan Nilekani observed in his book, Imagining India: Ideas for the New Century. That's not just another observation. By 2025, 25% of the world's workers will be Indians, points out the TeamLease report. Three hundred and fifty universities, 18,000 colleges and 6,000 ITIs will till then continue to churn out five lakh technical graduates, along with around 2.3 million graduates (or maybe more). Unfortunately, just 10-25% of them will be 'employable', according to the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII).

If that to you seems far fetched, consider this: according to a 2008 report of the Boston Study Group, India by 2012 will have 1.3 million surplus of un-trained and under-educated people and the country will fall short (by 5.3 million) of real talent.

An inefficient human resource development regime in the country, absence of an academia-industry interface, lack of focus on skill development of individuals and an almost non-existent quality assurance framework are the root causes of the poor outcomes of the current educational regime. With no returns expected in terms of jobs, there is a significant drop-out rate leading to an under-trained and under-skilled workforce.

"I opted to work right after graduation as I could see how my seniors were struggling to find a job of their choice and had to make peace with jobs that were underpaying and not worth their efforts," rues 23-year-old Jitesh Bhasin, a BPO employee. His fears are not unjustified.

This trend will result in a deluge of 'shall drop, will work' accumulating at the bottom of the education pyramid. The NSS' 61st round employment data hardly sprung up a surprise when it revealed that in urban India, 207 out of every 1,000 men who completed their graduation or went beyond that remained unemployed, against only 10 men out of a 1,000 who are not literate.

Skill deficit

Consensus on the lack of vocational training in the country impeding competitiveness and productivity of the workforce is easy to achieve among experts. How else do you interpret that only 25% of the engineering graduates, 15% of finance and accounting professionals and just 10% of professionals with any kind of degree are suitable to be employed in MNCs. Incidentally, that finding comes from an MNC itself (McKinsey).

India better pull up its socks. Close to 500 million people, says McKinsey, will need to go through skill development by 2020. As Dilip Chenoy, CEO, National Skills Development Council, says, "It's not education that is primarily responsible for lack of skills. It's probably the lack of systematic approach in skill development and building on whatever education one receives."

The 11th Plan document suggests that due to "the near exclusive reliance upon a few training courses with long duration (two to three years) covering around 100 skills, 80% of new entrants into the workforce have no opportunity for training in skills. 12.8 million population (sic) will enter the work force as new entrants per year. As against this, the present (largely government-administered) system of delivery can only provide training to 3.1 million per year".

The manner in which higher education institutes have grown in the past decade facing difficulty in attracting top-notch faculty, retaining them, and enhancing their skills is worrisome. "Quality has suffered a lot with this expansion," says Amit Bansal, CEO and founder of PurpleLeap, an Educomp-Pearson company that is into entry-level talent management. Many of them, therefore, do not have the ability to attract the best students. "It is the increasing number of students coming out of the neo- and non-academic managed colleges that contribute to non-employability or under- employability," says Srinivasan. With the dilution of entrance standards, the overall education quality is being compromised. K Pandia Rajan, MD, Ma Foi Management Consultants, adds how the academic infrastructure in engineering colleges has become very basic. "A quantum leap in engineering colleges due to poor accreditation policies is a big problem," he says.

Another area of focus is lack of soft skills. Shankar Srinivasan, chief people officer, Cognizant, feels that often students coming out of Indian institutes are technically proficient. "But they lack behavioural prerequisites such as communication, presentation, confidence and other soft skills," he says. Whether the reforms initiated by the government in terms of PPP model being adopted for upgrading ITIs and a modular employable skills programme with an objective to provide employable skills to early school leavers, existing workers and even ITI graduates works remains to be seen.

Undeniably, the need of the hour is to implement a skill-based education system in place of the degree-based system to sincerely solve the problem of educated unemployment.

India, China hiring prospects strong - Manpower

 

By Nick Zieminski

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Employers in most economies are more likely to add workers than three months ago, including those in the United States, but big gains are limited to booming emerging economies like Brazil, India and China, according to a quarterly survey by Manpower Inc.

Manpower's survey, considered a leading indicator of labour demand, suggests an employment recovery will continue in much of the world, but employers remain cautious. In the United States, large-scale job creation is unlikely in coming months.

The global employment services company said Tuesday its seasonally adjusted U.S. net employment outlook was plus-6 for the third quarter, up slightly from plus-5 in the previous survey. It was negative a year ago.

Manpower's index, based on interviews with 18,000 U.S. hiring managers, measures the difference between those who say they will add to their workforce and those who plan cuts. About 70 percent reported no change in their outlook, continuing a recent trend that shows many employers remain unconvinced about the sustainability of the current economic rebound.

"We'll go into the third quarter and see more of what we saw in the second -- no doubt improved BLS numbers, but not so improved that we're going to feel like we're out of the woods," Manpower Chief Executive Jeff Joerres said.

BLS refers to the U.S. government's Bureau of Labour Statistics, which reports monthly employment figures and Friday said 431,000 jobs were added outside the farm sector in May. That was far fewer than expected, and growth in private payrolls also fell short of forecasts.

Indian students look at a text message from a mobile phone in Kolkata, August 23, 2005. Employers in most economies are more likely to add workers than three months ago, including those in the United States, according to a quarterly survey by Manpower Inc. REUTERS/Jayanta Shaw/Files

Encouraging economic signals include a production managers' index that indicates a recovering manufacturing sector, Joerres said. But U.S. employers are able to meet added demand with their existing workforce, and will resist adding new workers until they see credible evidence that demand is sustainable.

"To get that evidence, we may have to wait until the first quarter," Joerres said, noting that hiring is seasonally weak in the fourth quarter. He described the pace of a U.S. jobs recovery as "still very tepid."

Manpower's survey dates back to 1962 in the United States but has a shorter history in other countries. The Milwaukee, Wisconsin-based company is active in 82 countries and makes most of its sales and profit outside the United States.

BRAZIL, INDIA, CHINA RANK HIGHEST

Manpower's global survey of hiring intentions, based on 61,000 interviews, found better jobs prospects in 23 of 36 countries and territories when compared with the second quarter, and all but four were higher from a year ago.

The strongest hiring prospects are again in emerging Asian economies like India and China, where companies enjoy both local and export demand. China's hiring outlook is the strongest since Manpower started surveying employers there five years ago, while India's has rebounded to a two-year high.

Prospects improved in Japan for the fourth consecutive quarter but remain the lowest in the region, partly a result of political turmoil.

"There's a lot of trepidation in the air in Japan, and as a result hiring is being depressed," Joerres said.

In Latin America, the majority of employers in Brazil anticipate taking on staff. Mexico can also expect a better hiring environment, especially in manufacturing and mining, but the hiring outlook dipped in Argentina.

In Europe, the weakest third-quarter hiring plans were reported in Italy, Ireland, Spain and Greece, while employers in larger economies like France, Germany and the United Kingdom are more willing to add workers over the next three months.

Manpower's third-quarter survey was conducted before a debt crisis in Greece led to a nearly $1 trillion European rescue plan. But Manpower's internal data suggests the crisis has had limited effect on the confidence of European employers.

"We've been seeing really no change in our business since the Greek credit crisis of a month ago," Joerres said.

More employers than last quarter expect to boost hiring in Central European economies, as well as in Spain, Sweden, Austria and Belgium, Manpower said. Prospects are down in Norway, Switzerland and in South Africa, which Manpower groups with Europe and the Middle East.

(Reporting by Nick Zieminski, editing by Matthew Lewis)

Distance Learning Programs

NIREM’s School of Distance Learning (SODL) offers a comprehensive range of high impact, industry-driven and employment-oriented distance education programs that meet the actual needs of the real estate sector nationally and internationally.


All the programs have been conceived and planned on the basis of actual demands in the market, which was assessed in consultation with real estate developers, multinational consultants, housing finance institutions, institutional investors, professional managers and various agencies associated with this sector. In addition, all the programs are conceived, planned, run and certified by IDS-NIREM as its autonomous programs and have various components including class room-teaching and/or self-study, assignments, project and field activities. At present, SODL offers the following autonomous and professional programs.

Post Graduate Diploma Courses:

• Post-Graduate Diploma in Real Estate Management
• Post-Graduate Diploma in Commercial Real Estate
• Post-Graduate Diploma in Real Estate
• (With concentrations in Appraisal, Finance, Investments and Marketing)
• Post-Graduate Diploma in Real Estate Sales & Agency Management
• Post-Graduate Diploma in Facilities Management

Diploma Courses:

• Diploma in Real Estate Management
• Diploma in Commercial Real Estate
• Diploma in Real Estate Sales
• Diploma in Facilities Management

Certificate Courses:

• Certificate in Real Estate Management
• Certificate in Commercial Real Estate
• Certificate in Facilities Management
• Certificate in Facility Maintenance

NIREM starts 1-year Real Estate Sales & Agency Management course

IDS-NIREM announced the launch of a unique course in Real Estate Sales & Agency Management, which is the first course of its kind in India. The PG Diploma course shall provide the industry with much needed Real Estate Professionals with thorough knowledge of and practical skills in developing sales & leasing strategies for different types of properties and managing real estate sales & agency business.

According to the institute, historically, many individuals who work in real estate have acquired their skills on the job. However, as the business of real estate has become more complex in structure and more international in scope, the industry has recognised the need for specialised education in Real Estate. IDS-NIREM’s one-year distance learning Post Graduate Diploma Program in Real Estate Sales & Agency Management (PGD-RESAM), the first in the country, educates men and women in the full range of skills required of real estate professionals today. The course emphasis is on to provide knowledge and create practical skills to plan and execute successful sales, marketing & leasing strategies for different types of properties and to plan & manage real estate agencies.

The PGD-RESAM program, launched by IDS-NIREM, offers both, the fresh graduates who intend to pursue a career in real estate and those in the real estate profession, an unequaled educational growth and career advancement opportunity. To get further information, visit www.nirem.org