- Since time immemorial, humanity has introduced superb technological prowess time and again, which has only helped in largely furthering the cause. Every generation considers what was innovated during the time as a cutting-edge novelty driven technological advancement shaping our growth prospects immensely. But for those timely inventions, humankind would not have progressed to where we are right now. Of course, since we find ourselves in the information-technology-driven present-day world, driving spectacular inventions, much to the delight of humanity. However, one of the most challenging aspects for any government is to keep pace with the requirements and necessities arising from the developments.
PC: Pace University
- Take, for instance, how India as a country has progressed on the IT front, dishing out millions of engineers in commensurate with the need of the hour to push ahead. Mind you, this is an artificial intelligence-driven world demanding professionals capable of delivering on expected lines. As such, engineers and non-engineers both have a key role, as long as they are bilingual in human and AI languages. There’s no taking comfort in these numbers. Let’s look at the context from the right perspective. India produces 1.5mn engineers every year (ahead of the US and China outputs), but their unemployability is widely decried. A big disconnect between academic training and the market leaves most of these engineering graduates without the skills that employers need.
PC: iQuanta
- However, there is a creamy layer that has hitherto flown in a different orbit. As it turns out, even its engine is getting rusty now. One indicator is how engineering dominance is retreating from India’s top B-schools. IIM-Ahmedabad’s share of non-engineers has jumped from 33% to 50% in three years. Among IIM-Indore’s and IIM-Lucknow’s new batches, engineers are now the minority. In the AI era, India needs smart engineers more than ever. But producing 20 times more engineers than the US is a failed strategy. In the MBA game, what is looking like a dramatic shift in India today is already commonplace in the US, where management programmes have always recruited from diverse academic backgrounds. Still, it’s better late than never.
PC: Forbes
- At least the elite engineering schools are reading the writing on the wall, and focus is gradually shifting to producing creators rather than coders. That means, as countless LinkedIn posts point out, enabling curiosity, interdisciplinary collaboration, and risk-taking. It doesn’t mean picking whether engineers or non-engineers make better managers. That’s a swampish debate. The future belongs to professionals who respond to technological and other transformations inventively and strategically, irrespective of their precise pedigree. The important thing is that they are fluent in both social and machine languages. Ultimately, there’s no disputing the fact that in the new world under construction, soft skills may be the real superpower.
