Indian IT Industry

Raja Bose · Post by **Raja Bose** » 30 Aug 2009 00:56

Paul wrote:This might interesting reading

http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/ ... ?uniontrib

Microsoft's VIP interns
Company aims to lure the best and brightest, promote its products

This is a re-hash of an old article MSFT gets out every once in a while.

Earlier they used to even have limo service to/from SEATAC airport. Notice that the main thing (salary) is pretty run-of-the-mill average....rest of the "VIP" stuff is just mere fluff

But that "fluff" is what is counted on to impress the naive youngsters and lure 'em in hook, line, sinker (similar to Google's fun activities and free food) - once they join that "VIP" treatment is a distant memory!

“You feel like royalty to be escorted by police,” said Joriz De Guzman, a 19-year-old intern working toward his master's degree in business administration at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School.

MSFT and other cos. just use a time-worn Bania tactic of offering something cheap to close a bigger deal! Guzman mian and others like him need to realize that after he joins MSFT the only time he will be escorted by police is when he is laid off and he tries to be difficult about leaving.

In most big cos. (incld. ours) these sort of "perks" are organized - for example, we have hikes, all paid 3/4 day trips to Lake Tahoe/Donner Pass, Go-kart races (with trophies awarded etc.), BBQ parties and all that fluff. I was eagerly waiting for the Go-kart races this year so that I could beat the pants off some of 'em Oiropean interns who think zey are ze real drivers - bet they haven't faced a desi driver in competition before!

Unfortunately the Go-kart program got cancelled this year

CalvinH · Post by **CalvinH** » 30 Aug 2009 04:44

Singha wrote: bottom line is people have grown lazy on easy money and a lot of people who shouldnt have risen much in the industry have done so. each such bad apple brings in 10 more using the guru-chela principle AND also demotivates 10 good people with their antics and politics. people have gamed the system to Nth degree and reduced meritocracy to a farce.

Singha ji..satyavachan....accurately describes current situation. India is also loosing the cost arbitrage as the salaries are rising fast and is not able to provide technical differentiation because of what you just described. Higher ups who have risen to those levels purely by ensuring that they are at the right place at the right time, are not interested in developing and building competencies but just promoting themselves and their coteries through fake initiatives and ppts.

CalvinH · Post by **CalvinH** » 30 Aug 2009 04:57

I still like culture of these companies....I mean you are surprised first time when a small robot comes to the meeting room to check people are in attendance before the owner walks in or people put their feet on the table in long meeting (and relax in the chairs) but the flexibility and openness in work culture is amazing. Especially among oldies. Probably the attempt above is just to get the right set of people together first time and show them the culture/environment. People stick not because of the package(SDRE are exceptions to this

) offered but because they like the work environment, working with colleagues with similar mindset/educational pedigree and this kind of culture. That doesnt mean packages are not at par or benefits (including esops) are not attractive. Paying 4k-6k pm for interns is not below par in any way. Next to only the big banks/FI perhaps.

I used to work in one bay area hi-tech where people used to bring machines to make racing tracks on the empty plot next to office and then race their cars. nearly every friday. It used to be fun. Not to mention the dogfights with remotely controlled planes.

By the way how come a "19 years old" is going for masters degree in management in wharton.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 02 Sep 2009 15:46

tech mahindra sent a email to recruits on august 28. deadline aug 31.
engineers types were told no can do @ 2.9L/annum and if they wanted could
join the BPO arm for 60,000/annum.

govardhanks · Post by **govardhanks** » 02 Sep 2009 16:51

I wanted to say that there is a life cycle seen in IT industry-

One example i can give you--

You create a virus that infects all the systems of the world and you escape. after few days you create an effective anti-virus for the same virus. Your antivirus software will hit the market. you will gain profit.

similarly there are large chunk of softwares which many rich people in developed countries are using. Identify their weakness and change the game and earn profit. This can change indian IT sector irrespective of reccession.

I am a non-IT student correct me if wrong..

bart · Post by **bart** » 02 Sep 2009 17:37

Singha wrote:we interviewed around 10 people today, the pick of the lot from around 80 screened on phone earlier. after a day long effort by two dozen employees finally 2 met the mark - and our mark is nowhere as allegedly selective as msft or goog - we dont throw smartass puzzles at people.

it is utterly frightening the level of (in)ability in experienced 10+ yr people from many revered cos. simple coding problems that a 2nd yr btech student should be able to do couldnt be done by 'architects' 'tech leads' and so on. and if they did anything in the right direction it was littered with unsafe practises. yet their resumes claim to have done so many projects, mentored people and
been the go-to guy for any issues.

I truly worry for the future of the world if the IT infra of the future is built/managed by this lot. whew - its been a draining experience...I need some beer and TLC to cool down.

bottom line is people have grown lazy on easy money and a lot of people who shouldnt have risen
much in the industry have done so. each such bad apple brings in 10 more using the guru-chela principle AND also demotivates 10 good people with their antics and politics. people have gamed
the system to Nth degree and reduced meritocracy to a farce.

+1

Its not just easy money but people working in areas they are not passionate about or couldn't really care about (other than mouthing some jargon and demanding a fat paycheck). IT is basically a bandwagon where perhaps about 10% of the people are passionate about it and would have chosen IT anyway. Most of the rest just jumped on because it was the latest fad. Those are the lot that create all the problems. This is not limited to India though it is higher over here.

govardhanks wrote: You create a virus that infects all the systems of the world and you escape. after few days you create an effective anti-virus for the same virus. Your antivirus software will hit the market. you will gain profit.

similarly there are large chunk of softwares which many rich people in developed countries are using. Identify their weakness and change the game and earn profit. This can change indian IT sector irrespective of reccession.

Hacking or writing a virus/worm/code exploit or for that matter a countermeasure takes both of the following:

In-depth knowledge of the nitty-gritty of computer technology (OS architectures, networking stacks, Internet architecture, security protocols etc).
AND
Some of the best minds in the industry.

No doubt there are a lot of individuals in India who can do such work. But not the Indian 'IT Companies'. Most of the guys who work there are 'experts' in .net and other such wondrous applications so they can claim to know the latest 'paradigm', you would be shocked at how many 'IT professionals' there are that don't know to use FTP from a command line, use basic Unix commands, or even unlock Num Lock on a Thinkpad without help from a Sysadmin.

rkirankr · Post by **rkirankr** » 02 Sep 2009 19:15

Bart wrote

This actually makes sense, even in good times. I have never understood what the F PMs actually do, on most run of the mill IT projects. PMs might be useful for real projects like say building a Dam or setting up an oil rig. In most IT companies they just tend to be a bunch of useless jackasses with neither technical knowledge nor genuine deep knowledge of project management methodology, they only end up confusing various parties and impeding the project by obstructing the free flow of information. Most good techies can easily manage their own projects, and probably will be able to pick up MS Project and PM concepts much faster and also make genuine use of them.

Don't know sirjee , Was a tech guy myself more in Java, Jtooyeeyee kind (not that I know and understand all things in it). Was given to rescue a project mgmt job .NET. Very good techie guys , with lots of experience. But these techies had made a mess by one going in east and other in west and till the date of deliveries. Had to crack the hunter and get them in line.
Client was very cunning , these guys never knew that the client slipped in some extra work for free while reporting bugs. Well it was a mess , somehow completed and got a reward too

But glad it is over

Raja Bose · Post by **Raja Bose** » 02 Sep 2009 21:16

CalvinH wrote:Probably the attempt above is just to get the right set of people together first time and show them the culture/environment. People stick not because of the package(SDRE are exceptions to this ) offered but because they like the work environment, working with colleagues with similar mindset/educational pedigree and this kind of culture.

The attempt is more to impress the people they want (the selection of the desirable set is mostly done beforehand) - SDREs are typically more pragmatic and don't get too dazzled by the fluff becoz they realize that when push comes to shove, all this culture/mindset goes out the window - if the co. can make a greater profit by removing your job, it will do so. Loyalty is not a virtue in industry, looking out for potential hellphyrrs targeting one's own musharraf is.

pgbhat · Post by **pgbhat** » 02 Sep 2009 21:36

bart wrote:No doubt there are a lot of individuals in India who can do such work. But not the Indian 'IT Companies'. Most of the guys who work there are 'experts' in .net and other such wondrous applications so they can claim to know the latest 'paradigm', you would be shocked at how many 'IT professionals' there are that don't know to use FTP from a command line, use basic Unix commands, or even unlock Num Lock on a Thinkpad without help from a Sysadmin.

In my brief stint as an intern ...... I was shocked to know about a new *nix system admin ( contracted from desh from "top" IT company) did not know what an ifconfig was.

..... of course there were plenty of testers oblivious about basic linux commands on servers where they used to test their apps.

suryag · Post by **suryag** » 02 Sep 2009 23:50

Guys this is not in anyway to cover up for the ineptitude of some of our engineers but a number of them fail to comprehend spoken english well. I have had my classmates who could answer all the questions in telugu when asked in the same language but blinked when questioned in english. Even if htey knew the answer in english it took some time for them to frame the answer and this lapse in time would at interpreted as ignorance.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 03 Sep 2009 07:55

professional colleges should impart non-credit english writing and speaking education in 1st year to those desiring to take it. just make it known, they will be hurt professionally if weak, people will sign up willingly.

govardhanks · Post by **govardhanks** » 03 Sep 2009 14:41

Singha wrote:professional colleges should impart non-credit english writing and speaking education in 1st year to those desiring to take it. just make it known, they will be hurt professionally if weak, people will sign up willingly.

I attended a conference in which a professor from IIT bombay told that " Not everyone can be imparted with knowledge equally. You find one or two interested out of 100's" and he said dont leave them teach these special guys in special ways.

I personally belive that
1. writing exam is a skill.
2. answering viva is a skill.
3. doing experiments properly is skill.
4. Imagining and executing a project work is also a skill and a lot more

few only few are gifted to have all of them, few have some them and few one of them. But everyone does has a talent.

If that talent is nourished that will bring a lot of difference. I am not saying that there should be each diff syllabus or lecturer of each student. But we should be able to recognize where everyone are diff and where everyone are same.

manish · Post by **manish** » 03 Sep 2009 16:09

manish wrote:
Singha wrote:wont be allowed by nato. alca-lu infra is into lot of classified comms networks I would think on both sides of atlantic.
Very true. And now reports say that Huawei has denied any such moves.
Here's an analysis which believes this might be just an attempt to jack up AlcaLu's stock price:
Napoleon, Huawei, ZTE, And Alcatel-Lucent

GD saar, the reports are beginning to look more and more like an attempt at pushing up the AlcaLu stock/to lure somebody to buy it. Despite earlier denials by Huawei, Reuters refuses to give up and continues the string of articles on AlcaLu being up for grabs. And they have no firm news on who would be the buyer. Today, they are pushing a few more, including Netzilla...
Alcatel-Lucent takeover on radar as sector shrinks

Cisco Systems, which has a massive war chest of cash, could also be interested to secure a better foothold in mobile and IP technology. To date, Cisco's strategy has been targeted, smaller acquisitions to add promising technologies to its portfolio. Its appetite for a larger, more complicated deal is unknown.

A Cisco spokeswoman declined to comment on its acquisition strategy.

What do you think GD? Would Netzilla be interested in burning its cash to buy into an increasingly less attractive biz? Would'n this drag Cisco into further conflict with the Chinese?

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 03 Sep 2009 18:17

csco has very little expertise in anything wireless except wifi for consumers. they dont know anything
about the base station side of wireless with all those beautiful Trillium poster diagrams and hundreds of
standarized layers and functionalities. their idea of running IP and ethernet in a freewheeling fashion doesnt
gell too well with the ITUs 100s of stds and layers and protocols.

but they might be interested in bits and pieces like Alcatel's crown jewels DSL which can only happen
if the co gets into bankruptcy and is broken up like NT - aint gonna happen. EU Govts are behind Alcatel.
Alcatel also has the well regarded Timetra acquisition routers among other things.

its more likely csco acquires someone like vmware (allegedly a good chunk of the best *nix kernel guys work there, market leader, huge ecosystem etc) or Arista (top shots are mostly ex-csco alums including some prominent ones like j.ullal and a.bechtolsheim) or some other storage networking/datacenter startup.

Tanaji · Post by **Tanaji** » 03 Sep 2009 20:07

The other side to the story is that it is currently not very profitable to be a wireless equipment maker (apart from base stations). You are either squeezed by players like Huawei that use slave labour to reduce their costs (or outright steal as they did with Cisco) or you have the young startups like Starent that snap at your heels in terms of features and prices. Add to that with the advent of COTS stuff like ATCA, getting margins from proprietory hardware is out. Only way to make profit is hoping for support contracts... but if you are the size of AlcaLu, that only takes you so far....

Chambers is as smart as they come, unless AlcaLu sells individual divisions they wont buy. I dont know much about what patents AlcaLu holds in 4G or related areas, but that may be the tempting offer for some. Witness how RIM is salivating and hoping to get hold of Nortel's LTE patents (Ericsson got the licenses with the purchase but not patent ownership).

ArmenT · Post by **ArmenT** » 04 Sep 2009 06:51

govardhanks wrote:I wanted to say that there is a life cycle seen in IT industry-

One example i can give you--

You create a virus that infects all the systems of the world and you escape. after few days you create an effective anti-virus for the same virus. Your antivirus software will hit the market. you will gain profit.

similarly there are large chunk of softwares which many rich people in developed countries are using. Identify their weakness and change the game and earn profit. This can change indian IT sector irrespective of reccession.

I am a non-IT student correct me if wrong..

I see the example you've got here, but you forget one HUGE factor -- marketing.

1. You need to make people aware of this product and how it can benefit them. Without marketing, this isn't going to happen.

2. Say you make a new word processor that really blows the socks off anything Microsoft does. Now you have to convince people to buy the product and here lies the hitch. There is this saying among IT managers ... no one ever got fired for buying Microsoft products. Mind you, Wordperfect had a much better word processor than Microsoft Word in the early days, and Lotus 1-2-3 was the dominant spreadsheet a few years ago, but Microsoft's marketing team started to offer better packaging deals and started to push their entire office suite (Word processor, Spread sheet, Presentation tool, basic Database engine etc.) in one go, so people would just buy from Microsoft than buy superior products from multiple vendors. Now that they have the market lead, their marketing team works full time to try and keep that lead. If you make a product that they don't have yet, they'll simply buy a competing product that does something similar and then throw their programming and marketing machine at it. Google and Yahoo are other companies that is big into doing this.

3. Yindoos are most certainly not exceptional programmers. Don't delude yourself -- the main reason people hire Yindoos is because they're cheaper for doing mundane tasks. All you have to do is look at open source projects or some of the student programming contests and you'll notice a serious lack of Indians in these projects, completely disproportionate to the number of so-called IT professionals. As people have pointed out above, the word "IT professional" is very misused. One "IT professional" I interviewed with didn't know what an IP address was. Another one came with 7+ claimed years of Oracle experience, but couldn't answer a basic question on how to select 20 rows from a table.

Raja Bose · Post by **Raja Bose** » 04 Sep 2009 07:15

^^^ ArmenT, why is Allah's name would the "IT professional" need to know what is an IP address, hain?! hmph....if Allah in all his wisdom wanted him to know about IP addresses, he would have given each believer and his goat an IP address

suryag · Post by **suryag** » 04 Sep 2009 08:16

Yindoos are most certainly not exceptional programmers. Don't delude yourself -- the main reason people hire Yindoos is because they're cheaper for doing mundane tasks. All you have to do is look at open source projects or some of the student programming contests and you'll notice a serious lack of Indians in these projects, completely disproportionate to the number of so-called IT professionals. As people have pointed out above, the word "IT professional" is very misused. One "IT professional" I interviewed with didn't know what an IP address was. Another one came with 7+ claimed years of Oracle experience, but couldn't answer a basic question on how to select 20 rows from a table.

That is very true ArmenT ji. I have seen ACM coding contests and BDs seem to be ruling atleast in the ones that i saw

govardhanks · Post by **govardhanks** » 04 Sep 2009 09:21

ArmenT wrote: I see the example you've got here, but you forget one HUGE factor -- marketing.

1. You need to make people aware of this product and how it can benefit them. Without marketing, this isn't going to happen.

Marketing yes sir agreed.

What is that an typical IT industry requires sir??

Why is that new student coming out for college takes time to adjust to industry. In other words why is he not industry ready??

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 04 Sep 2009 10:04

imo the goal of a college edu should be to teach the theory properly, impart good skills in raw programming languages and shells and a good understanding of how computer hw & sw work together.

our desi IT industry has corrupted the term "industry ready" to mean students should instead be trained in .net , oracle, and many other frameworks and pkgs so they can work on client projects faster - at no expense to the employer. they want colleges to take up more and more of
this under the cover of "industry ready" and "students are unemployable"

a student with weakness in 1st para jumping to 2nd para will be a neutered droid - just what the industry wants

a student strong in 1st para can do anything , from embedded thumbnail sized chips in automobiles, to packages to supercomputers. all routes are open - a possibility that services industry doesnt like. they want people locked into certain areas quickly as possible.

what do you want to be today ?

ArmenT · Post by **ArmenT** » 04 Sep 2009 10:25

govardhanks wrote:What is that an typical IT industry requires sir??

Why is that new student coming out for college takes time to adjust to industry. In other words why is he not industry ready??

The typical IT industry requires a bit of real-world experience in programming. Unfortunately a lot of college CS courses spend exactly 1 semester per programming language and only teach the basics. There's also less emphasis on algorithms in most courses, so people don't learn how to write efficient code. So a lot of fresh graduates know N programming languages, but they only know how to write programs to print their name in N programming languages.

Too many students are only good at writing their own homework code (or googling for it or begging people on programming forums to do their homework for them). Unfortunately, the real world often requires them to take a program written by 10 different people, understand how it works and then speed it up by a factor of five. Code reading and profiling for hotspots are skills that are not taught in most univs.

One semester is not enough to learn to master a programming language, so a good student should spend his/her spare time working on a real world project to really learn how to go beyond the basics. Trouble is that only a few students take the trouble to do this and the rest are just interested in getting their degree.

This is sometimes why the NIIT type institution grads might have a slightly better advantage when coming to the real world. Sure they only spend one year learning the course, but they specialize in a specific subject (for instance, Oracle DBA) for the whole year, instead of spending 3 months apiece on a different subject. Not by much, mind you, because they still don't know how to apply what they learned in the real world.

Frankly, this is true of most undergrad degrees though, not just CS. That's why doing a few months of internship in the real world helps a lot, because that's where you really learn to translate theory into practice.

ArmenT · Post by **ArmenT** » 04 Sep 2009 10:30

suryag wrote: That is very true ArmenT ji. I have seen ACM coding contests and BDs seem to be ruling atleast in the ones that i saw

BD as in Bangladesh?? The guys I've seen dominate contests have usually been Eastern Europeans (Russians, Bulgarians, Poles and Hungarians), Chinese and some American and English teams.

Raja Bose · Post by **Raja Bose** » 04 Sep 2009 11:25

ArmenT wrote:
suryag wrote: That is very true ArmenT ji. I have seen ACM coding contests and BDs seem to be ruling atleast in the ones that i saw
BD as in Bangladesh?? The guys I've seen dominate contests have usually been Eastern Europeans (Russians, Bulgarians, Poles and Hungarians), Chinese and some American and English teams.

Yup BD has this one university which has traditionally kicked Eye-Eye-Tea's musharraf during the ACM regionals (forget what it is called exactly).

Raja Bose · Post by **Raja Bose** » 04 Sep 2009 11:29

I find way too much emphasis on programming languages as opposed to fundamentals. It is quite common to see even grad students going "oooooh! I am learning .NET...its soooo coool <swoon>!". If one knows the fundamentals right, he/she can learn any programming language - most ITvity grads don't get it and this reflects on the workforce at large. Unfortunately companies during their interviews always ask what programming languages you know - I used to always answer "whichever one I need" and used to get a confused look from interviewer

. If you don't know how to use your hands or speak, what is the use of learning a language?

ArmenT · Post by **ArmenT** » 04 Sep 2009 11:37

^^^^^
Yep, there's one school of thought that says that you can write FORTRAN code in any programming language, which is certainly true for old-school programmers. And it is somewhat true because once you know your fundamentals well, it isn't too hard to shift from one language to another.

However, learning another programming language has benefits as well. For one thing, you tend to learn new programming techniques that you can apply back to your original language. For instance, learning C++ made my C code look more object-oriented afterwards and learning a bit of scheme makes my perl, python and C code use functional techniques as well. The trick is to pick up the techniques and transfer that knowledge back and forth.

Prasad · Post by **Prasad** » 04 Sep 2009 11:45

Bose-Mullahs,

The IT-Vity folks might pride themselves on working on 'software'. But truth be told, the kind of software that is written by a majority can be done by a 12th class pass student. They are not writing super duper ell-see-yeah flight control software!!

The kind of knowledge of in and out of programming languages and the need for such or thinking out of the box solutions for tough design problems doesn't arise at all in most cases.

Besides, I'm not sure if you realise but a majority of IT-Vity folks don't have a proper programming background let alone CS background. A lot of people have done 'some' coding prior to the job but that 'some' coding is usually hello world on java or c/cpp.

So blaming them just isn't right. The companies want people to write standard code and you won't find that many CS grads! I still remember my own manager telling me that instructions given to him when he was to go to conduct campus interviews - 'If (s)he has 2 hands, 2 legs and a head, (s)he gets picked. xxx is the count we're looking at!'

Raja Bose · Post by **Raja Bose** » 04 Sep 2009 12:23

ArmenT wrote:^^^^^
However, learning another programming language has benefits as well. For one thing, you tend to learn new programming techniques that you can apply back to your original language. For instance, learning C++ made my C code look more object-oriented afterwards and learning a bit of scheme makes my perl, python and C code use functional techniques as well. The trick is to pick up the techniques and transfer that knowledge back and forth.

Absolutely correct - language is the medium to learn a skill. However, the medium itself should not be touted as a skill.

tsriram wrote: So blaming them just isn't right. The companies want people to write standard code and you won't find that many CS grads! I still remember my own manager telling me that instructions given to him when he was to go to conduct campus interviews - 'If (s)he has 2 hands, 2 legs and a head, (s)he gets picked. xxx is the count we're looking at!'

Actually I blame the companies for this, nobody else. People will do whatever is required for getting a job - one cannot deny them that right. However, this type of hiring went thru the roof once the Indian ITvity scene started where companies just required worker-bees to do manual labour (only difference is that the labourer wields a keyboard and sits in an airconditioned cubicle instead of toiling in the hot sun with a shovel). Most of the larger public does not even understand the nuance since as per designation everyone is an engineer yet most lack the capability to do engineering! - like my BIL rightly pointed out, engineering is a commodity now. I don't come from an engineering background (undergrad-wise) so it was actually quite shocking to see the state of CSE and what people thought of as "skills".

Another problem I see which is largely prevalent in CSE research is that there are plenty of people who are neither engineers (don't have requisite hands-on skills) nor are they scientists (don't have the rigour required in pure sciences) - they indulge in some sort of pseudo-science with vague ideas which look good only on paper with equally vague "proofs" and simulation studies and their only contribution to research is churning out tons of papers - 99.9% of their stuff never sees the light of day and yet they smugly claim how they are "benefiting the research community". And these are not folks from some 3rd grade place either - I am talking about TFTA khan universities like MIT, CMU, UCB ityadi. I mean if they claim to do engineering research, what exactly have they engineered - where is the real system on the ground? If they claim science research, their proofs and methods are most certainly not rigorous by any means. It is almost a "dhobi ka kutta, na ghar ka na ghat ka" situation. And these folks become professors and in turn spawn students just like them - the research community I belonged to is one stellar example of this idiocy, with no new ideas (yet 100s of papers published annually) in the last 5-7 years!

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 04 Sep 2009 13:45

the BD place is Univ of Chittagong - traditionally a excellent place of learning and students from there routinely go for higher studies to the best places worldwide.

my Grandpa is a diploma holder in civil engg from the Univ of Dacca btw

Abhijeet · Post by **Abhijeet** » 04 Sep 2009 23:48

From what I've seen most people in the Indian software industry do work that's more comparable to a skilled trade, like a plumber or an electrician, than engineering. A good analogy might be the railcar drivers of an earlier time - skilled users of complex machinery, but no more.

I've found it very hard to get people with any imagination or opinions of their own, let alone being articulate with their thoughts. Most people want to leave the thinking to someone else and simply do what they are told. Unfortunately, this seems to be a larger problem with Indian society in general.

vina · Post by **vina** » 06 Sep 2009 22:59

Hmm. Was speaking with someone who is a Prig-e-diyar at Netzilla Gorilla. He backed up what Singhaji is saying. Gorilla is on a big hiring drive at Bangalore. He infact spent the saturday interviewing people. Seems like Gorilla has nearly 400 positions in Engg open and they are looking to hire. Lot of new work coming Gorilla's India center way I hear. His main whine was that they are looking to hire hard core enggs with > 2 years exp and are actively looking at senior profiles with more than 7 years exp as well. The problem is that in India, after around 7 years you tend to become a 'manager' and stop being a technical individual contributor anymore.

So, for all the will be tech geek onree and no management rubbish for me types in other IT/Vity companies , I guess it is time to run to Netzilla with your resume.

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 06 Sep 2009 23:37

Singha wrote:the BD place is Univ of Chittagong - traditionally a excellent place of learning and students from there routinely go for higher studies to the best places worldwide.

my Grandpa is a diploma holder in civil engg from the Univ of Dacca btw

are you sure it's not BUET ?

reason I ask is RB's reference to beating IIT, heard of that more than once.

Raja Bose · Post by **Raja Bose** » 07 Sep 2009 04:41

vina wrote:So, for all the will be tech geek onree and no management rubbish for me types in other IT/Vity companies , I guess it is time to run to Netzilla with your resume.

vina saar, Despite all the hogwash about the glorified tech path to seniority onlee it is pretty clear to me that without going over to the dark side, chances of moving up the ladder get slimmer by the rung.

Raja Bose · Post by **Raja Bose** » 07 Sep 2009 04:42

Rahul M wrote:
Singha wrote:the BD place is Univ of Chittagong - traditionally a excellent place of learning and students from there routinely go for higher studies to the best places worldwide.

my Grandpa is a diploma holder in civil engg from the Univ of Dacca btw
are you sure it's not BUET ?

reason I ask is RB's reference to beating IIT, heard of that more than once.

You are right, actually I was thinking of BUET.

Rajesh_MR · Post by **Rajesh_MR** » 07 Sep 2009 08:44

Raja Bose wrote:
vina wrote:So, for all the will be tech geek onree and no management rubbish for me types in other IT/Vity companies , I guess it is time to run to Netzilla with your resume.
vina saar, Despite all the hogwash about the glorified tech path to seniority onlee it is pretty clear to me that without going over to the dark side, chances of moving up the ladder get slimmer by the rung.

Maybe it all depends on what moving up means. I feel folks in tech ladder have better life and good promotion opportunities (more so in India).

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 07 Sep 2009 09:54

>> that without going over to the dark side, chances of moving up the ladder get slimmer by the rung.

if headcount is growing as in 1990-2001 and then 2004-2007 phase in India, people on managerial role
naturally get pushed up by the course of things. a cub-manager could start with 4 reports, deliver one proj and
be given a 'proper' count of 8-15 reports. a couple of years pass and as team size grows, he gets pushed into
2nd level mgr role and have 30 reports with two 1st level managers directly reporting to him. at this point the
pyramid narrows a lot - out of maybe 5-10 of 2nd level managers only one can become director. and directors seldom depart any co - they have shed blood to get there. so careers tended to peak out at 2nd level mgr status in product cos.

with the state of industry and all cos looking to cut costs, reduce headcount, mgr careers are actually peaking at 1st level onlee these days.

on technical side, the scene is equally bleak. [0] managers stuck at 1st level seldom if ever want to promote any of their technical reports to a grade above themselves.

secondly, you can be in san jose in the main herd and do 2+2=4 and get promoted because [a] visibility mgrs there wield more clout and get first cut of promotion quotas. here you can do sqrt(2) to 1300th place by hand and still not get anything for [0], [a] & above.

at best one can hope to rise to a technical lead here and thats it. be happy if you have a job and a small hikes to match inflation.

so neither side is paved with roses - mgrs have to attend late night calls everyday. technical people have to waste a lot of time mentoring newbies and reviewing stuff, then do their real work at night.

if you want easy money and fame, better to be born rich and enter bollywood. or atleast use family wealth
to start your own co, write the rulebook.

Raja Bose · Post by **Raja Bose** » 07 Sep 2009 10:40

Singha wrote:so neither side is paved with roses - mgrs have to attend late night calls everyday. technical people have to waste a lot of time mentoring newbies and reviewing stuff, then do their real work at night.

if you want easy money and fame, better to be born rich and enter bollywood. or atleast use family wealth
to start your own co, write the rulebook.

Words of the wise

BTW I told the newbie UCB Hakim who just joined - if in doubt don't ask me, coz I will confuse you

Rajesh_MR wrote:Maybe it all depends on what moving up means. I feel folks in tech ladder have better life and good promotion opportunities (more so in India).

I feel that after a few rungs tech path promotion is even bleaker than dark side promotion. I am waiting for co. to open propah Indian lab in next few years - becoming core group of pilgrims there ensures leaping thru a few rungs up (though hard-ass work for first few years to get established as usual). I dont even mind living in Bangalore (at least as long as Nilgiris still sells pies on Brigade Rd.).

As for life - anybody in industry has a tough life. For better life, as Singha saar said, best to be born rich and toss around baap-ka-maal.

Raja Bose · Post by **Raja Bose** » 07 Sep 2009 10:44

@Singha saar, ever heard of some chi-chi showpiece of Gorilla's called Collaborative Spaces? If I can make time, I might have to tag along with some maulanas from Stan-madrassa where part of the program (mixed-reality/augmented reality stuff) involves a visit to Gorilla's Kave where this collaborative spaces stuff is being shown.

Tanaji · Post by **Tanaji** » 07 Sep 2009 14:16

This mullah, whose bones have tired from waging war, can feel that a hellphyre will land on him soon... May have to join the ranks of unemployed soon. Who knows what future portends.

I disagree with the bleak thing for sr. manager types... they always have their old boys club to run to give them a plum posting if kicked from one sinecure. Us mujahids have no such recourse, especially if one has never managed anyone in their career... pure technical types don't get much respect these days.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 07 Sep 2009 14:32

>> they always have their old boys club to run to give them a plum posting if kicked from one sinecure.

at director and above level yes - they usually find some place to protect their near and dear ones. below
that it depends on how well connected the director is.

>> Us mujahids have no such recourse, especially if one has never managed anyone in their career

imo in product based cos, I very rarely seen managers move out unless its to a much higher rung posting
in some new outfit. but have you counted the number (nonexistent) of starts in many fields like telecom
these days? there are almost no startups becoming mid sized cos and rest of big/medium cos are shrinking.
and product co mgrs cannot shift into service co mgr job because nobody will let a guy who had 10 reports
manage 150 at same level of exp. plus they have no client exposure, bidding or writing proposals which
service co mgrs learn from ground up.

yes among the declining pie they will still get the prime cuts of meat, but the pie itself is imo shrinking.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 07 Sep 2009 17:30

this NYT article today has good details on the fields that increased jobs in 2001-08 -no prizes for guessing
telecom is -40 %

and semicon -34%

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/06/techn ... nt.html?em

According to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, employment in Silicon Valley high-tech industries — which were among the most heavily damaged in the storm — fell by 17 percent from 2001 to 2008. But that doesn’t tell the whole story. Some industries were winners and others were losers after the shakeout.

Three winners were pharmaceuticals, aerospace and scientific research, which posted impressive job growth, on a percentage basis, over the 2001-8 period, according to the bureau.

Out of 11 industries analyzed, though, eight lost employment. Hit especially hard were communication equipment manufacturing, semiconductor manufacturing and control instrument manufacturing.

Across the board, though, wages rose — by an average of 36 percent over the period.