Investment banks make a smashing return to the IIMs this year, while realty, infrastructure and innovation firms also make inroads.
As the placements draw to a close in most of the Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) in the country it would be interesting to note that investment banks that had hitherto taken a hiatus post the economic downturn have returned with a bang to most IIMs in the country.
While 2009-10 saw a downward trend in footfalls of investment banks at campuses, the placements of 2011 has seen a return of one of the traditional recruiters in the corridors of the premium B-schools in the country. “This year saw an increase in the number of investment banks recruiting from IIM-A campus. Goldman Sachs, Nomura, and Royal Bank of Scotland extended offers through PPOs, while Citi, Merrill Lynch and HSBC also participated in the campus recruitment programme,” says Atreyi Bose, member of student placement committee at IIM-A.
According to the placement reports, leading banks like Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, HSBC, Citi recruited in good numbers from IIM- A. Amongst Indian banks, Yes Bank had eight offers for the students.
While IIM Calcutta (IIM-C) saw 31.3 per cent offers in the investment bank domain with international investment banks like Barclays Bank, UBS, Morgan Stanley, Citigroup, Deutsche Bank and HSBC, Bank of America Merrill Lynch hiring students, management consulting and investment banking were the most sought after profiles at IIM Indore (IIM-I). Around 28 per cent of the students accepted finance roles, while 20 per cent of the batch selected sales and marketing roles and 25 per cent accepted consulting roles.
Sidharth Ramachandran, member of the placement committee at at IIM-Kozhikode says,”About 33 per cent of the graduating batch or approximately 95 people have been recruited by investment banks this year. In the years 2009, this figure stood at 37 per cent while it was 39 per cent in 2010. The students were offered a variety of roles starting from associate analyst to executive assistant. Some of the students with prior work experience have also been recruited into senior leadership positions.” While Deloitte and ICICI Bank were the largest recruiters with 16 offers each, 33 per cent of batch opted for finance roles and 24 per cent for consulting roles. Major recruiters among i-banks during placements at IIM-K campus included Deutsche Bank, Bank of America — Merrill Lynch, JPMC, Standard Chartered, Goldman Sachs, HSBC, Citi, Edelweiss, Axis Bank, Yes Bank, Indus Valley Partners, IDBI, and SBI Capital, among others.
With the economy showing signs of a speedy recovery and growth surge, it seems that students are ready to spread their wings and attempt their managerial skills in diverse sectors with placements from realty and infrastructure companies. Shridhar Guda, assistant professor from IIM Kozhikode (IIM-K) says, “Although IIM-K has not seen much of realty and infrastructure firms coming out for placements, but I feel that they will come up in the future as major recruiters. Although they may not match up to the traditional recruiters like finance and consultancy but there is definitely a trend towards a generation of more managerial content in realty and infrastructure firms that are on the rise.”
Following the collapse of US investment bank Lehman Brothers in 2009, investment banks has seen lesser footfalls in the last two year. Guda adds, “Compared to past two years we cannot say that the footfalls of investment banks are less but yes there is a sense that they have not completely recovered from the economic recession and are still finding their feet. But definitely compared to three years back the numbers would be comparatively less and as the economy bounces back into the recovery mode, they will be back in big numbers.”
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But what is interesting is that this year two new segments have made a slow and steady entry into the corridors of Indian B -schools. Although statistics have nothing to drive home, infrastructure and realty have got a long road ahead, say academicians. PD Jose, chairperson (placements at IIM Bangalore) says, “Finance has recruited about 36 per cent of students and investment banks feature quite largely among them. I would say they are still our major recruiters. We have had one or two realty and infrastructure firms this year on campus for recruitments but largely it was the finance sector that ruled followed by consulting at 31 per cent, sales and marketing at 21 per cent, general management at seven per cent, and operations and product management at 6 per cent.”
IIM-Kozhikode also saw recruiters from other sectors like FMCG, consulting and telecom that included the likes of Hindustan Unilever, P&G, ITC, Reckitt Benckiser, Marico, Coca-Cola, L&T, Airtel, Britannia, Kellogg’s, Colgate Palmolive, Reliance Industries, McKinsey & Co, Accenture Business Consulting, Deloitte, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Cognizant Business Consulting, TCS, Wipro, IBM, Mindtree, Aricent, Capgemini, iGate and Fujitsu. IM
Lakshmi Ajay reports from Ahmedabad.