The latest figures on fresher hiring in top it firms have confirmed our worst fears. Growing automation and Artificial Intelligence are eating into the last bastion of our white collar jobs. The figures from TCS and Infosys show that their under 30 workforce has shrunk by more than 10% over the last two years.
The trend could worsen further as automation and artificial intelligence become ubiquitous. It is not only a matter of losing jobs to machines but may erode the advantage of cheaper desk jobs that has helped us build an over 300 billion dollars IT industry. Losing this advantage might mean losing our IT industry which is the showcase of progress for our country. After all 80% of all IT revenues are export related. While the role of IT would only increase in our lives and economy, its nature would change fundamentally. Youth unemployment is the biggest socioeconomic challenge we are facing and losing IT race may spell doom. Our IT education needs to adapt fast. senior positions are holding better, meaning roles with higher innovation and solution designing capabilities are needed. So our youth need to be trained accordingly with greater mastery over the newer technologies. This loss of jobs would not be limited only to the it sector, but would replace most jobs we know, and imagine. Rabindranath Tagore had said that work is what binds an individual to the collective akin to the vedantic jivatma to paramatma. This might change and newer basis of human engagement and social interaction would have to be invented. Before sounding alarmist it’s time we acknowledge the challenge and collectively reimagine our collective future.
Reimagining our collective future
