To address this challenge, NASSCOM (National Association of Software and Service Companies) and the Indian IT-BPO sector have taken the lead in ensuring that requisite remedial actions are undertaken – well in time – to avoid any form of a talent crisis. NASSCOM has created a major workforce development platform and launched several initiatives, in partnership with the Government and academia that aim to bring positive changes to the Indian education system and its orientation towards building employable students. They have hit on the idea of `facilitating' the establishment of Finishing Schools for the Information Technology sector. A few such institutions have already taken shape and the association now wants to play the role of a facilitator, so that the IT and IT-enabled Services (ITeS) sectors get a more employable and skilled hand, instead of a fresh graduate. Such a school, in the private sector, can also enable a student out of college, to be better qualified for recruitment into the lucrative job market in this industry.

Finishing Schools will enhance the standard of fresh graduates so that they become acceptable to the industry. The objective of these Schools is to meet the needs of the graduates from various colleges and improve their communication as well as Information Technology skills, while brushing up their knowledge of the core courses.

Things have come to such a pass that the IT and ITeS companies have been recruiting a majority of the graduates over the past three or four years because of their phenomenal growth. Consequently, most of the larger IT companies have their own training centers to provide the basic hands-on skill in their domain to these raw recruits. But the smaller and medium scale companies have not been able to afford such a luxury. And it is perhaps they who need such finishing schools to get more readily employable candidates. . It is possible for a cluster of industries, in any centre, to come together and set up such finishing schools. If they do not want to get involved directly, they can always encourage existing institutes to establish a separate and exclusive school for the industry, with significant sponsorship because the industry will be the main beneficiary from such a school, in addition to the students who will go through the training.

Depending on the industry and the nature of its demands, it can provide the laboratory and other training facilities, along with the resource persons to hone the skills. This can certainly go a long way in enhancing the level of education and training, generate more employable candidates and equip the students to plunge into their jobs with confidence and skill. West Bengal has become the first State in the country to set up an IT finishing school that will facilitate the generation of industry-ready IT professionals. The school has been set up under the aegis of the West Bengal Electronics Industry Development Corporation Ltd. Speaking on the occasion, Dr Debesh Das, IT Minister of West Bengal, said these Finishing Schools would focus on the "employability" of graduates. Similar schools would be set up where domain-specific training across industry verticals would be provided.

The course content, for such schools, is devised based on feedback from industry. There is a need to bridge the gap between skills imparted to students by academia and those required by the industry. With every 100 sq ft generating one job as a thumb rule, it is expected that 1, 70,000 jobs would be created in the IT arena within the next two years. As such, it would be imperative to ensure that necessary facilitation is made for generating industry-ready IT professionals. The Central IT Ministry's Committee on HRD for the Eleventh Five-Year Plan has recommended to the Planning Commission that funding mechanisms be put in place for setting up such finishing schools with a view to bridge the gap between the availability and requirement of industry-ready IT professionals. Mr. Madhavan Nambiar, Additional Secretary, Department of IT, Government of India, suggested that there was a need for `finishing schools' for graduates in the country to make them more suitable for employment. These would add to the quality of the talent pool ready for industry.