Interview by Kritika Gupta

The NorthCap University

Mr. Shakeel Hasan is currently positioned as Head – Placement & Career Services at The Northcap University. He has more than 16 years of experience and has worked in 7 companies. He holds experience in Career Development, Training, Placements, Corporate Relations & Business Development. He has held the positions of Manager, Senior Manager Placements, Zonal Head Placements, Manager Business Development, etc. His educational qualifications include Honors Diploma in Web Centric Computing and MBA in HR-OBH.

An amazing experience in the education industry

My experience in the education industry has been amazing as my role is primarily to assist students in their career planning and provides information that helps them to give a direction to their aspirations and interests. I firmly believe in timely counseling and training sessions that enhance the students to compete with the best challenges in the Industry.

The higher education system in India has undergone rapid expansion. The country has become the second largest market for e-learning after the US. India has one of the largest networks of higher education institutions in the world with 850 universities (as of April 2018) and 42,026 colleges. Indian education sector witnessed 18 merger and acquisition deals recently.

Some of the features which make the Education Industry is the best place to work for:

  • Robust Demand: Huge demand-supply gap with additional requirements.
  • Competitive Advantages: Largest population in the world with the age bracket between 5 to 24 years.
  • Increasing Investments: FDI inflow increased in the recent past.
  • Policy Support: 100% FDI allowed by Government of India.

Leadership philosophy of Mr. Hasan

My philosophy of leadership is to embrace lifelong learning through promoting the development of positive relationships among students, faculty and staff, foster industry engagement achievement, embrace diversity and respect for one another.

I believe in creating an inspiring vision and a mission statement that exhibits the values of North Cap University. A vision should be empowering and excite members to do great things. I will be a moral leader who is kind, respectful, and genuine. I will deliver on my promises and represent everything I believe in.

Check The NorthCap University Faculty

At the heart of the School of Professional Attachment are the people who make up the organization, the individuals are the most important pieces to the success of a University. I will not be a perfect leader, I will make mistakes, but I will stay true to my values and what I believe is best for the North Cap University.

Tackling the challenges thrown at the Head - Placement and career service of The NorthCap University

The timing and delivery of the Career services are shifting as technology and social media change the face of graduate recruitment, and there is a growing awareness of employability as an important outcome from the university experience.

Some of the challenges being faced by most of the universities careers services are:

  • To understand the cohort
  • To engage the less active student population
  • Mass Rejection
  • Surviving and thriving under ever-increasing scrutiny

Views on the growth of students through placement opportunities available at The NorthCap University

The North Cap University is a preferred destination for most of the MNCs for hiring students from various streams of Engineering, Management, and Law. More than a hundred companies visit NCU regularly every year for carrying out placement drives and generally end up picking up higher numbers than what they had originally planned based on the performance of our students. The University boasts of an excellent track record of placements.

Read about The NorthCap University placement

We push the envelope further with excellence in the following areas:

  • Assessment on Pre Employability Skills
  • 360-degree Feedback
  • Personalized Profile Discussion
  • Career counseling and gap analysis
  • Goal Setting & Customized Career Development Plan
  • Training & Development
  • Enhancing student employability
  • Higher and better job placements with a wider industry reach

Establishing a relation with the students and being available for them

School of Professional Attachment nurtures the students from the time they join the University till they finally get a good placement - it acts as a bridge between students and their first job.

We establish a relationship with students by the help of various engagement activities which is mentioned in the answer of previous question no 4.

I make myself available for students as well as corporates 24*7 since the placements and career services are ongoing activities round the clock.

Thoughts on an ideal school environment

An ideal school environment should be led by people who value others, their voice and need for choice to develop authentic measures for assessing student learning.

Teachers must be knowledgeable, care about student learning, and adapt their instruction to meet the needs of their learners and work hard to make the curriculum relevant to the lives of students.

An ideal school environment recognizes that student success is a complex goal to achieve.

Mr. Shakeel Hasan on how to prepare students to become budding Entrepreneurs

The North Cap University has a dedicated Entrepreneurship Development Cell (E-Cell) to shape the entrepreneurial attitudes of the students across the university. The objective of the E-Cell is to provide possible support/hand-holding to the potential student entrepreneurs i.e. students with entrepreneurial intent, where,

  • Students take advantage of E-Cell.
  • They are interning with the startup to learn more entrepreneurial skills.
  • We are encouraging students to do something entrepreneurial, even on a small scale.
  • It doesn't matter what kind of business they eventually start -- the key to success is to understand what appeals to the customers.

A three-to-four-year degree program gives ample time for students to experiment, fail, and try again.

Suggestions for the current youth and the aspiring students

  • I would like to suggest all the current youth and aspiring students that “Placement is not given but it has to be earned.”
  • Youth have to discover themselves who really they are and take time to explore all the possible careers, however different they might be.
  • Career exploration is a journey, not any destination, planning should begin long before students take the first step towards their career.
  • Why are you restricting your knowledge to books? Try and get some test of work as well.