MBA Placement Report (Part 3): Shifts in sectoral preferences

The year saw more MBAs shifting towards Marketing as a profession finds Amrita Das from MBAUniverse.com
Marketing saw a renewed interest among MBAs across all B-schools in India according to the data of the MBA Placement Report 2009. The global financial meltdown made a significant impact on the Consultation sector that has been the top choice of MBAs over the years. On the other hand, Banking and Financial Services remained marginally affected, with no major change. The shift towards the Marketing sector can be attributed to the fact that recession is not directly linked with the sector. FMCG products, for example, will always be required recession or no recession. This has lead more and more students to take up Marketing as a career choice since they too feel that slowdown can never affect general marketing in a major way.

However, no similar pattern was noticed as the scene was different at different campuses. MBAUniverse.com Placement Report 2009 brings to you the campus-by-campus scene:
IIM ADespite the global financial crisis, 63% of the batch therefore opted for finance and consulting jobs. The decision of over 100 students to opt for jobs in the financial sector reflects that the choice of students is based on long term career choice. However, marketing jobs saw acceptances by about 13% of the batch.

IIM BOverall, 25% of the batch accepted a position in a consulting career. Boston Consulting Group was the single largest recruiter among the Consulting firms in this years placement, inducting 10 IIM B students in their fold. The other sectors that have seen significant number of positions being offered include Finance (29%), Marketing (16%), and General Management (16%).

IIM CIIM Calcutta showed its indifference to the crisis, with over 40% of the students opting for finance portfolios. Consulting too took a substantial number this time, with over 21%. Over 18% of the visiting companies offered high profile marketing roles.

IIM LThis years placements at IIM Lucknow showed the rising trend of a change in the focus of students, with almost 31% of the offers being made in the marketing domain in addition to about 40% of offers coming from the finance domain. In addition to these, about 16% of the batch accepted consulting offers while the rest took up offers from HR (5%), General Management (4%), Operations (2%) and Systems (2%) domain.

IIM IFinancial services continued to dominate in terms of the number of offers at IIM Indore. This was due to the participation by leading MNCs, Indian banks, public sector banks, credit rating agencies, insurance, trading, broking, and financial services firms. Like previous years nearly 50% of the offers came from financial services firms.

IIM KMarketing sector saw a jump of over 6% among the students of IIM Kozikode. While Nestle and Coca-Cola offered roles in marketing for the first time, regular recruiters like Hindustan Unilever (HUL), Colgate Palmolive, Marico, ITC, Aditya Birla Group and Johnson & Johnson picked students for roles in branding, sales and marketing, operations and logistics. Despite a reduction in their international operations, significant participation was also seen from the financial sector companies. As many as 37% of the batch opted for finance services. A large chunk of students also opted for the strategy and consulting roles.

XLRIMarketing threw up diverse opportunities at XLRI with 32% of the students choosing marketing over other options. FMCG majors like Procter & Gamble, Hindustan Unilever, Nokia, Johnson & Johnson, ITC, Pepsi, Amul, Asian Paints and Reckitt & Benckiser offered sales and marketing profiles to students this year. The year also saw a wide variety of first time recruiters including, LOreal, Titan, Castrol and telecom majors like Bharti Airtel & Virgin Mobile. Consulting as an option saw a heavy slide. This year only 8% of XLRI students opted for consulting as a career as opposed to last years 21%.

FMSNearly half of the students (49%) in MBA opted for a career in Finance, a decrease of 3% as compared to last year, rightfully reflecting the prevailing uncertainty in the financial sector. FMS continued its legacy of unmatched placements in the marketing sector with several FMCGs like Britannia and Wrigleys recruiting only at FMS.

IIFT IIFT retained its niche in international business and trading with 26% of the batch getting recruited for those roles. Sales and marketing also was a preferred option, with 30% of the batch getting placed in the same.
XIMBFinance was still a top draw in spite of the downturn with 32% students opting for financial sector offers. Increased number of students, almost 23%, also opted for marketing as a career as opposed to about last years 20%.

Next: The fourth part of this series will bring to you a story on entrepreneurs who feel recession is the right time to start new ventures