Skilling india has been the topmost priority of recent Indian governments. It has set an ambitious plan of skilling 500 million people by 2022.  All kind of trades will be needed for inclusive growth. A recent survey showed an electrician gets more average salary than a engineer in india after 2 years of job. The shortage of skilled persons would compound this ratio in coming years.

With all the focus on skilling computer training has become relevant again. People need to interact with different computer systems like a Point of Sales system or a data entry into in house ERP system at their workplace. Since it is difficult to predict, acquire and standardize exact system needed for workplace they are being trained on MS Office as a part of computer training. It is safe to assume that MS Office is a significant part of any skilling program..

We have been working very closely during all stages of our product development stages with organisations involved in this. We got chance to interact with all the stakeholders –

1. The training center who are situated in remote and inaccessible part. Electricity come and go at their will. The computers are very old as they have been donated. The configurations don’t match and 90% are still on XP operating system no more supported by Microsoft. Some centers has projectors and work like classrooms where a lecture is given to many students. Some centers see student coming and going at their own time. Even if internet is there the external factors like electricity, mobile towers, disruptions and the speed makes it a aspiration.
2. A trainee who has dropped out from formal education system. He has enrolled into the program hoping for better future. A computer is not what he is going to operate in the core trade he is being trained upon. He has never touched a computer in his life. He is afraid and nervous. Making him expert is not the aim of program. It is designed just to remove his fear. Off course there are other profiles of trainees who needs to go advanced. English as a medium of instruction is problem many times.
3. The trainers who teaches many subjects and act as person doing everything. He needs to give attention to all students when they are practicing. He keeps his training content different for different set of trainees. They hope to improve their skills also for better prospects. At times they are hired for short duration depending on demand.
4. The area manager who looks after many training centers. His problem is not being able to keep track of individual centers as many of them are shifting and in remote areas. Sometimes he finds out that the permanent trainer has left the center long before he got the news and he has to arrange for another trainer.
5. The training head at the headquarters for whom the number matters. How many has been trained, how much time is needed to make them achieve certain level, how many of them has been placed, how can he measure the training effectiveness. If a new course is being introduced how much time it will take etc. How he can standardize the training.

Our product “Anakage for skilling” is flavor of our offering for MS Office which is specially designed for skilling scenarios. All the above stakeholders has influenced our product feature set and road map. All of them are important influencers in buying decision and ignoring any would mean we are not good. Whereas existing products in market are looking mostly at the content for trainees and possibly few more areas we have painstakingly understood all the asked and non asked demands and put it in our product.

In next blog post we will share how “Anakage for skilling” is solving the needs of a ignored problem and how the technology wave is bypassing a need of large part(500 million by 2022) of India and many other countries in world.