How to resolve the problem of identifying the right talent in the unorganized sector ?

How to resolve the problem of identifying the right talent in the unorganized sector?

Many a times you might have been to an automobile service centre or to tire puncture repair shop and you moved on soon after paying the charges for the work of the mechanic.

You might not have bothered to ask the qualification of the mechanic; but the precision by which the work was performed might have impressed you.

Similar is the case with the carpenter from whom the house was furnished or the electrician whom you might be calling to get your household or office work done. Their formal qualification does not bother you much as long as their quality of work is assured by your references. In case work is not done properly you might complain about it to your reference, who, might be in reality, equally helpless, and lacks actual knowledge about skills and knowledge of that person.

In most cases, these technicians and labourers begin their jobs soon after getting elementary education and hone most of their skills while being on job. This situation at times does not give them a holistic training as well as a chance to identify their faults and improve upon it, which is popularly known as ‘a jugaad’ to earn livelihood.

Non – recognition and problem of hiring

"Jugaad", although an outcome of a social and economic necessity, it has coincidentally motivated a lot of individuals to become innovative and imbibe a lot of skills.

Most of the times their skills and knack to find the faults and techniques to repair surprises us. Isn’t it? We take these skills for granted and rarely bother to ask from where did he or she learns these skills from? What made them curious to become so proficient in it? Many of them are self made. Such a situation puts us in dilemma whether the person has the knowledge of the task we have assigned to that person. 

Was it not a big question for you about who would be the right person for a particular work? How would the quality of the work be assured? If the skills of the person are recognized, this uncertainty can be reduced to a certain extent.

Recognizing their prior learning

Providing recognition to their prior learning, can not only help men & women augment their productivity and enhance their real income, but also help employers in implementing positive HR practices such as health, safety, welfare and compensation, training and certification and even compliance to applicable laws at their workplace in the unorganized sector, thus eventually enabling these individuals to pull themselves out from leading their life through Jugaad.

Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) RPL, is a platform provided under the Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana of the Central Government, to provide recognition to the informal learning or learning through work to get equal acceptance as the formal levels of education. It aims to appreciate prior learning irrespective of the medium of achieving it. In short, RPL is a process of assessment of an individual’s prior learning to give due importance to learning as an outcome rather than learning as process.

Individuals with prior learning experience or skills are assessed and certified under the Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) component of the Scheme. RPL aims to align the competencies of the unregulated workforce of the country to the National Skills Qualification Framework.

What problems does it resolve?

The informal sector of employment unlike the formal sector of employment, lacks a concrete data about a labourer's data on literacy , education and work experience, moreover, these labourers might have an experience of working on multiple job roles and at times might have worked across multiple sectors. This situation makes it difficult to decipher their actual skill sets in a particular set of tasks or trade.

Due to this reason, employers often have to depend upon the recommendation of vendors and contractors while hiring these labourers for the kind of output these labourers can give.

The RPL under the Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana(PMKVY)  is an excellent initiative which enables to have a mechanism to gauge and formalize the actual skillset and also gauge the extent of excellence of a labourer in a particular occupation.

The RPL program under PMKVY which assesses and certifies the labourers for their skills, not only helps the employer to know about the skill sets of each labourer that is hired, but also helps the employer to decide the training these labourers might need as per the requirement of the project they shall be working on. Further, the certification also helps the labourers to realize the gaps in their skills and further train themselves in a way that the skill levels match with the requirements of the job market.  

Moreover, such recognition not only helps in formally certifying their skills of the workmen but also gives them a chance to earn decent wages, avail provisions of social security and job security. Apart from that certification it can also help them to exhibit their skills while taking up a job or even wish venture out to take up self employment.

As it is quite possible that the labourers have worked across sectors, RPL can help the labourers to validate their cross - sector skills which can eventually help them become more employable across multiple sectors.

Thus, it can be said that, RPL helps in solving the following problems,

1- It helps us (employer) overcome the challenge of evaluating and sourcing the right talent.

2. It helps in identifying the level of proficiency of labourer’s skill and also identifying the different skills in a labourer.

3. It helps in knowing which labourer lacks the required skill and take appropriate action.

4. It helps in getting the existing skills of the labours formally recognized.

5. It makes the hiring process easier as the employers need not solely depend upon the recommendations of the vendors about the skill sets of the labourers.

6. To create registry of skills with the Government of India.

7. It helps labourer to enrol into various pension schemes set up by the Government for various occupations.

8. It facilitates in availing loans to set- up micro- enterprises under various loan schemes such as MUDRA scheme.

Thus, it facilitates us to know the right talent and skills before hiring them as well as it helps the labourers to exhibit their knowledge and skills either to employers or to new clients if they choose to become entrepreneurs, through the certificate that they receive after successful completion of the assessment.