Jayanti Ghose is a career and education consultant. Her research in the area of career counselling spans almost two decades. She writes for the top dailies published from Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Ahmedabad, Baroda, Pune, Patna, Lucknow and a weekly column in Economic Times. In an interview with Nivedita Mishra, she spells out why India will be happening in the coming years.
Which are the hottest emerging sectors?
The emerging career choices that are projected to have excellent growth prospects are media and entertainment financial services (including insurance), hospitality, outsourcing (BPOs & Call Centres), retail, NGO sector, biotechnology, product design, IT and communications, health services sector including pharmaceutical industry, intellectual property rights law (including patent practice), animation and education.
In which sectors do Indians have a natural advantage?
In all sectors, we have well educated talent at various levels from which manpower can be drawn.
In realistic terms, can sectors like Entertainment and Retail be taken seriously?
Absolutely, they fulfill a strong human need and are also signs of development and an improvement in the quality of the life of Indians.
Many youngsters are unsure of the kind of professional courses to choose, particularly where factors such as personality and temperament are concerned. How should a person go about?
The career plan should be in line with a student's academic strengths and in line with the demands of the career in terms of personality and attitudes. Hence, it presupposes the fact that a student has made the effort to understand the requirements of the various career options open to him/her at the various levels and short listed those according to his/her own personality skills, abilities, interests and attitudes.