Are you only worth your last drawn salary?

What is talent? How do you judge it? Shouldn’t qualification, experience, useful contribution in the past etc. be the yardstick to measure potential in an individual? There is also something called as an ‘inherent’ potential which might not come across directly in the CVs but to a trained talent hunter it becomes pretty apparent, if not in the CV, then surely during the interview! But many a times when one approaches a new job the one thing that is commonly asked is about the person’s last drawn salary. And unfortunately, on this basis, an individual’s pay is decided in the next organization.

Consider this; a salary drawn can be dependent on factors such as the company one works for (start-up or an established company), the role entrusted in previous organization etc. Some companies offer better non-salary perks and higher bonuses, ESOPs etc. which might have a bearing on one’s final payslip. Secondly, in today’s uncertain job market, many people take a plunge and work for start-ups and in many cases sacrifice salary in the expectation that the start-up would one day bloom but as we know many of these companies do not see the end of the day and then the person sometimes become ‘persona non grata’  in the job market.  In today’s uncertain job scenario, people learn, unlearn and relearn various tricks of the trade to become relevant. They take risks and also fail or become unemployed. Should an individual who is unemployed for a while because of volatile job market or the risks that he or she might have taken, make him vulnerable to lesser pay in future organizations? 

Salary should commensurate with knowledge, experience, ability and the sincerity of purpose and not by a dip in one’s career due to the above mentioned points. Good companies do not compromise on talent and give due worth and recognition because as they say ‘You don't build a business --you build people-- and then people build the business”.  

Jobs in the Life science Industry in India – It is a mirage

India is a country where academic excellence is given a priority from the very childhood. Parents encourage children sometimes even going to the extent of coaxing them to leave other activities and focus on ‘studies’ to get into good colleges and get a good degree (read engineering/medicine). People who follow their passion for science then go on to complete higher education degrees (PhD, PostDoc) in the hope that their ‘youth’ spent in the labs would guarantee them good job opportunity in the future. However, that is not the case now as many genuinely talented, knowledgeable and deserving candidates are running helter skelter to cling on to whatever comes their way thereby even sacrificing or ‘adapting’ to the newer ‘job’ requirements. 

Consider this, an engineering graduate gets into a job in the fertile age of around 22-23, whereas a Life science PhD holder gets into an active meaningful job only after the age of 30 and thereafter the real struggle begins. Although, the Indian Life science industry has evolved off late but in reality they have not helped the life science job seekers. There are very few Government sponsored jobs and mostly the industry caters to the demand. There was once a time when Biotechnology used to be compared with the Information technology in terms of the revenue generation scope and job creation. Alas, the biotechnology sector has fallen way back. It would be futile to expect all research driven opportunities coming their way for the PhDs but the ancillary positions which require scientific acumen should be promoted. Many PhDs have good communication and have good business skills, they should be considered for positions that require such skills rather than only looking for people with MBAs. 

There is a case for the Human resource (HR) departments to also gear up with these eventualities. Many a times HR people are not trained to look for talent but they only go with matching the key words required for the job with the candidate’s CV! This is a narrow way to approach the talent hunt and in my opinion this needs to be overhauled. 

We would need to find out solution to this mess otherwise not many people will take up science or pursue research in the future.