10 Things You Need to Know About Placement Statistics of a College

Everyone likes to go through the placement statistics of a college as a factor consider before choosing whether the college is right for them, or their kids. Sadly, most people interpret this information very wrong. Here’s a quick guide:

  • Inside the placement statistics of a college, the most important values you look for are the company name and the placement package and how many students got that offer in that year. In here, the placement package is a number, in LPA, called CTC. Do note that CTC means Cost to Company, and not salary. We in India realy love this term CTC instead of salary, both on the employee as well as the employer end, because it allows employees to boast about their very low earnings and gives employers a chance to advertise higher pay than the employees are actually getting. What CTC means, true to its definition, is the amount of money the company spends on you in a year – the cost it incurrs due to the money it spends on you. What this means is that if the company gives you one plate of french fries everyday, it is allowed to include this into your CTC, whether you like or even accept that plate or french fries or not. Now substitute french fries with transport allowance, rental allowance, etc. etc. What a company includes in its CTC deferrs from company to company. Some company offers allowances and benefits on top of their advertised CTC, some would add french fries into it. Understand the difference. CTC always has a component called cash in hand, which is how much the employee gets paid in salary, ehich is a fraction of the CTC. Both cash in hand and CTC and often also the benefits, which includes stuff like rental, health allowance and stock options, are important. Blindly comparing CTCs is stupid.
  • When you see a placement stat that says an extremely high amount of package, consider which country the person got placed in. A 1 Crore a year package sounds amazing, if he/she gets it in India. In the US, this translates to roughly 150k USD, which is great but not as extraordinary as getting a 1 Crore per year salary in India simply because of the living costs. Always consider this fact.
  • The placement statistics of any college will love to highlight as high numbers as can theoretically be made possible. So it won’t show distinction between company types, where the person is placed (which country), breakdown of the CTC, etc. A CTC of 7 LPA where cash in hand is just 3 LPA, then the monthly salary before taxes is only 25k INR. And if the rest of the CTC is potato like plates of french fries (an exaggeration), its useless.
  • Considering ‘average placement statistics’ for any branch is the worst thing you can possibly do. What does average even give you? Always a majority of the people are going to be placed in an MRC (Mass Recruiter Company). This is always gonna happen in a huge college with so many students. Each MRC will bring the average down significantly. And with the problems that CTC brings, averages are anyways skewed. Median is just as bad an idea. The best thing to do is to go through the statistics and see how many people got placed into a good company and then compare within these ranks. Your or your wards aim should always be only to get into these ranks.
  • Its not just the earnings that are important but also the value of the company. Getting a high pay but with unsatisfying work and no personal and professional growth is infinitely worse than an ok pay with great personal and professional develoment. So one should understand the companies they are looking at in these placement stats.
  • Understand that you are not someone else. Someone else got it doesn’t mean you will. Doesn’t mean you have to. And if someone else didn’t get it, doesn’t mean you won’t.
  • Try to figure out cross-branch placements. For instance, civil engineers being placed in IT companies. This is always a bad sign; obviously, why would you do civil engineering if your goal was to become an IT guy in the end?
  • Keep in mind the total numeber of students in a particular branch for any kind of inferences that you draw from the placement statistics.
  • Tread very carefully anytime you see a 100% placements sign. They have a lot of exclusions. For instance, if a student decides to pursue higher studies only because he didn’t get a job elsewhere, sometimes he/she is included inside this 100% placements. Understand the rules pertaining to 100% placements.
  • Placement numbers for computer branches will always be more bright and shiny than the other branches. But always see how many of them got placed in a top tier company and then compare. This difference is in part (ofc not entirely) due to the fact that MRCs need IT people and they ofc come mostly from the computer branches.

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