A roundtable discussion titled on ‘IT Skill Development: Challenges & Solutions’ organized by Bangladesh Association of Software and Information Services (BASIS) was held on 3 December, 2022 at BASIS Auditorium on Saturday.
Russell T. Ahmed, President of BASIS, presided over the program while Mr. Fahim Ahmed, Vice President (Finance), moderated the program and Fahim Mashroor, former president of BASIS, was keynote speaker.
The roundtable discussion has organized to seek in bridging the missing links between industry and academia addressing future human resources.
At the program, Prof Dr. Sazzad Hossain, member of University Grants Commission (UGC), Md. Mostafa Kamal, Director General of ICT Department (Additional Secretary), Mr. Imtiaz Elahi, Managing Director of Graphic People, Mr. Raisul Kabir, Chief Technology Officer of Brain Station 23, Mr. Julian Andrin Weber, Secure Link Services Bangladesh Ltd. (SELISE), Mr. Iqbal Ahmed Fakhrul Hasan, Managing Director of Divine IT Limited and many others were also present.
At the keynote presentation, Mr. AKM Fahim Masroor, former president of BASIS, said as a challenge that most companies demand ‘experienced’ resources. As the average size of companies is small, they are not ready to train new graduates and make them employable.
In that case he mentioned several solutions such as a special fund (backed by government and development agencies) could be created to assist SME IT companies to hire new graduates. Tax and other incentives may be provided for large IT companies to hire new graduates. Establishment of commercial research and development labs in all private universities, private organizations will collaborate with them in their work. Industry-focused short-term (1-3 months) training programs (in partnership with their member companies) can be arranged for junior level employees and fresh graduates.
Prof Dr. Sazzad Hossain, member of University Grants Commission (UGC), said, “Students in our country are talented enough, only coordination is needed here. Universities, training experts and the government each have to do their part in coordination with each other. Only then we can get our desired result and get skilled human resources. The Ministry of Education can play the biggest role in this regard. We should give opportunities to our talented youth. They all want to work but there is a gap somewhere, if we can find this gap and solve it, we hope to reach the desired goal.”
Md. Mostafa Kamal, Director General (Additional Secretary) of Department of ICT (DoICT), said, “We are only creating platforms. Everyone has to work on that platform. There is plenty of work to be done from that situation. These works should be done together in one line. All kinds of cooperation will always be continuous from our side in creating skilled human resources. The demand of BASIS Institute of Technology and Management (BITM) as a University is very reasonable and we are very positive about it. The university should give more importance in developing skilled human resources so that the foundation of students is strengthened.”
BASIS President Russell T Ahmed said, “BASIS Institute of Technology and Management (BITM) has 12 years of experience. Through which 95 per cent to 99 per cent of the trainees are working in different places and it has the ability to make sure its trainees to get job. BITM can be considered by UGC as one of the best institutes in producing skilled manpower and BITM can be connected to universities so that BITM and BASIS can coordinate between industries and educational institutes. Through this, UGC can create opportunities in building skilled human resources. Skilled human resources will be available from here according to market demand. Digitization and automation will be hampered if the skilled human resources required for the growing information technology sector of the local and foreign markets are not developed and it will be difficult for Bangladesh to survive in the international market as well. In that case, it will not be possible to achieve the desired export target of Bangladesh.”
However, as expert of academia said that they are teaching in proper way to develop IT skills of their students. As the same way, different IT skills development experts said that they also provide well training to improve skills and from the government side, concern officials told they are in touch with all these things which are needed to improve IT skills of human resources.
