What Employers REALLY Wish They Could Tell Academics (But Never Do) - The Unfiltered, Uncomfortable, Necessary Version That Should Have Been Said 15 Years Ago…
A private confession session — chai in hand, honesty on the table.
Three senior HR heads, one COO, and a CEO sit together in a room, AC humming, coffee cooling, and one brave soul finally says…
“Sir, Madam… we really need to talk.”
Before academics get offended — this is not an attack.
This is just the conversation employers dream of having, but never actually have… because everyone is scared the other side will send a legal notice or a strongly worded email. 😄
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1. “You’re obsessed with research papers, rankings, fees… but who is obsessed with TEACHING?”
Let’s start with the ugliest truth. Indian academia has turned into a self-improvement gym:
• more papers
• more citations
• more NAAC scores
• more marketing brochures
• more fancy buildings
• more conferences with cold samosas
But ask: “Who is improving the teaching?” Silence.
Students don’t come out industry-ready. They come out Google-dependent.
Employers are forced to ask: “If you don’t value teaching, why do you call yourselves teachers?”
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2. “You wrote the rules via academic-controlled regulators… and now YOU complain those rules are slow.”
AICTE, UGC, NAAC — all these bodies are designed, staffed, run, and influenced by Academics.
So when Academia says: “Regulations slow us down”… Employers think: “Regulations slow you down because YOU built slow regulations.” This is like inventing traffic jams and then blaming the heat.
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3. “NEP 2020 gave you 100% autonomy. You used 0% of it.”
The entire education ecosystem got the biggest reform in 40 years — flexibility, freedom, multi-disciplinary learning, project-based modules. What did academia do?
• Rebranded courses
• Added new electives no one teaches properly
• Printed new brochures
• Conducted seminars titled “Understanding NEP”
But teaching quality? Unchanged. Curriculum relevance? Unchanged. Industry connect?
Only on placement day. NEP opened the door. Academia chose to repaint the doorframe.
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4. “Employers care only about ONE thing: how well you teach. But you care about EVERYTHING except that.”
Employers don’t care about:
• your research grant
• your citations
• your campus size
• your number of MoUs
• your magazine rankings
• your conferences
• your elite committees
They care about ONE output: How well did you prepare the student to think, speak, work, decide, and adapt?
Academics don’t like this simplicity. They want to be evaluated on everything except the thing they’re paid to do.
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5. “Companies are paying salaries AND paying for training. You are paid only for teaching — yet you don’t teach.”
This is the real sting. Employers pay:
• salaries
• onboarding
• induction
• bridge courses
• soft skills programs
• coding bootcamps
• communication grooming
• corporate culture orientation
All because academia didn’t do the basics. Academia gets paid by:
• government
• students
• donations
• grants
…yet they still produce graduates who need finishing school at age 23.
As one CEO said: “Why am I paying twice for the same product — once as fees, again as training?”
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6. “We’re one step away from skipping degrees AND skipping age limits — and that will collapse your business model.”
This is not a threat. This is a trend. Global companies have already stopped requiring degrees:
Google, IBM, Tesla, Accenture, Microsoft.
Startups don’t care about your university. They care if you can ship work.
AI is making talent visible WITHOUT degrees. Platforms like GitHub, Kaggle, Figma, LinkedIn, Behance — spotlight skill, not certificates.
Employers whisper: “Very soon, we will hire 17-year-olds who can deliver — and bypass your entire system.”
Academia thinks it’s irreplaceable. AI thinks otherwise.
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7. “You are trying to run universities like businesses. We are forced to run businesses like universities.”
This is the tragic comedy of our era. Academics today behave like:
• property developers
• admissions marketers
• brand managers
• fund collectors
• paper publishers
Meanwhile employers have become:
• trainers
• teachers
• mental health counselors
• skill academies
• coding instructors
• personality developers
The roles are reversed. The results are disastrous.
One HR Head said: “We’re running classrooms inside companies. Colleges are running companies inside classrooms.” If this isn’t backward, what is?
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8. “Your syllabus is not outdated. It is prehistoric.”
Not old. Not stale. Not “needs revision.”
Prehistoric; Belonging to a time when dinosaurs roamed, Windows XP was modern, and Nokia 3310 was the peak of innovation.
Employers want to scream: “How can a world changing every 6 months be taught by a curriculum updated every 12 years?”
The real sting? Academics know this. And still… nothing changes.
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9. “Stop acting like you’re preparing students for 1999 placements.”
The world has moved to AI, robotics, climate-tech, global freelancing, hybrid culture, digital collaboration.
Meanwhile colleges proudly teach: C, C++, and 27 definitions of marketing.
One CTO told me: “The students know the 4Ps of marketing but not the ‘Share Screen’ button on Zoom.” It would be funny if it weren’t tragic.
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10. “Private colleges are not education institutions - they’re real-estate projects with classrooms.”
Let’s call it out. So many private universities are investor vehicles:
• overbuilt campuses
• inflated fees
• minimal academic soul
• and 3 professors doing the job of 15
Employers whisper: “Your buildings are world-class. Your teaching is You Tube - WhatsApp-level.”
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11. “Public universities have become comfort zones, not innovation hubs.”
Yes, brilliant professors exist — but they are islands. The system is broken:
• zero incentive to update yourself
• zero fear of becoming irrelevant
• zero connection with industry
• zero urgency because salary is guaranteed
Employers think: “Students entering from these places need detox before they learn anything useful.”
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12. “Your topper culture has produced brilliant marks… and fragile minds.”
This is the deepest anomaly. Employers are tired of:
• students who panic in real situations
• students who can memorize but not think
• students who freeze in ambiguity
• students who crumble at feedback
One HR director said softly: “Academics have produced students who are perfect on paper and broken inside.”
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13. “Industry is not asking for coding ninjas or genius analysts.
We’re begging for basic readiness.
• communication
• discipline
• curiosity
• confidence
• problem-solving
Employers are desperate: “Just send us young people who can think and speak without meltdown.”
Instead they get: “Sir, kya training milega?” “Ma’am, can I go home early?” “Sir, mujhe passion nahi mil raha.” “Ma’am, I want only remote work but high salary.” Who built this helplessness? Academia.
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14. “You have disconnected yourselves from reality - and students are paying the price.”
Academia talks about knowledge. Industry talks about competence. Academia talks about marks. Industry talks about mindset. Academia talks about theory. Industry talks about relevance.
Both sides talk to each other only during placement season — like awkward relatives pretending to be close just because there’s a wedding.
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15. “Stop hiding behind NAAC, UGC, AICTE, NBA. These badges don’t impress anyone.”
Employers laugh — not loudly, but definitely internally. Why? Because badges don’t build talent. Actual teaching does.
A placement head once whispered: “We don’t check your approvals. We check your students’ eyes — are they confident or scared?” That tells the truth faster.
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16. “Your faculty shortage is not the problem - your faculty mindset is.”
Most teachers are good humans stuck in a bad system. But many have become dangerously outdated:
• Still using chalk-and-talk
• Still dismissing AI as “cheating”
• Still reading PPTs word-by-word
• Still teaching for exams, not life
Employers feel helpless: “How do we upgrade students if their teachers stopped upgrading themselves?”
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17. “We don’t criticize academics because we disrespect you. We criticize you because we TRUST you.”
The sting hides affection. Employers actually believe academia is the last hope. But they are scared. Scared because:
• the world is changing too fast
• students are entering broken
• industry can’t repair everything
• the system produces degrees, not readiness
• and no one is taking accountability
They want to say this — politely OR brutally: “If students collapse, neither HR nor companies can fix what schools and colleges didn’t build.” This is the truth no one says aloud.
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The Final Line: “We’re not angry at Academics. We’re scared FOR them.” **Academia isn’t failing because it’s incompetent.
It’s failing because it has forgotten its only job: TEACHING.**
Academia built a world where they became the center. But the world that is coming AI-driven, green-powered, skill-first — has no center. AI is rewriting the world.
The Green Economy is rewriting the purpose of work. Gen Z is rewriting expectations. Millennials and Gen X are rewriting careers.
But Academia? Academia is rewriting nothing. This is why employers want a heart-to-heart. Not for blame — but because the next decade will decide whether India builds thinkers… or another generation that needs “finishing school” at age 23.
