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The end of India’s ‘IT miracle’?

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Re: The end of India’s ‘IT miracle’?

#121

Post by rurban »

chrisper wrote: post #74
niklasd wrote: post #50

I studied in India 2012 for a short time. I met incredible smart and hardworking people. However, one thing that I found quite unnerving was that there is a tendency to always anwser yes if asked if one knows how to do something, even if thats not true. Sometimes a plain "I don't know" can be very helpful in achieving a goal. I can't count how many times I asked a rickshaw driver if he knew a certain place and he ans…

I believe it is similar in Vietnamese culture. When we work with them they often say yes only for us to find out later that they had no clue what to do.

Even in China, and that's the biggest market there.

You have to adjust your questions. Always start the question with a W, and never with a Has or Is.

Re: The end of India’s ‘IT miracle’?

#122

Post by baybal2 »

kumarvvr wrote: post #77
sho wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> silences creativity, encourages rote learning and focuses too much on numbers on report cards You can absolutely say that about the Chinese education system as well, and they seem to be doing OK. I agree it's a shame that creativity is undervalued, if not outright suppressed, by the education system, but at the same time I don't think entrepreneurial spirit arises from formal education in the first place.

I don't know much about China's IT sector, but at-least in their manufacturing sector, they have built up a sizable manufacturing base, not by being innovative, but by being sweatshops for western countries, and, ahem, borrowing their IP. Most Chinese companies that are on the radar now, like Xiaomi, have taken this path. They have learnt from western counterparts and built upon it.

As somebody whose career was linked to well being of the Chinese manufacturing sector I can say that manufacturing was on decline for quite a long time, with first symptoms appearing right at around 2009-2011.

The way the new mayor of Shenzhen ordered to bulldoze all factories in city center at around 2009-2010 shows how much esteem Chinese government has for entrepreneurship.

Can anybody imagine a governor of California ordering to bulldoze all silicon valley corporate campuses on a whim just because he wanted to have few hundreds more empty luxury shopping malls and 5 star hotels with blackjack and hookers?

Re: The end of India’s ‘IT miracle’?

#123

Post by ben_utzer »

saiya-jin wrote: post #85
avip wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is ABC of travelling in India. Never ask "is this the train to Pune"? Ask where the train is going instead. The answer to Y/N question is always yes in India, and that can mean anything between "I don't speak English" and "NO".

it's part of the culture to be nice (to strangers) and NO is considered rude. brings a lot of funky and frustrating moments not only when travelling. another is that strange indian head-shake that is so hard to reproduce - never figured it out completely, but it felt like when I eventually ask yes/no question and they say yes with that shake, it's actually more like no/don't know/maybe

Just make an 8 with your nose. :-)

Re: The end of India’s ‘IT miracle’?

#124

Post by singingfish »

chris_wot wrote: post #92
sidcool wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are the biggest IT services company with $100 billion market cap. They are bad at many things, but making money is not one of them.

Someone needs to help reduce that market cap. They really are the pits.

Worst bit is I feel really sorry for some of the people they employ.

Re: The end of India’s ‘IT miracle’?

#125

Post by stevekemp »

onecooldev24 wrote: post #93
chris_wot wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, they do.

If you don't understand the point I am making, then you don't deserve anything, let alone a 'job'.

If you believe people don't understand your statements then the onus on you would be to clarify, expand, and explain.

If you're just going to be rude/abrasive then people will downvote your comments and ignore you.

Re: The end of India’s ‘IT miracle’?

#126

Post by AnIdiotOnTheNet »

kumarvvr wrote: post #47
sumanthvepa wrote: post #33

While the article doesn't explicitly make the association, I get the impression that a lot of HN readers make the assumption that India's tech sector is synonymous with its IT services industry. Not so. While it is true that IT services is plateauing, that is not so with the tech sector as a whole. E-commerce, cloud-computing, fintech are exploding in India driven by a massive domestic market demand and an ability to…

Tech is doing fine, but India definitely dosen't have the homegrown talent to cater to the new wave of startups. The fault is the Indian education system, which silences creativity, encourages rote learning and focuses too much on numbers on report cards. Its really sad and alarming here. (I am from India). There are whole generations of students, who, from their early schooling, right up to a Bachelor's degree in En…

> A few years back, when complaints were made against rote learning, schools have begun to give 'home projects' to kids, ostensibly to improve their creative skills. However, these projects devolved into internet searches, copy-pasting online articles and pictures and calling it a day.

That's not really unique, many American school children do the same for their homework. It's a time-honored tradition (at least since the internet has existed).

Sometimes I wonder if the whole point of school isn't just to teach children how to game systems, which will be a useful skill in corporate jobs.

Re: The end of India’s ‘IT miracle’?

#127

Post by T-N-T »

plinkplonk wrote: post #81
chvid wrote: post #46

In my own observation the use of outsourcing to India (in terms of market share) has been declining for years. Either being replaced by work done here in Copenhagen or in countries nearer by - Poland in particular. As a practioner; I cannot say that I miss working with projects outsourced to India. I really hope that you guys learn a less bureaucratic and hierarical way of working and you as a country become more foc…

"I really hope that you guys learn a less bureaucratic and hierarical way of working" These generalizations make as much sense as me telling a random American HN user "I really hope that you guys stop indulging your blood lust by invading other countries and killing millions of innocents to make profits for your munitions industry and you as a country become less bloodthirsty" Most Americans are not killers, though t…

>I really hope that you guys stop indulging your blood lust by invading other countries and killing millions of innocents to make profits for your munitions industry and you as a country become less bloodthirsty

That's a sentiment a lot of us share about America though. You seem to think Americans are the only people criticizing other countries? Stereotypes aren't born in a vacuum. Americans keep putting worse people in power, the latest of which being Trump. Indian outsourcing is troublesome to work with. And my country, France, has a problematic economy and we have a hard time keeping talent here instead of fleeing for better paying countries. All places have their issues. You don't make issues disappear by acting like they don't exist or focusing on the minority that behaves differently.

Re: The end of India’s ‘IT miracle’?

#128

Post by mieseratte »

kamaal wrote: post #107
pjc50 wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Saying 'yes' and failing is a lot more better than saying 'no' and not trying at all. Not for the person whose money you've spent on the failure.

Not all failures are in the 'WW2 Normandy' Ballpark. In fact in almost all cases, letting people fail is how let them learn.

We're not talking about hiring some interns and giving them room to fail here.

If I hire your firm and you tell me you can achieve an objective, then I spend money and come to find out you can't and you knew you couldn't, you've defrauded me. If I ask if you can perform a task and you tell me you know how, then I find out you have no idea, you've lied to me.

I'll take a "No, but I can figure it out" any day of the week, but lying is a cardinal sin in any relationship.

Re: The end of India’s ‘IT miracle’?

#129

Post by osrec »

IT miracle? More like IT sham. The quality of engineers in India is sketchy at best in my experience. Lack of understanding and innovation is rife across the board, but they seem to be great at selling their service. This may be because of the "yes" culture other comments have mentioned, but I would guess it's got a lot to do with a massively undercut price. It is, however, a false economy, because you often end up implementing things 4 times before they're fit for purpose. Also, the attrition rate in Indian tech firms is crazy - I've often seen 80% of a team change before the end of a 6 month project, which means continual re-explanation of requirements etc etc. For me, developers in India have always been a bad experience, and I'm genuinely surprised at the success the Indian IT outsourcing companies have enjoyed over the decades.

Re: The end of India’s ‘IT miracle’?

#130

Post by mindhash »

niklasd wrote: post #50

I studied in India 2012 for a short time. I met incredible smart and hardworking people. However, one thing that I found quite unnerving was that there is a tendency to always anwser yes if asked if one knows how to do something, even if thats not true. Sometimes a plain "I don't know" can be very helpful in achieving a goal. I can't count how many times I asked a rickshaw driver if he knew a certain place and he ans…

If somebody offers you an amazing opportunity but you are not sure you can do it, say yes – then learn how to do it later! Richard Branson
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