On the sunny and bright noon of April 7, 2021 students, colleges, and recruiting organizations got together for the much-awaited reveal of Dare2Compete Awards 2021 rankings. The fourth edition of the awards celebrated the extremely adequate performance of all its stakeholders and showered elusive insights into the industry trends by releasing the distinctive D2C Campus Employer Branding Report 2021.

With CRISIL as the knowledge partner, this year the rankings and D2C CEBR were based on an overwhelming 24,000 student nominations (2x YoY), 51,000+ votes (2.5x YoY), and 7,200 survey responses.

Across B-Schools HUL L.I.M.E. once again made the cut as the winner of D2C Prestigious B-School Competitions 2021, closely followed by Flipkart WiRED& Amazon Customer Excellence Challenge. Narrowing down to the category of Premier 10 B-Schools, students crowned Amazon Customer Excellence Challenge as theD2C most prestigious B-School competition 2021. HUL L.I.M.E& Asian PaintsCanvas took second and third places, respectively.

Under the D2C Prestigious E-School Competitions 2021 category, Code Jam won the winning title followed by Hash Code, both of which were from the house of Google.Microsoft Imagine Cup secured third place followed by Flipkart GRiD and IBM Hack Challenge.

Talking of the D2C Prestigious B-Schools 2021, the top four positions were secured by IIFT, IIM Ahmedabad, IIM Bangalore, and IIM Kashipur in that order. In the E-School category, IIT Madras emerged victorious, taking home the tag of Dare2Compete most Competitive E-School 2021.

Rashmi from T. A. Pai Management Institute (TAPMI), Manipal, was named D2C Competitive Leader 2021 (Category: B-School). Talking of the Engineering space, Guhan Narayanan from IIT Madras lifted the trophy of D2C Competitive Leader 2021 (Category: E-School)

For complete rankings, visit https://dare2compete.com/awards/2021 or click here.

The D2C Campus Employer Branding Report (CEBR) 2021 turned out to be a crowd-puller. As a part of the D2C Campus Employer Branding Report 2021, winning titles were awarded in the category of ÂDream Companies to work for 2021Â:

• In the premier 10 B-Schools, HUL remains the dream employer, leading it from the front with Amazon and McKinsey. While across 30 B-Schools, Google grabs the dream employerÂs position, followed by Hindustan Unilever Limited (HUL) and Amazon.
• In the Engineering space, Google wins first place and Microsoft takes a close second with Amazon as third.
• BCG pips Mckinsey to grab first place as the desirable consulting company, followed by Bain in premier 10 B-Schools. However, the famous MBB trio – McKinsey & Company, Boston Consulting Group, and Bain & Company grab the first three places as usual across premier 30 B-Schools.
• In the Banking and Finance sector, Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase & Co. shine this year as well, as No.1 and No.2 respectively, across segments.
• ITC gains 2nd spot while HUL shines at No.1 in the desirable FMCG/Beverage companies space, followed by P&G, Nestle, and Coca-Cola in that order across segments.
• Tata Sons wins first place under the General Management domain, followed by Aditya Birla Group (ABG), Mahindra, and Reliance across Premier 10 B-Schools. Interestingly in premier 30 B-Schools, the order changes as TATA, Reliance, ABG, and then Mahindra.
• In line with last yearÂs report, Amazon, Flipkart, and Google shine as the top 3 desirable Start-Ups/Online-Services/E-Commerce/Technology Companies where students would like to work across segments. Microsoft and Udaan took the 4th and 5th position respectively in the premier 10 B-School segments.

D2C CEBR 2021 has also given us much-needed insight into the thought process of students. Here are some key findings from the D2C Employer Branding Report 2021:

• Marketing and General Management are the preferred domains that B-School students would like to work in followed by Finance, Analytics, and Operations.
• E-Schoolers want to work as a Software Engineer/Developer followed by Product Manager roles and then Data Scientist & Analytics.
• Consulting and FMCG/FMCD are the most sought-after sectors by B-Schoolers, closely followed by E-Commerce and BFSI.
• Engineering students aspire to work in ITeS or their Core engineering sector, followed by Analytics and Consulting.
• 56% of B-School students expect and are happy with at least INR 100,001- INR 150,000 minimum monthly in-hand salary after graduation. In E-Schools, expectations are rather spread out with a minimum starting at INR 50,000.
• 81% of B-Schoolers &74% of Engineering students would like to have only one to two interactions with the company to understand it better before deciding to build a career in that company.

The awards distribution ceremony was graced by three thoughtful panel discussions where the audience garnered actionable insights and gleaned fresh perspectives on industry trends from the best business minds at leading companies.

In the first panel discussion, the industry luminaries like Anandi Shankar, Talent &Organisation Director, Unilever South Asia; Bharatendu Verma, Batch Representative 2019-21, IIM Ahmedabad, Poornima Pandey, VP Group HR, TATA Sons and Soumita Bose, Executive Director, HR, JPMorgan Chase & Co pitched into the lightning discussion over ideal career decision-making thought process, whether the process should go about Industry > Company > Job Profile? Or should it be reversed?

Putting her point across the big names, Anandi Shankar, Talent &Organisation Director, Unilever South Asia, said, ÂWe should look back every two years of our career and see if there is substantial growth in us as an individual. If we are too comfortable, it’s probably the wrong career for us.Â

Malliga Rajkumar, Senior Director, HR, Flipkart; Roshni Wadhwa, Director, Human Resources, LÂOréal; Sharada Ramachander, Director and Head Talent Acquisition (Global), CRISIL Limited, and Sonal Jain, Director HR Consumer Health Business, Johnson & Johnson honored the second-panel discussion on understanding the dynamics of engaging with students and working professionals.

Commenting on the companyÂs core beliefs basis their national and international campus engagements, Roshni Wadhwa, Director, Human Resources, LÂOréal said, ÂThe more diverse a team one has under their foray, the more innovation can come that can accentuate the entire business. Engaging with young minds can help a company leverage their powerful ideas that can mould their business strategy.Â

The third-panel discussion straightened out the dilemma of democratizing the hiring process.

Aashish Kshetry, Vice President, HR & Systems, Asian Paints; Amitav Mukherji, Head Corporate Human Resources, ITC Limited; Ashwani Prashara, CHRO, Hydrocarbons, Reliance Industries and Manish Sinha, SVP & CHRO, Automotive Business, Mahindra &Mahindra conveyed their views on whether the companies should go beyond top-tier B-Schools and Engineering Colleges?

Disclosing how Reliance has changed its recruitment processes while venturing into new forays Ashwani Prashara, CHRO, Hydrocarbons, Reliance Industries said, ÂWe have democratized and re-looked the entire hiring process. We look for talent from every nook and corner and go for the best fit for our company irrespective of the studentÂs college.Â

The final act of the Dare2Compete Awards 2021 ceremony was the D2C Recruiter-2-Recruiter and D2C Recruiter-2-Student networking session. In the one-of-a-kind session, the students got exclusive facetime with campus recruiters!