GPT pans universities for dearth of IT talent

Telecoms firm GPT has slammed the quality of graduates applying for its jobs.

Phil Griffin, senior engineering manager at GPT, said the candidates were not as good as they had been in previous years and the recruitment drive was proving very slow. The company is looking to hire more than 300 engineers across the country in the next three years,

?Earlier this year we announced that we wanted 60 graduates, but so far, despite extensive advertising we have only got half that number,? said Griffin.

There had been a good response to vacancies for software and hardware engineers, but the percentage of people GPT considered qualified to do the work was small.

Griffin blamed universities for producing ?IT experts? that know what a computer does, but lack the necessary design or technical skills.

?We need people with design skills in C or C++. Some of our applicants know a little bit about the C language, but have never been taught the standard C model, which is a key part of program design,? he said.

On the hardware side, few candidates could deal with the A6 technology that is crucial for the production of GP?s market- leading SDH products.