r/IndiaCareers

Hey guys.

I desperately need some advice because I'm losing my mind trying to figure out my future.

I am a dropper for jee and honestly, the burnout is so bad that, Pehle dream college hua karta tha, ab college jana hi dream ban chuka hai.

I just want to get into a college and move on with my life at this point.

The plan was obviously BTech, but everyone keeps saying the market is totally crashed, recession is bad, and Al is taking over entry level tech jobs. So I got scared and looked into other options.

I checked out BA in Journalism and Mass Communication, but people are saying the exact same thing there too that nobody knows what the scene will look like in 5 years.

Literally every field I look into, people tell me it's dead or risky. I am so confused and stuck right now.

Can anyone please tell me what career options are actually safe or going to boom in the future? If you're doing something other than BTech or know about fields that actually have good scope and stability, please share.

Any guidance would mean the world to me.

Ever since February when anthropic released their powerful model, there has been a domino effect of things being released day after day, lot of vibe coding, lot of GitHub projects, different apps and software's all over insta and LinkedIn, some just straight up bullshit and some really solving pain points. But all these tech CEO's, they keep saying the same shit thing again and again like they agreed that this is what we would say (Robots). "AI won't replace your job, person who uses AI will", "A Big wave is coming, and people don't even know about it", "AI is going to create more jobs in the future", AI this...AI that....,AI,AI,AI,AI,AIIIIIIIIII. Even in recent college graduation speech in USA, I'm not sure about the college name there was a video where Jensen mentioned the word AI around 32 times saying the same aforementioned stuff.

Here is how I'm looking at this. All these investors (VC, PE etc) have invested a shit ton of money in this AI thing so much to a point that it is too big to fail (regardless of it creating a bubble or not). So how would not let it fail? you have to get people using you AI and drive them to pay to use AI. But the thing is showing logic that this will reduce the workload or helps with task management this that etc etc. is not going to compel mass amounts of people to use it (thereby investors not seeing their investments value raise quickly enough).

So, then what would tech companies do in order to drive people to use their products. "Use Emotional Manipulation". "AI will not replace you but a person who is using AI will". This statement which hits hard to a lot of working professionals scaring this shit out of them cause it's a matter of survival in the long run (so you have hit the emotion here). This initially raises curiosity and later some people use it, and some people have a peek and just move on. But you don't stop there, companies around the world go around doing mass layoffs in the name of AI even though models today are not that high trained to replace a person. (I'm making this statement after talking to lot of managers and directors in the field I'm working in - Audit, Tax, and Advisory. All mentioned it help them summarize stuff or prepare basic stuff in excel or word or PowerPoint but not to a point where they complete the entire stated task in hand by themselves with just human prompts or voice commands, even if it tried it did a lot of mistakes so it took almost as much time to the person as if the person did not use AI in the first place). So, this raised fear again, so people again rush to educate themselves with AI by paying money. Keep doing this on a repeated process you get a paying user base for your AI model. Now you have covered Individuals, but how about established businesses. If you have been tracking the news you would see that lot of these AI companies partnered with lot of Asset Management firms (Blackrock, Blackstone etc etc) (who would have invested in them) you drive implementation of AI in their company and also asking them to drive implementation in their portfolio companies, cause think about it, a company CEO would not be driven much from a sales person from one of these AI co to implement AI in their firm unless that order is coming from their investors which are these Asset Management firms. So, this reels in a lot of companies. So, we are up to a point AI is everywhere.

This AI model which does pattern recognition in scale and are going to keep getting powerful day by day so in next two years they might have cracked a person's job to be done entirely by AI without Human supervision.

I see lot of wage workers in insta wearing some kind of meta glasses on top their head basically gathering training and output dataset to train these models so machine can automate it in future. So, lot of job loss expected there. Lot of entry level jobs will be gone so there is no way graduates both UG and MBA will matter anymore. So, my advice before you pay shit ton of money to study college evaluate whether it's actually going to help you by the time you are out.

There is shit ton to unpack on the data center thing. How much energy and water it drains, and India is being a whore at this point to let any company set their data center in India without thinking implications, all for personal pocket money to these bureaucrats and if you think "no no it will create jobs" (How much will they create? enough to compensate for all new graduates and existing unemployed people? THINK!)

So, if this happens revenue are up, all this companies can go public or whatever and all the VC's or PE who invested can make 10x or 20x of their invested capital.

I remember this from recent the boys' series; we all are fighting a unbeatable foe. Which is more powerful than companies, powerful people, life or nature - its P&L, Supply and Demand, elegant flow of currency across the globe. we all are cogs in a great machine and we all have a part to play. I know if you are thinking what does that have to do here, I feel like we all are stuck in this machine and we can't do anything about it but just slave away.

Let me know if you have any different thoughts about this AI.

Hi everyone, I genuinely need your help , I’m a GET in a FMCG manufacturing plant , and it’s been 10 months into the GET period and now the HR has found a role for me in their other plant Which is in south . Now the problem is my family lives near to me 35kms away , and my mother lost her parents , siblings in the past 2-3 years , my elder brother is abroad, so it’s just me and my father here for her , she is depressed still trying to process the loss , but my movement will give her even more shock . Is there any way to spell out my concerns to the HR ? And is there any possibility that they can keep me here ? People are saying do not say directly it will make a bad impression of yours , please tell me how to choose my words carefully
Please help !!

Hi everyone,

Need some honest career advice.

My career so far has been across tech consulting, business solutions, presales, digital transformation, client-facing work, stakeholder management, and industry/market research. I’ve also done my MBA, and my profile has mostly been at the intersection of technology, business strategy, and consulting style work.

I recently got offered a UK government role based in their embassy in India. The role is around technology and innovation advisory, where the work seems to involve tech partnerships, innovation ecosystem building, policy/business engagement, and supporting UK-India collaboration.

The role genuinely excites me because it feels very different from a regular corporate job. It has the appeal of government/international exposure, strong networking, meaningful work, and possibly better work-life balance.

But the pay cut is significant. The pay slabs here are fixed.

Currently, my fixed pay is around ₹28 LPA.
Although it is a senior role, but the new role offers around ₹17.7 LPA gross, with around ₹15 LPA net in hand.

So this is roughly a 45% pay cut.

The government role feels more meaningful and unique, but I’m unsure about future growth, salary progression, and whether it helps later if I want to move back into consulting, tech strategy, public policy, partnerships, or corporate strategy.

Would you take this kind of pay cut for a UK government/diplomatic mission role?

How valuable is this kind of experience in the long run?

What should I clarify before joining?

If you were in my place, what would you do?

I’m 28M, currently working in the consulting arm of a WITCH company after my MBA. From the outside, things probably look fine. But internally, I feel like I’ve been settling my whole life.

I topped my school growing up and genuinely believed I was meant for something big — top consulting, entrepreneurship, wealth, impact, all of it. But somewhere along the way, I kept making “safe” or mediocre choices.

I did engineering from a tier-4 college near my home. Got two campus offers (tcs and some startup) but rejected them because I wanted to prepare for CAT. Took a drop year. Didn’t make it.

Then I joined a BPO-type role at a well-known consulting company for around 4 LPA. I knew from day one that it had limited growth, but I stayed there for 2 years while preparing for CAT again.

Again, things didn’t go as planned.

I ended up joining a tier-2 MBA college. Honestly, I hated the environment there. Felt like most people were busy with hookups, partying, smoking up while learning nothing meaningful. I didn’t feel like I belonged there either.

Now I’ve graduated and landed a 24 LPA job. On paper, that sounds great. But I also have a 30 lakh education loan.

And the worst part? I still feel embarrassed about where I work. I lie to friends and family that I’ve got a 30+ package because I want them to think I’m doing extremely well. Deep down, I feel mediocre and disappointed in myself.

I’m 28 with:

- No savings

- Around 2 lakhs owed to friends

- No side income

- No strong network

- No clear path to becoming “rich,” which was always my dream

My family doesn’t even own a car. Parents are government employees who worked hard their whole lives. I always thought I’d “make it big” and change everything financially for them and for myself.

But now I’m scared this is it.

That I’ll just continue drifting through decent-but-not-great jobs, paying EMIs, pretending to be successful while internally feeling like I underachieved relative to my potential.

Did anyone else feel like they peaked in school and spent the rest of their life trying to catch up to that version of themselves?

How do you recover from this mindset? And realistically, can someone still build an exceptional career/wealth trajectory starting at 28?

I’ve used AI to structure this.

TL;DR:

28M, tier-4 engineering → failed CAT once → dead-end 4 LPA job → tier-2 MBA → now at 24 LPA in WITCH consulting with 30L loan. No savings, debt, feeling mediocre despite “doing okay” on paper. Always dreamed of a high-flying career/wealth but now scared I settled too much in life.

I (M, 51) went to a third interview at a small but well-known company a few weeks ago. The owner of the company was something else. I'm still trying to figure out if it was a prank. Here are some of the things he said verbatim:

"Official working hours are from 9 to 5, but no one leaves on time. I want 11 net working hours from you every day. I monitor the cameras, and I know who works hard and who messes around. So, 55 hours of work a week, that's the minimum."

"The salary is a fixed $70,000. That's what I have."

"Look, working with me isn't easy. Consider me like that nagging sergeant in the army."

"The thing that annoys me most is speculation and guessing. I work with facts only. If you start 'assuming' things, you'll cause me problems, and then you'll have a big problem with me. So, it's better to avoid it."

"Our culture here is amazing. We had a company bowling day last year."

"Oh, you'll be working with Steve. He's a bit of a mix. He's a genius, but sometimes he's arrogant because he thinks he's the smartest person in the room."

"You have a small web design business on the side? You need to forget about that. I need 100% of your focus here if I hire you."

"Honestly, you're my first choice for the position."

So, to be clear, he's offering $70,000 for a normal work week, but in return, he wants me to give him 780 extra hours of work per year for free. The man was unbelievably difficult and clearly a first-rate micromanager. I don't understand how he even has employees. And the kicker? His wife runs HR.

When I got home, I sent him a polite email withdrawing myself from consideration. The surprise was that he replied asking if I was interested in doing some freelance work for him. I replied and explained in detail why I withdrew, and as I expected, he didn't answer again. I dodged a bullet.

Yesterday I saw around 2.7 Lakh students appeared for the bar examination. It made me realise that lakhs of students are pursuing law without realising that there's no market.
I am myself a graduate from a decent university in a t1 city, did lots of internships in litigation and then I worked in a big four firm and thereafter I joined a Tier 1 NLU for my LL.M and cleared UGC Net as well, and I am still unemployed.
I have applied to almost 300 companies and universities by now and still people aren't shortlisting me even for an interview. The situation is same with all my classmates as well. You have two options either go to court and start with peanuts earning somewhere around 5-10k per month or stay unemployed. The NLU dream that is sold at least for LLM courses is bullshit.
Universities require people who have PhDs. They don't even care about LLM and NET qualifications. I have seen incompetent people as professors while I was a student myself. I always used to wonder that I can definitely be better than these guys. But rather than going through your certifications, they just focus on whether you have a PhD or not, which is a shame tbh.
The problem is that the field is full of people who have connections, mostly only they are succeeding. Companies rarely hire one or two people for law and even they prefer referred candidates.
I am struggling, I don't want y'all to struggle. I'll suggest prepare for NEET or JEE, or do something else rather than wasting your precious years. If you secure a T1 NLU for your bachelors then you might be fine, or else you're doomed.
P.S.- If you guys have any leads, do let me know. xD

Im a 2025 grad currently working as a qa automation engineer my ctc is 6.75 lpa in hand inr 50k per month.
I was under the impression that id prepare for my switch and start applying as soon as i was close to the 9 month mark. Which came in april.
Since i started applying, ive applied to a 100 positions with 0 callbacks.
These were positions where my profile was perfectly aligned.
There was no experience mismatch and everything was as per requirements.
I’m demotivated and i feel like this is it for me.
Please guys im really struggling here.
Need some words of encouragement and advice.

I am going to talk about one of the biggest lies being sold everywhere, especially to freshers. That lie is called the Data Analyst job role.

Nowadays, people think data analytics is an easy field to get into and requires very little coding knowledge. This half-knowledge is being sold worldwide. Yes, it requires less coding compared to software development, but it still needs knowledge of Python, SQL, Power BI, Excel, and most importantly — communication skills.

Until and unless you can communicate your findings properly, your technical skills are useless. You need to have a good command of English and know how to present insights clearly.

Another thing I feel is misleading is the “AI/ML Engineer” role. Most companies ask for at least 2–5 years of experience. But how is a fresher supposed to have that much experience? Common sense says they can’t.

Also, this field really boomed after 2021, so expecting freshers to already have years of industry-level experience feels unrealistic and overly ambitious from companies.

Maybe you think I’m just ranting, or maybe you think I’m not competent enough or not hireable enough. But honestly, look at other tech roles like software engineering, manual testing, backend, or frontend development.

Companies hire freshers there, train them properly, and make them workable enough for the job. Eventually, the employee works long enough to cover the training cost anyway.

So why can’t companies do the same for AI/ML or Data Analytics roles? Why not train freshers and make them industry-ready instead of expecting experience from day one?

Maybe I lack some corporate or market knowledge, and I’m open to hearing experienced opinions on this.

Or maybe… a referral would also work 😂

TL;DR:

People are selling Data Analytics as an “easy” career path, but it still requires technical skills and strong communication. At the same time, AI/ML roles demand unrealistic experience from freshers, while companies in other tech domains still hire and train beginners properly.

A little about me-

Complete Ba hons + M.Sc. in Psychology ( tier 1- city)

I have done a few internships for example.

As a Counseling intern with Aiims,

Interned with Fortis and civil hospital,

freelancing as a consultant for a pre-seed mental health startup - helped them build Assessments.

Market research for a travel company

I just gave my final exams for msc, Last week.

The job market in mental health and psychology is really bad. I don't see any opportunities where the pay is good. Even after a lot of experience goes up till 12-15lpa max.

Currently I am getting 'jobs' from 10,000 to 35,000.

It feels so unfair that even after doing my masters this is the reality. I can't work at such a low pay, I'm already 25 and I want to be financially independent and not a burden to my family anymore.

Why are only Engineers and MBAs paid well?

Don't get me wrong I'm not jealous, i just see this pattern and i don't see it changing anytime soon, I feel psychology has a lot of potential but it's just not the best country or the best time ( economics) for it.

Please guide me how to take this background and switch to a well paying or even a fair paying field.

I'm interested in consumer marketing/ consumer behaviour, UI/ UX - if anyone is this these fields please let me know the skill set required for these so I can atleast be ready for interviews. ( Suggestion apart for these are also welcome)

The 7 biggest career mistakes I see engineers repeatedly make...

 In my 25+ years of journey into technology,  I have noticed the same career mistakes show up again and again for engineers — regardless of company, stack, or experience level.

Staying “just technical” for too long –

Is writing good code enough? Probably not.  The people who grew the fastest developed their skills on communication, stakeholder management , business context and understanding the larger context rather than the specific ask.

Confusing hard work with visibility

Most of the engineers quietly do superb work with the assumption that leadership will take a note of it themselves. Many times, this doesn’t happen. Its you who have to ensure to present your work at larger forums like team meetings and make yourself visible. Obviously, promotion happens for people who are visible .

Chasing every new framework/tool

Trying to pick up every new tool is the urgue we have to go away with. Instead, focus on fundamentals on system design, machine learning , modelling , architecture and problem solving

 Lack of domain knowledge

The best engineers I have worked with, were great at technology solutioning , but also had a good grasp of the domain they operated upon. Their domain skills made them valuable for everyone and their approach was understood with business leaders too.

 Looking for salary growth only

This is one the most common parameter to judge a job opportunity. Everyone tends to focus on the CTC only and ignores the learning path, career growth and futuristic roadmap . While compensation is important, all the parameters go hand in hand. Infact, for someone who is in the initial years of their career, my suggestion will be to keep the ctc element to the last. Its import

What do you think? Anything more that we can add to this list?

Vatsy

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3 year gap after 12th ( wasted years for neet preparation )

did bcom from tier 4 aatu jhatu college because I needed a escape from neet and science I was mentally broken ( there are no bba degrees in my colleges here )

need any non voice job starting 2-3 lpa is it possible or do i have to beg on street for coins considering the job market ? have no skills right now. I cant do voice intensive jobs due to personal issue.

Option 1 : cat / mba entrances

Option 2 : ssc cgl / gov exams

Option 3 : ca/cma alongside doing mcom from tier 4 local college

Option 4 : immediately try to get a job after bcom ( may not be possible with just bcom i don't know )

Please give genuine advice about my situation and profile. I'm very poor and cant afford above 5 lakh mba fees. So don't suggest tier 3 mba with no roi like that please.

Don't put bullsh#$ suggesting to go to a foreign country. It's not that easy and you won't pay my expenses.

I am done with school gonna start my college . I have to take a degree I am not pursuing hotel management because apparently its not a good degree and not at all helpful . Nor am I doing an acting degree . I am interested in law but it's not flexible at all and I am kinda scared if I am even made for it or not . People have suggested me MBA but it's very boring and very oversaturated degree according to you all what path should I choose what degree should I choose need guidance please

Hey guys so I am 27F. Worked in sales for around 2 years in a good product company and have been kicked out coz i was not able to meet target. 30th april was my last day at company.

I have no offers , no interviews schedules and not even getting calls from companies.

I am not a sales person so I am moving towards performance marketing. I am trying to learn it and then apply eventually for fresher role. And later on i will do freelancing too for side hustle.

I have also decided to start trading so that i can earn passively. However , i have no knowledge about it and i will be learning it from scratch.

I am also trying to find job meanwhile in sales for the timebeing because i need money ofcourse because i know lending performance marketing job is hard.

My mind also moved towards preparing for govt bank jobs. I always wanted to but the problem is i am already 27 and considering I am weak in maths, i have to do a lot of practice which requires lots of time.

So i am juggling between all of these. I am in no position to give my entire time to just focusing on govt job because everyone knows the selection rate is low and my age is moving closer to max age limit.

Pls advice what should i do

9/9/8 profile Obc-Ncl male. Completed my BTech in Mechanical engineering from a top NIT in 2024. Landed a job through campus placements in a PSU in a technical role. The pay is around 80kpm.

But, I didn't like the work I was doing and the pay growth and intellectual growth seemed to be very sluggish. Hence I had the MBA plans in my mind as it could pay me well with the quality of work being better. 

With that in mind, I wrote CAT 2024 with zero prep, as I decided that I would attempt next year with some work experience which would improve my chances. Surprisingly, I got 95.7 %ile and I got some PI calls too. But I was able to convert only low tier IIMs. Hence, I thought that I would try next time with good amount of prep.

I appeared again for CAT 2025; this time with 6 months of prep, and I had hoped that I could get at least 99%ile as I got a good score last year without even knowing the exam pattern. But alas, I only got 94.8 %ile and I was devastated. I felt like all my plans had gone down the drain. 

I am really under confident now and I am not sure if I have it in me to crack CAT. I am thinking that I will give CAT once again this time, and I hope to get at least 99%ile. I would have around 3 years of work experience under my belt if I join a college in 2027. I would also be 25 years old by then. I am not sure if that's old for an MBA.

I just want to know what colleges I should aim for, given my profile and experience. Will my technical PSU work experience hold any benefits? What should be my realistic expectations about doing MBA and life post MBA? Also, what if I don't make it this time too? What should be my course of action?

Hi everyone I am 25M I currently work in tech as a python developer in Pune and have a total of 1 yr of experience ( 6 months experience in Power BI and 6 months current experience as a Python Developer)

I have already tried the Sbi clerk job as well but the rural posting and sales profile didn't go well with me so I came back to IT.

I have 3 paths currently in front of me with certain pros and cons

Path 1: Stay in tech but as all of you know the AI revolution and layoffs uncertainty is always there and I am not a fan of deep development and coding.

I can either prepare alongside my job for a tech role which doesn't involve much coding and switch next year.

Path 2: Try for IBPS SO/SSC CGL/Insurance

I can try for these exams alongside my job for the next 4-5 years

Path 3: Get into a Tier 1.5-2 Mba but I know ROI isn't promising and it will cost a lot of money It doesn't feel safe to take heavy loans and create unnecessary pressure on parents.

All paths have some pros and cons but after all that uncertainty after graduating in 2023 i have had 2 yrs of gap and i really don't know what I will do it i get laid off someday as it happened with my colleague last week.

Can anyone suggest what would the ideal path be for moving ahead as depending upon this IT job of 30-35k per month and not making any backup can be risky.