American postmodernist novelist Thomas Pynchon once wrote something to the effect that every generation is homesick for the decade it’s living in. I would like to believe the same does not hold true for me. The last thing I’d want is to sound like an old man, awash in snobbery, cribbing about the incompetence of the youth. After all, what is competence and who measures it? But having said that, I’m sure we can all agree on three basic components that cannot be compromised when in the pursuit of anything one holds valuable in life: unwavering discipline, a voice of one’s own and an infectious drive to steer away from the cramped alleyways of mediocrity.
Unfortunately, all of this became magnified during a recent round of interviews I conducted at the National Institute of Technology (NIFT), Delhi, of which I’m a proud alumnus. The positions I was hoping to fill were diverse: four designers, a graphic designer, a social media assistant and three merchandisers for retail and management. We got 500 résumés. As it’s humanly impossible to sift through all of them, we shortlisted candidates based on their scores. It came down to nearly 50 candidates for design and retail each.
