Employees from India’s financial capital Mumbai (89%) and Kolkata (86%) and Hyderabad (84%) feel they lack practical work experience because of inadequate industry-academia linkages. Seventy nine per cent say colleges and universities do not have counselling services on place.

Why this does not surprise Ashish Rajpal, founder of global learning company XSEED, is not hard to fathom.

A Harvard graduate in education, he feels development of skills to solve real-life problems, communicate and collaborate with others are critical to succeed in 21st century workplaces.