Indian colleges and universities produce about four million non-technical graduates and 400,000 engineering graduates each year. In spite of this vast talent pool the NASSCOM-McKinsey Report 2005, revealed that only about 25 percent of technical graduates and 10-15 percent of general college graduates from India were suitable for employment in the offshore IT and BPO industries.
And with the Indian ITES-BPO industry growing at breakneck speed it was found necessary to look ahead and develop workforce initiatives at the earliest.
With this in mind, Hewitt Associates and NASSCOM (National Association of Software and Service Companies), the apex body of Indian IT & service companies, along with the ITES-BPO industry, created an ‘Assessment and Certification Program’ called NASSCOM Assessment of Competence (NAC).

Nasscom President Kiran Karnik has been quoted as saying, “The aim is to create a continuous pipeline of talent by transforming a ‘trainable’ workforce into an ‘employable’ workforce”.
Started in the state of Rajasthan where about 2500 candidates took the first NAC test in November 2006, it is now conducted in many other states and has become an industry standard.
With its assessment and certification procedure, it encourages a noticeable and efficient steam of talent. It also aims at providing insights into the requirements of training and development besides assisting educational institutions, and corporations in the advancement of programs and initiatives that will encourage talent.
Some of the ITES-BPO companies that support the NAC initiative are Accenture, Dell India, Convergys India, Amex India, Genpact, IBM Daksh and. Cognizant Technology Services,