What "placement support" actually means — and how to spot fake claims

"100% placement" is one of the most misused phrases in Indian coding education. Almost nobody who advertises it actually means "every student who finished got a job" — most mean "we referred everyone at least once", or "here is a certificate that says you completed the course". Here is what real placement support actually looks like, and the questions that separate real from theatre.

What real placement support does

There is no magic here. Real placement support is a small set of unglamorous things done well, every batch:

• Portfolio review — one-on-one, on your actual GitHub, not a template.
• Resume review — specific to the role you are targeting, not a generic template.
• Mock interviews — technical and behavioural, with someone who has actually interviewed candidates.
• Referrals into a maintained hiring network — companies the institute has an actual relationship with, not a shared job board.
• Post-placement follow-up — many students need help with the first 30 days on the job. Good institutes stay in touch.

What fake placement support looks like

A vague "placement cell" that turns out to be a WhatsApp group with a few links a week. A "guaranteed job" clause that turns out to be a certificate. A partnership page with 40 company logos and zero named graduates. A tour where nobody can name a specific student who was hired last quarter.

The three questions that expose it

Ask these before you pay. Answers matter more than the way they are asked:

• "Can you show me the LinkedIn profiles of five graduates from the last two batches?" — a real institute has this ready.
• "What percentage of your last batch was placed, and how do you count that?" — the definition of "placed" is where dishonest numbers hide. A serious answer will define it clearly.
• "What is the median salary of a placed graduate?" — median, not average. Averages are how you hide low outliers behind one big-package outlier.

Why we are careful about the numbers we quote

We deliberately do not publish a "100% placement" claim, because the honest number is never 100% — some students take a break, some pivot to further study, some take longer than the visible window. What we do publish is named graduates and their companies, on our Placements page, so that anyone can verify. If you would like a candid conversation about what our support looks like for someone with your background, talk to a counsellor.