Company Secretary (CS) Career Scope: Jobs, Placemenets, Salary 2023, & Top Recruiters

A company secretary is the business' internal compliance officer and legal expert who manages a system of checks and balances. They are in charge of ensuring adherence to all the corporate rules in compliance with regulatory and statutory responsibilities. A company secretary takes on a crucial role as a business strategist and planner, their key responsibilities include streamlining office workflow procedures, and assisting coworkers and managers while simultaneously handling legal horizons like the company’s tax returns, audits, and financial information. Serving as the point of contact for any inquiries, requests, or problems, they are highly venerated and revered through financial aspects and tunnels. Company secretaries possess a broad variety of abilities that cross corporate law, finance, management, strategy, equities, and company secretarial duties.

In these critical areas, they advise the company's board and support the chairman, CEO, and external directors. The company secretary serves as a vital ingredient; therefore, they have a responsibility to carry out their tasks with due diligence. In addition to serving as legal mentors, they are accountable for ensuring that all organisational operations comply with the legislative framework. If the corporate legislation is not obeyed, a company secretary may be held guilty of misconduct and fired for dishonesty or infringement on the company's constitutional protections hence, being a company secretary requires legitimacy, honesty, and fair ethics.

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All About Company Secretary

Why should one choose to be a company secretary?

With its headquarters in New Delhi, the Institute of Company Secretaries of India (ICSI) also maintains regional offices in Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata, and New Delhi thereby making Company Secretary a popular profession amongst major metropolitan cities. With 62,000 members and more than 3,50,000 students enrolled in company secretarial training courses, ICSI has 72 chapters spread out across India, indicating its popularity and veneration.

Company Secretary is a profession that seeks career grace even by the laws and sections. Under Section 383 A beneath the Companies Act 2013, it is mandatory for companies with a paid-up share capital of INR 10 crores or more to encapsulate a full-time Company Secretary. An accomplished CS will reportedly now receive an alluring package worth INR 1-1.5 crore annually, which unquestionably makes it one of the higher-paying careers in India. Sutanu Sinha, managing director and official secretary of ICSI, claims that "big firms require at least 16-20 corporate secretaries and there are a limited number of them in the cart. Hence, proves the fact that if one aims to become a Company Secretary, their career isn’t dull. In ICSI-The Institute of Company Secretaries of India, the ratio of men to women is reported to be 51%: 49%. Likewise, there is a good male-to-female ratio.

Top Company Secretary Careers

The technical prospects for Company Secretary are quite bright for anyone with the right ambition. It is a prestigious post in the accounting and business industries. It is a wide horizon which encapsulates securing rights over the stock exchange, corporate affairs divisions, financial auditing industries, law boards or governmental bodies. A successful candidate can graduate with little to no experience, and even within two years of starting be appointed as managing director or the Chairman of the business. The below-mentioned are a few career options which are considered to be reputable under the domain of a Company Secretary.

Company Registrar: It is the responsibility of the Registrar of Companies to regulate the provisions of the Companies Act as well as the Limited Partnership Act. Registers and records of companies and LLPs are maintained by the registrar of companies. No matter if it is a private limited company, one-person company, or Limited Liability Partnership, all records and returns have to be filed with the ROC in whose jurisdiction their registered office is located. They are an imperative part of a company's management hierarchy.

Legal Advisor: In their capacity as legal advisers, they must assist the company in any legal matter. Aside from ensuring compliance with laws and regulations of the company, security, and corporate sectors, they supervise the company's internal management and raise a toast to bureaucratic retention within the company.

Corporate Policymaker:  Companies rely on company secretaries to formulate both short-term and long-term corporate policies. In addition to advising the company board on existing policies when necessary, they also consult with the company’s legal department.

Chief Administrative Officer: As the company's chief administrative officer, they are responsible for overseeing its general administrative activities. It is their responsibility to safeguard all legal and confidential documents of the company.

Principal Secretary: Managing all aspects of corporate meetings, ranging from board meetings to annual general meetings, interacting with significant clients and vendors, and meeting with government and private delegations, is the responsibility of the principal secretary. In addition, organising corporate events and managing clients may also be part of their responsibilities. Click to learn Elements of Cost in Cost Accounting.

Scope of a Company Secretary in India

In India, being a Company Secretary is a career where one will be attracted to willingly work hard owing to its various positive career prospects while keeping everything in place. While serving as a rocket-science block for an organisation being a Company Secretary, you will get to know all the aspects and functions that help an organisation to shape its success. Being a company secretary would require you to amalgamate a strong sense of commitment, dedication and maybe even the ability to multitask to extract unexplored managerial and corporate trends. The below-mentioned are a few horizons where the scope for Company Secretaries is glorifying and flickering.

Legal, Secretarial and Corporate Governance:

A company's control is exercised through a system of policies, procedures, and rules known as corporate governance. It mostly involves striking a balance between the interests of a company's stakeholders, such as shareholders, management, customers, financiers, the government, and the community. It has been assigned to Company Secretaries all over the world to ensure that businesses adhere to sound corporate governance practices.

Foreign Collaborations and Joint Ventures:

One of the fascinating milieus that Company Secretaries engage in is curating Foreign collaborations and Joint ventured partnerships wherein they explore, analyse, brainstorm and later demarcate the pros and cons based on which, they magnify the parameters in accordance with regulatory compliances and enrol/extract partnerships and collaborations.

Management:

Company Secretaries are considered to be prominent when it comes to Managerial entailment. They can firmly handle and have control over General/ Strategic Management, Human Resources Management, Corporate Communication & Public Relations and Information Technology.

Financial Market Services:

When it comes to Financial Market Services, Company Secretaries have off-bound contributions which involve International Trade & WTO Services, Finance & Accounting Services, Taxation Services, Public Issue, listing and Securities Management, Securities Compliance and Certification Services, Takeover Codes, Insider trading, Mergers & Amalgamation.

Academia:

Individuals aiming to enter the work field of a Company Secretary can also contribute to building its legacy by indulging themselves as professors/teachers/lecturers to disseminate their information in relation to the combats and technicalities that one should know in order to become a Company Secretary.

Average Salary for Company Secretaries in India

The salary of a Company secretary in diverse sectors is satisfactory. Being a company secretary is considered one of the most accountable and visible job roles, which puts a lot of pressure on CS to deliver results at all costs. As a result, the average salary of company secretaries is very high. The most significant job titles or profiles for Company Secretaries are included in the table below, along with their typical salaries.

Top Recruiters for Company Secretaries

A qualified CS leads to discovering jobs in the public and private sectors, financial institutions and banks. The government body available requires your services and assistance as a Company Secretary for smoother functioning. Therefore, it can be said that the profession of Company Secretary holds strong control over enrollment and recruiting processes. The below-mentioned are a few prominent companies that are well-known when it comes to hiring individuals aiming to enter the horizon of a Company Secretary.

• KPMG
• Reliance Industries
• TCS
• Infosys
• Oliver Wyman
• Cognizant
• Aditya Birla Group
• ICICI Bank
• Google
• Amazon

Top Company Secretary Placement Colleges

Placements are an important part of any training program. Leading colleges in India ensure that their students have the best career opportunities. To curtail the benefits that colleges offer both in the context of placements and academics, it becomes important to search and explore before choosing a particular college especially when it comes to managerial or financial engagement like that of a Company Secretary. The table below highlights significant colleges that offer a diploma/course for individuals aiming to curate themselves under the horizon of a Company Secretary. 

How to get a good job as a Company Secretary?

• An individual aiming to enter a job construct may make progress by establishing an awareness of managerial and corporate milieus. Auditing strata, Government arena, Financing, and Accounting are a few aspects they need to identify in their direction to make money.
• Your skills, strengths, flaws, and expertise should all be included in the resume you write while applying for a position as a Company Secretary.
• As part of the job search process, it is peremptory to build a network. It is beneficial for a Company Secretary to have connections with people belonging to the world of Business, Market, Finance, and Human Resources.
• In order to gain real-time exposure of the true essence which is linked to the world of Business, Finance, auditing and Laws, individuals wanting to enter the horizon as a Company Secretary should participate in Live projects and audits.
• To be successful in a position as Company Secretary, it is important to stay up-to-date on Social, Political, Economic, and Financial trends. This will help you develop your skills and strengths while also enhancing your career potential.
• When entering a particular field or planning to engage in a particular domain related to work as Company Secretary, it is important not to overdo it and become overwhelmed by knowledge outside of your area of expertise. Instead, assess what interests you, and how well-suited you are for the job based on your skills and abilities, and take into account the vastness of information available in accordance with your aptitude.

Top Indian cities to get lucrative job offers as a Company Secretary

At present, there is a high demand for demonstrating corporate transparency and credibility by organisations. Most companies are focused on retaining the confidence of their stakeholders, which leaves top management with little time to connect with them and build trust. To address this issue, many business organisations/companies in modern cities employ qualified professionals that are Company Secretaries. The below-mentioned are a few top cities that not only venerate the Company Secretary as a profession but also provide blooming opportunities.

Life after being Employed as a Company Secretary

Being a company secretary is a position that holds a great dimension of power and your opinion will carry a lot of prestige. So, your decisions and ideas will have a major say and influence the company for which it is imperative to run smoothly and in the direction of success. If the company is reaching heights and is pacing up at the speed of a smooth-running rollercoaster, you will feel unstoppable and extraordinary with an amazing amalgamation of satisfaction. Moreover, with the increasing use of technology, it is likely that company secretaries' documentation needs will improve in the future making the horizon and work of a company secretary easier.

In an ever-competitive corporate environment, where employees are under a lot of pressure and stress at work, not needing to meet deadlines allows a Company Secretary to work in a relatively relaxed setting. This can lead to your best performance as an employee for the company you are working for. Consequently, being a Company Secretary is beneficial in this hard-fought climate because it reduces the mental discomforts that workers experience every day.

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