What is it about?

The perceptions of employed university graduates on the extent to which they were able to meet the skills requirements of their jobs, and also the perceptions of employers on the extent to which their graduate employees would need further training in order to perform satisfactorily in their jobs were assessed.

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Why is it important?

Findings show that -Employers across all the sectors placed a high importance on all the generic skills identified in the study while analytical, problem-solving and interpersonal skills were ranked a little higher than others. -The employed graduates believed that the skills acquired in school were not adequate in meeting the skills requirements of their jobs. -Overall results on the extent of the training needs of graduates as perceived by employers show that graduates of all the fields of study would require further training to a large extent before they could perform satisfactorily in their jobs. Considering the relative needs for training among graduates of different courses of study, graduates of social sciences had the greatest need for further training followed by those in medical sciences, while graduates of agricultural science had the least need for further training.

Perspectives

Apart from establishing the level of importance of employers’ generic skills requirements, this study considers the perceptions of employed university graduates themselves on the extent to which university education has prepared them for meeting the skills needs of their jobs. Using perception of employed graduates is one of the ways of assessing the market relevance of university education, which, hopefully, can provide useful feedback to the universities. Therefore, this study has implications for the role of the education system in facilitating employability and alignment between education and work.

Dr Oluyomi Susan PITAN
University of KwaZulu-Natal

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This page is a summary of: Graduate employees’ generic skills and training needs, Higher Education Skills and Work-based Learning, August 2017, Emerald,
DOI: 10.1108/heswbl-04-2017-0026.
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