Graduate Careers Australia
Graduate Skills: What Employers Want
Organisational Skills (continued)
Matching and Decision-making
Understands personal priorities (ie. what is important or what must be done first) and constraints (internal and external restrictions, ie. within oneself and those imposed by the work environment). This includes the need for a sustainable balance of work and home life. Able to match opportunities to core skills, knowledge, values, interests, etc. Able to make informed decisions based on the available opportunities.
Negotiation
Able to reach 'win/win' agreements (ie. reaching an agreement where both or all parties gain, rather than one gains all and the other/s, nothing).
Political Awareness
Understands the hidden tensions and power struggles within organisations. Aware of the location of power and influence within organisations (ie. who is the real boss, who actually makes the decisions which affect the workplace, employees and customers).
Coping with Uncertainty
Able to adapt goals in the light of changing circumstances. Able to take many tiny risks.
Development Focus
Committed to lifelong learning (ie. not just getting one qualification, willingness to undertake specific courses which can improve skills, effectiveness in a job and overall employability). Understands preferred method and style of learning (ie. knowing how you learn best, eg. text book, note taking, research assignments, small-group learning activities, presentations, field work, hands-on practical activities or experiential learning).
Transfer Skills
Able to apply skills to new contexts (eg. a teacher making a topic interesting and appealing to a class and then working in an advertising agency and 'selling' a client on a new campaign for the client’s product). This is a higher level skill in itself. Skills are not automatically transferable.
Self-confidence
Has an underlying confidence in abilities, based on past successes. Also has a personal sense of self-worth, not dependent on performance. The 'self-reliant graduate' needed to be aware of the changing world of work, took responsibility for his or her own career and personal development and was able to manage the relationship with work and learning throughout all stages of life. Also in the UK, another researcher found that employers wanted graduate recruits who could: work flexibly and could 'grow' jobs; as well as respond to or anticipate the constant changes in the world of work. US research outlined in List 2, identifies a range of skills required by employers in general (ie. not specifically graduate employers).
List 2: Employers Seek a Variety of Skills
Basic Skills
Reading, writing and computation.
Technical Skills
Computer skills. Workers use a growing array of advanced information, telecommunications and manufacturing technologies. Moreover, information technology changes rapidly, requiring workers to frequently upgrade their skills for competency in successive generations of technology.
Organisational Skills
New systems of management and organisation, as well as employee-customer interactions, require a portfolio of skills in addition to academic and technical skills. These include communication skills, analytical skills, problem solving and creative thinking, interpersonal skills, the ability to negotiate and influence and self-management.
Company specific skills
New technology, market changes and competition drive companies to innovate, constantly upgrade products and services and focus on continuous improvement of work processes. As a result, employees must frequently acquire new knowledge and skills specifically relevant to the company's products and services, and their production processes or service delivery modes.
Recent Australian findings called Employer Satisfaction with Graduate Skills— Research Report (2000) found the following skill deficiencies: creativity and flair; oral business communications; and problem solving. The skill deficiencies which employers identified themselves most often were in the areas of: communication; interpersonal relations with other staff; and understanding of business practice.
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