Matching University Graduates’ Competences with Employers’ Needs in Taiwan

Abstract

The dramatic expansion of the number of higher educational institutions in Taiwan has contributed a great deal to the growing unemployment rate of university graduates. Given the accumulated number of students who graduated in previous years and failed to find a job, the pressure of finding a job is growing each year. On the other hand, however, many employers lamented that they are struggling to find qualified job candidates. The major reason for this mismatch is that the traditional university instruction that most graduates receive is no longer adequate for the changing demands of the new market, and employers are also failed to notice that the definition of a good job perceived by students is very different from decades ago. To address this mismatch, it is important to understand what employers want in graduates and what students are seeking in a job. By administering questionnaires to both employers and university students, we endeavor to identify the component of a good job perceived by students, and skills demanded by employers for work accomplishment. Questionnaires were administered to 250 students and 250 employers, and many differences between the two parties were identified. Suggestions were given for students, universities, and employers to narrow the talent gap between employers and university graduates.

Employability Skills Based on Polytechnic Graduate Job Role: Immediate Supervisor Perception

“…Immediate supervisors in Quality Assurance units experience personal qualities as the most important and are the priorities of both employability skills that must be acquired by prospective graduates before entering the workplace in the Research and Development unit, Maintenance unit and Production unit. This finding is in line with the results of the study conducted by Ho (2015) where the employer puts a dimension of personality that includes loyalty and ethics followed by disciplined and has the best preferences. This finding is similar to the findings of Latisha and Surina (2010) that employers are looking for employees with high personal qualities.…”

University Graduates’ Assessment of the Relevance of the Curriculum to the Labor Market in the Philippines

“…Majority of those who acquired their master's degree are graduates from the College of Education since the graduate courses are offered in the said location. The respondents of a tracer study also came from different academic majors such that 27% majored in agriculture, 27% in education and social sciences, 20% in construction and engineering, and 26% in business (Ho, 2015). Evidence from surveys stated that career-specific and generalist degrees can produce employability outcomes among the graduates (Kinash et al, 2014).…”

“…If the need for relevance in the curriculum is not met, graduates are then prompted to take a lengthy transition from the university to the labor market which leads to a long time looking for an appropriate job that matches their qualifications (Ho, 2015). The learning competencies are a loss on investment when graduates are unable to fit the degree, interests, and capabilities developed at a university to the demands of the labor market (Corominas, Saurina, & Villar, 2010).…”

An exploration of global employability skills: a systematic research review

“…The technical and technological skills required depend on the type of organisation. Employees should possess job-specific knowledge and skills (Ho, 2015) and be able to apply subject knowledge (Messum et al, 2011;Mirza et al, 2014). These findings concur with Husain et al (2010), who found that personal qualities, thinking and interpersonal skills showed no significant difference by type of organisation, but that information and technological skill requirements do.…”