Abstract
College of business students who soon will graduate and representatives of employers likely to recruit them rated the skills “most important for [job] candidates to possess” and the skills "new college graduates most need to improve upon." Students' ratings for important to possess skills closely mirrored those of employers, demonstrating that efforts to teach students about employer preferences had been successful. Students' ratings of the skills most needing improvement differed dramatically from employers' ratings. Most critically, students rated "interviewing skills" as most in need of improvement whereas employers rated this in the middle range and employers rated "realistic expectations" and "lose sense of entitlement" as most in need of improvement whereas students rated these in the middle and low range. The results suggest that students develop career-related plans using accurate information about employer skill preferences but inaccurate information about their own skill deficiencies. Carefully targeted training likely will be required to improve student performance but success ultimately may depend upon developing academic and judgment skills.
Recommended Citation
Roth, Lawrence; Ahmad, Sohel; and Sebastian, Richard J.
(2010)
"Student Versus Employer Perceptions of College Graduate Skills,"
Journal of the North American Management Society: Vol. 5:
No.
1, Article 2.
Available at:
https://thekeep.eiu.edu/jnams/vol5/iss1/2