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44Качество подготовки выпускников вузов с точки зрения ожиданий и требований работодателей. Анализ методов преподавания, способствующих формированию требуемых компетенций (competences) и установок (mindsets)
Сергеев Павел Сергеевич,
PhD, Сьямэньский университет (Китай), Институт исследования высшего образования E-mail: psergeev@outlook.com
В настоящее время становится все более очевидным тот факт, что компании выражают недовольство квалификацией выпускников ВУЗов либо напрямую, ставя вопрос о релевантности академических знаний, либо косвенно, нанимая все меньше молодых специалистов. Автор утверждает, что одной из причин такого противоречия является то, что поставщики образовательных услуг - либо из-за склонности к консерватизму, либо из-за отсутствия взаимодействия между академическими кругами и бизнесом - не понимают реальных потребностей и ожиданий компаний и организаций.
В данном исследовании автор использует собственный опыт работы в бизнесе и преподавании, а также анализирует мнение бизнес-инсайдеров для определения и формулирования компетенций и установок (mindsets) более высокого уровня, которые воспринимаются работодателями как применимые (или неприменимые) в рабочей среде, имеют реальную ценность для работодателей, а также могут быть количественно оценены как ключевые показатели эффективности деятельности сотрудника. Автор утверждает, что именно данные компетенции, как правило, отсутствуют в «арсенале» выпускников ВУЗов. Кроме того, автор предлагает объяснение преимуществ конкретных педагогических подходов для решения поставленных задач. Автор утверждает, что такие стратегии преподавания, как обучение, ориентированное на результат, обучение на основе проектов и т.д. существенно повышают качество подготовки выпускников, и могут быть реализованы, в том числе, на базовом уровне планирования учебных курсов и образовательных программ.
Ключевые слова: качество подготовки выпускников; компетенции студентов и выпускников; методы и стратегии преподавания; разработка учебных программ; система обучения компетенциям.
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Introduction
At present, strict requirements to the quality level of higher education, imposed by both customers (students) and consumers (businesses and government organizations) of educational products, are causing universities to pay great attention to the competitiveness and quality of educational services. However, both Western and Eastern education systems are still demonstrating increasingly low outcomes.
For example, dissatisfaction of American corporations and recruiting firms with the business qualifications of graduates has been recently growing very fast.The the survey of employers, conducted by Gallup Lumina foundation, showed that only 11% of business leaders strongly agree that college graduates have the skills and competencies that their workplaces require [1], [2, p. 51-52].
The same phenomenon has similarly emerged in China. The Blue Book of China's Society revealed that 17.6% of the new graduates were still unemployed after two months of graduation which was four times higher than the average rate for China [3]. The research conducted by BBC News agency at the job fair in Beijing showed that according to employers, graduates have purely theoretical knowledge which can be hardly applied in the real business situations [4].
On the same note, according to the survey of employers satisfaction of cadre in different regions of the Russian Federation, conducted by the Agency of Strategic Initiatives in Russia, only 31% of employers consider practical skills of graduates to be sufficient to effectively and efficiently perform work duties. More than half of the respondents-employers note that additional retraining of young professionals is absolutely required [5].
The situation looks even more challenging if the perceptions and attitudes of academic officers and corporation managers are compared. According to Gallup, "A whopping 96% of chief academic officers at higher education institutions say their institution is "very or somewhat" effective at preparing students for the world of work." [6].
These findings have revealed the existing gap between the education model required by businesses and the model employed in universities as well as how academia and labor market understand the definition and measurement of education quality. Commenting on this phenomenon, Zhao [7] states that the reason lays in the fact that education systems have overlooked the changing needs of businesses in the
globalized economy and uses improper education approaches. On the same note, Craig [8] claims that in spite of the significant shifts in economy and society, both lower-level and high-level courses curriculum in universities either have remained the same for decades or are designed to meet the academic targets of universities, but not the labor-market demands.
Starkey and Madan [9, p.3-26] define this phenomenon as the "relevance gap". The authors argue that the "relevance gap" requires creating a new interface between business and universities. It is of the uttermost importance for educators to identify the reason for the above-mentioned discrepancy and take it into account when developing or reforming national education system and teaching strategies. However, what are those skills, knowledge, qualities, etc. that businesses require the graduates to be equipped with? Is it feasible to convert these requirements into effective teaching strategies and instructional methods? If positive, than which ones of them will serve this purpose better? This study will seek to answer these questions.
Objectives, Methods, Limitation and Scope
The objectives of the study were formulated as follow:
1. to identify and describe skills, knowledge, attributes, competencies and other factors related to them which are perceived important (or non-important) by employers while hiring or assessing the performance of recent graduates, and
2. on the basis of employers requirements, to select proper teaching strategies and instructional methods as well as to describe how and why they may help better prepare college graduates for a successful transition into the workplace.
The main method of the research was based on the author's observation of the phenomenon of the above-mentioned "relevance gaps". Having more than 15-year work experience in managing several key departments in international corporations, as well as a 5-year teaching experience in various vocational training and higher education providers the author immersed himself in the setting where studied objects had to operate. Working in the position of the head of department and later as a college instructor, the author had the opportunity to identify major requirements of businesses to employees; determine gaps between such requirements and fresh graduates actual level of academic and practical preparation; employ different teaching strategies and techniques to determine a number of efficient ways to reduce such an imbalance. The observation conclusions were, thus, based on more than hundred of job interviews with fresh graduates applying for their first jobs, as well as on both evaluating the level of students preparation to perform workplace tasks and assessing performance of students in authentic environment. As the second dimension of analysis, the existing opinions regarding the studied problem of both business insiders and education instructors were integrated into the present study.
The study has several limitations and conditions. First of all, the author only analyzed those factors of
importance which can be influenced by higher education providers.
Secondly, as the companies, the author worked for, were specialized in trade and product development, therefore the main spectrum of business operation pools which applicants were mostly hired to perform included - but were not limited to - marketing, product / brand management, purchasing, sales, product training, logistics and contract law operations. Therefore, the results of this study are more appropriate to employ in the process of designing courses / programmes for students majoring in business, finance, economics and corporate law. It should be noted that in the majority of countries the greatest numbers of degrees are still conferred in the fields of business. For example, bachelor degrees conferred in these fields of study in the USA, China and Russia amount to 19%, 15% (not including management related majors) and 33% of all the students. At the same time, the findings and recommendations may be applicable for other majors as well. Moreover, in some cases - for example, for jobs requiring deep knowledge of the specifics of high-tech products - graduates with degrees in science may even have advantage. The author's experience shows that such graduates may better fit for jobs related to extensive market research and / or focused on working with big data arrays. However, this phenomenon is arguably connected with the low level of academic skills of graduates with degrees in business fields.
Thirdly, in most cases, fresh graduates were hired for the first-line managerial positions. This fact helped exclude competencies required by top management. At the same time, the company created, promoted and supported internal career development opportunities. Therefore, applicants and employees potential was evaluated and considered when taking hiring decisions and / or assessing their performance.
Finally, the study did not consider instruments, activities or strategies which require federal or institutional level to implement. The author sought to make the study both practical and feasible to apply by instructors themselves with minimum or no need for administrative coordination, harmonization or approval. At the same time, the given principles and approaches can be easily transferred to an institutional level.
What Employers Expect from Young Professionals
In order to to catch a fish, you have to think like a fish. The same rule works if we want to meet the needs of businesses and if educators seek to improve career readiness of their graduates. The needs of businesses, the major companies goals ultimately transform into requirements and targets for employees. In the existing literature they may also be referred to as higher-level skills and competencies or mindsets.
So, what is the objective most companies are striving to achieve? The resulting ends of any company's activity is the increase of value for stock holders. Thus, the first factor educators are suggested to take into account when designing educational prod-
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ucts is the results or outcomes orientation. Business is not about measuring credits or marks earned. Steve Glaveski, the CEO and co-founder of Collective Campus, [10] states that successful business is about measuring business outcomes created. The work process is also important but only from the position of the optimization of limited company resources to complete a task.
Speaking about the ways results are achieved it is important to note that business operations are not built around employees competences and skills. We claim that teaching specific skills - be they soft or hard ones - is not the perfect approach to designing instructional methods and choosing course content. First of all, skills is not the "language" employers speak. When an applicant states that according to CLA or any other skills test he or she is 75% creative, 90% innovative, HR or supervising managers do not know how to convert this information into the in-company "currency", which is the ability to successfully complete a work task or to solve a work-related problem. These tasks or problems should be treated as separate projects as each of them requiring proper planning, execution, control and evaluation. Postl, the former President & CEO of Pennzoil-Quaker State, the former CEO of Nabisco International, [11] argues that twenty-first century economy increasingly relies on a project-centric approach which requires cultivating so-called systems thinking. The later is defined by Senge [12] as an ability to see wholes, interrelationships rather than things, as well as patterns of change rather than static pictures of a situation. Gref, the CEO of Sberbank [13] claims, that an employee with the developed systems thinking is considered one of the most hunted ones on the labor market.
The outcome oriented approach can only be efficient if backed up by ability to work in a team structure. In 2017 NACE collected responses from 260 companies most of which were large companies like Chevron, IBM and Seagate Technology [14]. Respondents agreed on the point that the ability to work in a team is the key competency any recent graduate must have. However, this ability may be understood slightly differently in different business environments. What is relevant in all cases, however, is a customer-oriented state of mind when taking decisions and working with others, no mater if it is an orientation to external or internal customers. The later may be even more important in the work related settings. Micah Solomon, a famous business consultant, [15] describes the internal customer orientation as the way employees are treated by each other and by those up and down the corporate hierarchy. For example, in most cases a product management department is an internal customer for a financial department, while sales managers should usually be treated as internal customers by all other company units. Solomon under-5 lines that companies can only thrive by maintaining a 5 focus on both external and internal customers at the same time. However, here lies a hurdle any young spe-° cialists face entering the workforce. First of all, few col-^ leges offer classes preparing students for dealing with
either type of customers and building appropriate relationships. Students in universities are only accountable to themselves. However, once being hired, they are also re-accountable to the team, to the colleagues, to the top management and to the organization on the whole. In the professional world, relationships building may happen with team colleges who are not necessarily just nice people to congregate with. Thus it is necessary not only to maximize work related contribution into projects the team work in, but also to find ways to manage difficult relationships in a productive and professional manner.
Building and maintaining successful relationships is just one of many challenges fresh graduates face in professional world. Employees usually find themselves working in a very stressful environment with a lot of strict limitations. These can be, for example, extremely challenging project time frames, working on several different tasks simultaneously, temporary substitution of another employee with non-similar work duties or even transfer to another department of a company. Very often supervising managers purposely put fresh specialists in such an environment - either during a job interview or in the workplace - to evaluate how they can adapt to new and / or stressful conditions. According to Clay Parker, the president of the Chemical Management Division of BOC Edwards, [16] demonstrating agility (including learning agility), resilience and adaptability when dealing with complex challenges and handling a constantly changing environment, has become even more important than technical skills for employees. The value of agility and resilience - such as the ability and willingness to learn and then apply that knowledge effectively to prevail even in unfamiliar situations - can not be overstated for personal life and business. In addition, the ability to quickly bounce back when knocked down by a challenging business or personal problem helps young professionals to endure and thrive. As new challenges become mainstays of life and are met much more often than during getting typical learning experience in college, these abilities should be definitely cultivated before entering a workforce.
The lack the above-mentioned abilities partly correlates with the lack of self-confidence. Nowadays, only those with the strongest belief in themselves can survive and thrive in today's business world of intense competition. We found that results of self-assessment tests we carried out among the students of the Higher National Diploma of the UK constantly showed that learners considered the lack self-confidence and self-efficacy as one of the biggest possible obstacle on their way to the successful career. Moreover, this issue even changes ex-students style and personality, as well as can affect the capability to motivate colleagues and the quality of communicating their ideas to both other employees and supervising managers. Mike Summers, Vice-President of Global Talent Management at Dell [16] states that most of young people can not create focus, energy, and passion around the points they make and ideas they present. It is not a complaint about poor grammar or spelling. Ideas are
products or services and must be "sold" to colleagues or business partners. The lack of self-confidence limits or illuminates the ability of fresh graduates to influence on others opinions or attitudes. It does enable students to cultivate and young professionals to demonstrate emergent leadership skill, which is one of the most valuable hiring attribute for Google according to Laszlo Bock, the senior vice president of people operations for Google [17]. Finally, low self-confidence often does not allow new employees to prove grit, which is defined by Google as "persistence at something" and is considered even more valuable than knowledge when seeking really successful ex-students.
Finally, self-confidence multiplied by extensive knowledge may help cultivate initiative decision-making and a broad and open-minded approach to complete tasks in project - centric business environment. It is the ability to generate ideas, put them through patterns, and suggest a grounded and rounded product or a concept. It could be a new or modified product or service, an improvement of an in-company business operation, or even a new company / department strategy. The key conditions are that the ideas should be brave and fresh, must be suggested as a rationale, risk assessment and an action plans. Such ideas should be capitalizable and must be initiated personally in the sense that personal responsibility for the actions and outcomes must be realized and taken. We would call this an entrepreneurial thinking and entrepreneur-ship. Krueger [18, p. 123-138] states that the difference between entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial thinking lies in the fact that entrepreneurship is based on actions and intentions and entrepreneurial thinking is about attitude and beliefs. Entrepreneurial thinking is the critical element driving entrepreneurial action. Not only it is important to see an opportunity, but also it is crucial to decide to pursue it. Charles P. Holt, the Vice-President of the Wilson Center for Research & Technology at Xerox Corporation, [19] claims that entrepreneurial and innovative thinking is the ability to recognize opportunity, while essence of entrepre-neurship is being able to mobilize talent and resources quickly in order to seize that opportunity and capitalize it as a business. Holt, the Vice-President of the Wilson Center for Research & Technology at Xerox Corporation, [19] claims that entrepreneurial and innovative thinking is the ability to recognize opportunity, while essence of entrepreneurship is being able to mobilize talent and resources quickly in order to seize that opportunity and capitalize it as a business. In reality, young professionals may not be engaged in any of those. For example, according to L.D. DeSimonet is, the chairman and CEO of 3M, employees «prefer explicit direction or are sufficiently absorbed by their assigned work» [19]. Thus, college instructors should sick to do their best to cultivate both entrepreneurship spirit and entrepreneurial thinking in college students.
Important or Non-Important, that's not the Question
In order to set priorities properly we need to understand what is of less or no importance for businesses with
regards to millennials' performance and preparedness for workplace. Obviously, designing educational programmes around these factors and objectives may significantly increase relevance gaps discussed in this study.
First of all, let us examine Grade Point Average. GPA assists in determining academic progress of individual students, however it is close to being useless for employers. According to Job Outlook 2018 survey conducted by National Association of Colleges and Employers, GPA factor was ranked as the 7th influencing factor, and was "somewhat of an influence" for hiring decisions among more than 200 employers participating in the survey [14]. On the same note, Laszlo Bock, senior vice president of people operations at Google, [17] states that "One of the things we've seen from all our data crunching is that G.P.A.'s are worthless as a criteria for hiring". He adds that only for brand-new college grads GPA might have very slight correlation and can only grant small advantage for jobs requiring math, computing and coding skills.
So, should education providers use GPA as an instrument to assess students performance? A grade point average or GPA has been a standardized way of calculating a higher education student's academic merit for a long time and can not be abandoned painlessly. However, colleges should practice other assessment approaches - either as an alternative or in addition to GPA. One of the way to evaluate students' performance could be real-time feedback / learning outcomes assessment which will be discussed in the next section.
Secondly, there exists the never lasting battle between proponents of hard skills and those who claim that soft skills are more important to cultivate. So, which skills are more valuable when new grads enter the workforce? The answer would be none and both of them at the same time. As it was stated above, unless an employee is considered to be of a valuable asset for a company and is included in the so-called cadre reserve, no specific skills are assessed by employers. Projects outcomes in the form of key performance indicators set for participants are measured instead.
Undoubtedly, skills, traits and qualities are the instruments and/or catalyzators According to Employers' study results emphasize that career readiness is not about stand-alone skill sets and degree subject knowledge [14]. Businesses do not consider this set to be a discrete, stand-alone one. Instead, it is claimed to be part of a larger whole that comprise a person's habits of thinking and behaving, a so-called "habits of mind" that should be cultivated in students. Thus, career readiness is best thought of as a holistic repertoire of skill sets linked to specific fields, rather than as stand-alone competencies which exist in vacuum. On the same note, Laszlo Bock, senior vice president of people operations at Google, [17] states that the company evaluates applicant's ability to effectively, structurally and systematically approach work-related problems, but not measuring skills independently.
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Moreover, speaking about the educational content, instructors and curriculum designers have to face one of several academic paradoxes. The challenge is that we only have a good sense of what knowledge and skills should be involved provided that we have to deal with a perfect situation when a well-structured problem needs to be solved or a clear task with «comfortable» time-frames and resources is set. However, in a real business world, managers have to deal with paradoxical and uncertain situations. They must identify what knowledge and what skills are needed, be able to set skills priorities and, possibly, acquire additional knowledge, contingent upon what approaches they take to solve a problem or to plan and execute a project [18]. For example, developing a new product for a market requires more than 30 different skills. At the same time, negotiating terms and conditions of a supply contract or conducting product training sessions may require different mix and different weights of skills and knowledge. If an employee can not identify what skills and knowledge are required, or lacks any of them, because this is something the teaching content ignored, the project will not be completed or the results will be worse than expected. Krueger [18] states that "knowledge and skills acquisition are insufficient if we do not know how, when and where to deploy them". We will look at the way to deal with this paradox in the next section.
Bridging the Relevance Gaps: what Works and why. Implications for Pedagogy
There are no set-in-stone terms researchers and instructors use in order to describe, classify or analyze teaching as a package of teaching practices constituting pedagogy as a science. Meanings of different terms often do not have similar connotations across cultures. For example, student-centered teaching can be referred as a teaching approach or strategy, a mix of teaching methods, instruments and instructions or even as an education system at large. For this section, repeated patterns or sets that shape the interaction between teachers and learners will be referred either as teaching and learning practices or as teaching approaches. The skills, competencies, proficiencies, knowledge and mindsets which were discussed in the previous sections will be referred as students' or learning outcomes / results.
Research are consistent in showing that there is a relationship between learning outcomes and teaching approaches applied by instructors. For example, the interplay between presage factors - such as course design, teaching and assessment methods - and students learning outcomes was tested and described by Biggs [20]. This relationship formed the basis for the so-called "3P model". This concept is usually employed to demonstrate how teaching approaches ef-5 fect students perceptions which in turn mediates or in-o fluences the types of outcomes achieved. == In order to better integrate Biggs' model into the S present study several modifications of it are suggested below. First of all, students' motivation, satisfaction
and approaches to learning are not the objects of this study. Though perceptions will be excluded from the model, Biggs' model is still applicable in our case, because:
1. presage factors can also directly influence learning outcomes,
2. the concept proves the existence of relationship between the studied variables,
3. most of the teaching approaches suggested below were found to have positively influenced on students interest in studying which resulted in achieving better learning outcomes.
Secondly, apart from teaching approaches, the model also shows that such presage factors as rules, requirements and traditions of education providers as well as teachers' experience, perceptions and expertise should be taken into account. As it was stated in the study limitation section, we are not considering teaching approaches which require radical changes at either institutional or federal levels. Therefore, education provider-related presage factor does not have significant effect on the study results unless there exist strict limitations in terms of academic freedom of instructors. At the same time, implementation of new teaching instruments is always associated with teachers' retraining as well as reconsidering and re-framing of pedagogical knowledge. Understanding the importance of this process, we, however, admit that instructors' often have resistance to changes due to academia conservatism and the lack of understanding of the benefits new teaching approaches may bring for students. Therefore, speaking about this particular variable, we see our goal as to demonstrate the value and opportunities of the suggested teaching approaches and change instructors' perception and understanding of a target segment-based teaching concept, but not as a presage factor influencing on the students' outcomes.
Thirdly, we claim that the characteristics of students as a presage factor - i.e. students' previous experience and current understanding - is only important at the stage of determining the content difficulty. The recommended teaching approaches, at the same time, can be employed for teaching students at any level. Therefore, students' characteristics will not be specifically focused on in the adopted model discussed below.
Speaking about practical implications for instructors, it should be noted that teaching approaches should be selected according to requirements and expectations for students' learning outcomes. We listed our view of such requirements in the previous sections. In table 1 these requirements are aligned with the specific teaching approaches (TA). There are provided the key features and elements of TAs which can arguably contribute to cultivating the required competencies and, thus, to achieving students' learning outcomes. There are also explained the major effects on students' competencies development. The last column suggests the outcomes which may benefit most from integrating specific teaching practices into educational patterns.
Table 1. Presage / Product relationship. Implications for teachers.
Presage
Product
TA
What does TA offer (key features, elements and specifics)?
How does TA contribute?
Mostly appropriate for:
Project-Based Learning (PBL)
- Gives students real-world know-how and experience, by creating direct connections between the classroom and workplace.
- Requires students to respond to complex questions, problems, or challenges during an extended period of time.
- Requires students to properly set and achieve demanding targets, to work out effective strategies as well as to determine and meet tight deadlines.
- Focuses on social and business interaction and collaboration with different stakeholders of the learning process, including students, teachers, administration, businesses and community partners
- Based on multidisciplinary and / or interdisciplinary approach to designing curriculum
- Students explore different approaches to problems, seize and shape opportunities, refine and transform ideas into solutions to respond to challenges, mobilize the resources to create value and make most out of it (including that for internal customers).
- Students take responsibility for project participants' and their own decisions to create value through practical entrepreneurship experiences.
- Students discover their strengths and weaknesses (qualities, potentials, interests and wishes), as well as learn how to make the most out of them and to stay focused on their passion and keep creating value despite setbacks (demanding project rules should be set for this to cultivate).
- Students learn to understand and appreciate the value of ideas suggested by wide range
of individuals and groups, as well as build an inspiring vision that engages others.
Results or outcomes orientation
Project-centric approach
Resilience and adaptability
Entrepreneurial
approaches
Customer-oriented
approach
Self-confidence and self-efficacy
Constructive Alignment (CA), Outcome-Based Education (OBE)
- Sets clear and valuable learning outcomes that students are required to demonstrate at the end of learning experiences (an equivalent of KPI used in organizations)
- Offers structured and complete content (knowledge, concepts, attitudes and skills) which enable students to achieve predefined learning outcomes.
- Provides real-time feedback to students, but not just grades their final assignments.
- Offers multiple ways for students to demonstrate their competences.
- Students learn about and become habituated to managing timelines, planning actions, identifying priorities, success criteria and milestones to achieve project objectives.
- Students became habituated to constantly reflecting and judging their achievements and failures, as well as permanently improving their abilities to create value by building on their previous experiences and interactions with others (by means of real-time feedback)
- Students learn to report or present project results in various ways appropriate for different situations.
Results or outcomes orientation
Self-confidence and self-efficacy Entrepreneurial approaches
Lean learning / Just - in - time learning
- Focuses on gaining access to knowledge just when it is needed as a response to the demands of a knowledge-driven and speed-oriented market place
- Emphasizes using reliable sources of information, as well as processing and analyzing information in a fast and effective way.
- Promotes «Use it or Lose it» approach to education by incorporating new learning into the practical work intermediately (just like workplace training in organizations)
- Students get habituated to learning on the go and life-learning, as well as to optimizing knowledge retention.
- Learners gather, manage, evaluate, effectively process different types of information resources, as well as make sound decisions and conclusions to create value for others.
- Through research and development students learn to develop and get access to new knowledge exactly when it is required in order to cope with emerging challenges
Results or outcomes orientation Entrepreneurial approaches
Resilience and adaptability
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We encourage educators to incorporate practices listed in table 1 as being potentially most effective in cultivating required higher-level competencies and mindsets at the core level. For example, PBL encourages students to work alongside experts to solve challenging and authentic problems. This can include having a student do project work at business and non-commercial organizations. For employers, students may even become valuable partners and co-creators. OBE / CA prepares students to the work place environment by both cultivating results-oriented mindsets and providing with valuable knowledge and skills, based on the employers needs. Coupled with
Lean Learning students can learn how to get, process and present information just when it is needed. This is obviously a must have skill in the era of overwhelming amount of data. With that said, pedagogical approaches may vary in efficiency, instructors should take their own particular route to promoting the acquisition of knowledge and skills in line with the intentions and expectations required by stockholders.
Conclusion and Further Research Suggestion
The problem of relevance gaps between graduates' career readiness and requirement of economies
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and societies has been gaining importance in many countries. Educators seek to develop and implement teaching frameworks which may help decrease this discrepancy and equip students with - as academia thinks - valuable and useful educational assets. However, as it was demonstrated above, executives and HR managers still often consider recent college graduates to lack the skills and mindsets that they believe to be most important.
Taking into account how fast-changing business environment is today, the quality of teaching is and will be affected even more. Therefore, we suggest to move from creating course design basing on the mix of the traditional pack of knowledge, skills and attitudes. We urge our colleagues-educators to act more as marketing managers and marketologists, and explore real needs of end-consumers, i.e. commercial firms and non-commercial organizations.
This study gives basic knowledge about which competencies and mindsets - such as results orientation, project-centric approach, etc. - are crucial for employers. We also suggest that such strategies, as PBL, OBE/CA and lean-learning are claimed to be efficient to achieve our teaching goals. These suggestions and observations may be a starting point to design new or improve existing courses. We claim that by doing so, educators may significantly increase graduates' readiness to become workforce assessed by employers. It is also believed that as a «side effect», implementing these ideas may increase motivation, learning results and self-efficacy of students. The test of this hypothesis is suggested as the future research area. It is recommended to apply the mix of quantitative and qualitative methods for such a study with the primary focus on action research coupled with the survey of business insiders to measure results dynamics. It is also crucial to encourage business experts to work alongside educators to develop assessment criteria and participate in the assessment process.
THE QUALITY OF UNIVERSITY GRADUATES FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF EMPLOYERS EXPECTATIONS AND REQUIREMENTS. ANALYSIS OF TEACHING APPROACHES FOR CULTIVATING REQUIRED COMPETENCES AND MINDSETS
Sergeev P.S.
Xiamen University
Nowadays, it is becoming increasingly obvious that companies more often express dissatisfaction in recent students' qualifications either directly by posing questions about the relevancy of academic knowledge or indirectly by hiring less graduates. The author claims that one of the reasons behind this controversy is that education providers - either because of the disposition to conservatism or due to lack of interactions between academia and businesses - fail to understand real needs and expectations of companies and organizations.
In this study the author combines own experience in business, vast academic expertise and insights of business insiders in order to identify and describe higher-level competencies and mindsets which are perceived to be applicable (or not applicable) in work environments, have real implications and value for employers, and can be quantified and assessed as KPIs. The author claims that these are the competences and mindsets which young professionals usually lack
most after the graduation. In addition, the author explains the advantages of specific teaching approaches - such as Project-Based Learning, Outcome-Based Learning and Lean-Learning - which can be implemented at the course level and can improve quality of graduates' preparation for labor market.
Keywords: outcome-based education; preparation quality of graduates; students' and graduates' competencies; teaching strategies and teaching approaches.
References
1. Gallup, Lumina Foundation, 2014, "What America needs to know about Higher Education", published by Gallup, Lumina Foundation, 2014
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