A recent survey carried out by the Career Advisory and Assessment Services has brought forth the industry’s opinion on the quality of graduates Pakistani universities are producing. 76.61% of employers are not happy with the quality of Pakistani graduates. Interestingly enough, 94.74% of the employers think that due to lack of any career advisory services Pakistani students often end up studying courses that don’t match their personalities.
The survey was conducted with 159 national and multi-national companies from across Pakistan and its main aim was to understand what factors employers consider while hiring fresh graduates.
Speaking on the importance of the survey, Moazzam Shahbaz, Founder & CEO Career Advisory and Assessment Services, said that it would be helpful for all involved parties to understand why the bridge between the industry and the academia exists. More importantly, they can focus on policies, amendments, and the teaching methodologies that need to be set in motion to bridge the gap.
According to the statistics gathered from the survey, 70.18% of the recruiters do not consider grades while recruiting candidates. While interviewing a candidate they notice relevant qualifications (86.55%), personal development (79.53%), and soft skills (74.27%).
The survey also highlighted the top soft skills recruiters look for in a candidate. These include verbal communication (83.63%), positive attitude (71.93%), teamwork (64.91%), critical thinking (59.06%), self confidence (59.06%), written communication (57.31%), drive and flexibility (57.31%), stress tolerance (47.37%), adaptability (46.20%), time management (45.61%), self-awareness (45.03%), planning and organisation (45.03%), and integrity (43.86%).
After the survey came out, education experts seized the opportunity to state that our education system is based on unequal lines. The quality of education in the public and private sector is very different which results in disparity among the students. Such an uneven infrastructure fails to produce graduates that can meet the industry’s constantly increasing needs.
This survey strongly stresses on the academia-industry gap. Universities focus more on their own ranking and getting as many graduates out there as possible. What they forget in this race is the quality of graduates they are sending out to the industry and whether they are up to the mark. This eventually leads to a large number of unemployed youth.
Such surveys are imperative to understand where we stand as a nation and how much work still needs to be done.
