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Cited by 47Higher Education and EmployabilityEngineering Education and Curriculum DevelopmentCompetency Development and Evaluation

Students’ Workplace Readiness: Assessment and Skill-Building for Graduate Employability

Open access
Siddique, Sara, Ahsan, Ali, Azizi, Neda, Haass, Omid·2022·Sustainability
DOI 10.3390/su14031749
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Abstract

This study introduces a new approach for the competence development of the socio-technical aspect. The curriculum of the Project Management (PM) course taught in degree programs concentrates largely on imparting technical knowledge. Current research seeks to direct the attention of the PM curriculum towards Personal Competencies as well. PM studies not only require a project to be carried out successfully but also expect students to demonstrate certain personal competencies, behaviors, and traits to effectively lead the project team. This research seeks to inform action and yield pertinent knowledge and instructional material around the desired personal competence. This study adopts an exploratory and (educational) action research approach with a quantitative mode of inquiry. The first of the four phases of this study comprises an action-based approach to find out which Personal Competence is essential for PM students. The second phase is of further follow-ups with the research subjects that indicate their lack of understanding of the PM personal competencies. The next phase employs a second survey showing that the Communication Skills of research subjects need work. The last phase offers a comprehensive training plan around the required competence, a training evaluation tool, a competence assessment exam, and tools for training and trainer feedback. The findings of this research bear immense implications for PM competence building and curriculum. The practical contribution of the study offers a way to prepare the graduates for ready employability.

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  • Developing countries are facing extreme project implementation-related problems, which has become one of the main barriers towards sustainable development.

    “Developing countries are facing extreme project implementation-related problems, which has become one of the main barriers towards sustainable development [5,6].”

    From Blockchain Technology: Potential Applications for Public Sector E-Procurement and Project Management (2022) · cites this paper as [6]

    The Introduction discusses a gap between education and industry in Pakistan, while the Conclusions concern students’ project-management skills. Neither section says that developing countries face extreme project-implementation problems or that such problems are a main barrier to sustainable development. Searches for those terms found no passage addressing that claim; the indexed passages provide no page numbers. (LLM, conf=0.75)

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Research works printed but not linked: 6

  1. Bilal, M.; Khan, I. Issues and Prospects Behind the Depressed Higher Education in Pakistan. Interdiscip. J. Contemp. Res. Bus. 2012, 4, 157-172.
  2. Haque, S. University Graduate Unemployment in Pakistan: Employability Strategy for the University Graduates. Indian J. Commer. Manag. Stud. 2013, 4, 54-61.
  3. Boyatzis, R.E. The Competent Manager: A Model for Effective Performance; John Wiley & Sons, Inc.: New York, NY, USA, 1982.
  4. Rizwan, A.; Alsulami, H.; Shahzad, A.; Elnahas, N.; Almalki, S.; Alshehri, R.; Alamoudi, M.; Alshoaibi, H. Perception Gap of Employability Skills between Employers' and Female Engineering Graduates in Saudi Arabia. Int. J. Eng. Educ. 2021, 37, 341-350.
  5. Hawks, K.W. The Effects of Implementing Bloom's Taxonomy to Develop Mathematics Lessons for Elementary Students. Ph.D. Dissertation, Liberty University, Lynchburg, Virginia, 2010.
  6. O' Leary, Z. The Essential Guide to Doing Research; The Cromwell Press Ltd: Trowbridge, Wiltshire, 2004.

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Authors
Siddique, S., Ahsan, A., Azizi, N., & Haass, O.
Affiliations
  • Foundation University Islamabad (PK)
  • Torrens University Australia (AU)
  • RMIT University (AU)
Corresponding author
Azizi, Neda
ORCID
Venue
Sustainability
Publisher
MDPI AG
Published
2022-02-03
Volume
14
Issue
3
Pages
1749
ISSN
2071-1050 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.3390/su14031749
OpenAlex
W4211098768
Cited by
47
References
43
Citations by year
2026: 11 · 2025: 9 · 2024: 9 · 2023: 14 · 2022: 4
FWCI
19.40
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • Sustainability (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
  • RMIT Research Repository (RMIT University Library) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
  • Figshare (submittedVersion, cc-by)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Education › Higher Education and Employability
  • Physical Sciences › Engineering › Media Technology › Engineering Education and Curriculum Development
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Competency Development and Evaluation
Keywords
career readiness, graduate employability, project management education, personal competencies, communication skills, competency assessment, training program, curriculum development, project team leadership

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