Are we teaching what employers want? Identifying and remedying gaps between employer needs,accreditor prescriptions,and undergraduate curricular priorities

Abstract

Employers and policy makers have criticized higher education institutions for the perceived knowledge and skills deficiencies of their graduates. This article seeks to identify the gaps between employer needs, curricular priorities, and accrediting standards, specifically in the management domain. To this end, the authors content analyzed 200 job announcements for entry-level management positions in the 10 largest metropolitan statistical areas in the United States and the learning goals of 51 business programs, comparing both to the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business’s Standard 9. While the findings demonstrate considerable overlap between employers’ stated needs, business programs’ curricular focus, and accrediting standards, notable gaps emerged, especially in the area of self-management. The authors discuss the implications of these findings for both business programs and accrediting bodies.

Keywords

Employability skills gap workforce readiness

Higher education institutions face significant challenges, with heightened attention being paid both to the quality of instruction and to their graduates’ workforce readiness or employability (Bisouz, 2008). Employers and policy makers have criticized institutions for the perceived knowledge and skills deficiencies of their graduates (Casner-Lotto, 2006), frequently casting both recent graduates and their degree-conferring institutions in a negative light. Even voices from within the academy have questioned the value of a university degree (Arum and Roska, 2011; Caplan, 2018). Business schools specifically have not been immune to this criticism, with prominent voices calling into question the relevance of the business curriculum for preparing students for the workforce—which is surprising and perhaps alarming, considering the professional nature of business programs (Bennis and O’Toole, 2005; Pfeffer and Fong, 2002). While the causes of these deficiencies may be varied and numerous, from quality of instruction and rigor across levels to conflicting goals of faculty and employers, those in higher education institutions, and business schools specifically, must address them, especially in the light of a recent push for the demonstration of real-world impact in teaching (AACSB, 2018).

This article follows previous work across a variety of disciplines in seeking to identify and remedy the gaps between employer needs and graduates’ capabilities (Bennett, 2002; Brink and Costigan, 2015; Fitzgerald et al., 2016; Plice and Reinig, 2007). Researchers have generally relied on surveys or interviews of employers, recent graduates, students, and/or faculty members to assess employer needs and/or graduates’ employability (Andrews and Higson, 2008; Jackson, 2012; Refai and Thompson, 2015; Robles, 2012). Our approach differs in three important ways. First, rather than relying on a perceptions-based approach, we content analyzed job advertisements in the management domain to assess employer needs (Cegielski and Jones-Farmer, 2016; Todd and McKeen, 1995). Second, rather than critiquing graduates’ perceived shortcomings, we turn inward to examine whether what we teach is aligned with what employers desire. To accomplish this, we content analyzed business program learning goals to determine curricular priorities (Brink and Costigan, 2015). This shift refocuses the conversation away from students’ perceived shortcomings and toward program–employer misalignment, which provides a more actionable route for identifying and remedying gaps between employer needs and graduates’ employability. Third, we examined the standards of the leading business program accrediting body, the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB) to extend our gap analysis, and, therefore, our range of solutions to include accreditor prescriptions. The findings from this threefold gap analysis allow us to identify areas of needed revision for our educational programs and accrediting standards to narrow the gap between what employers want and what graduating students bring to the workforce, thus reinforcing the relevance and value of the business degree.

Literature review

Much research has focused on the skills and attributes needed to be successful in the workforce (Andrews and Higson, 2008; Azevedo et al., 2012; Bennett, 2002; Burning Glass Technologies, 2019, Robles, 2012). Yorke (2006: 8) defines employability as “a set of achievements—skills, understandings and personal attributes—that make graduates more likely to gain employment and be successful in their chosen occupations, which benefits themselves, the workforce, the community and the economy.” Given the necessarily practical nature of the construct, and the role of skilled employment in economic development, it is not surprising that work in this area spans academic and practitioner boundaries.

Academic work on employability frequently utilizes surveys or interviews of one or more stakeholder groups, such as hiring managers, employees, students, recent graduates, or faculty members, to determine perceptions about the skills and attributes needed for the workforce. For example, through surveys and interviews across four country contexts, Azevedo et al. (2012) formulated eight generic competences that are both relevant and valuable for business graduates: influencing and persuading, teamwork and relationship building, critical/analytical thinking, self and time management, leadership, bigger picture, presentation, and communication. Going beyond formulating lists of competences to ranking their relative importance, Matsouka and Mihail (2016) found that firms rated a learning orientation, extra effort, teamwork, integrity, and communication skills as the top five attributes they were seeking in new employees, while knowledge breadth, technical skills, and academic qualification ranked near the bottom of their list. Tanyel et al. (1999) surveyed employers representing a wide range of industries and faculty at two regional universities to assess their perceptions of the importance of various traits, skills, and abilities for graduates. Their work provides interesting insights into how employers and faculty members diverge in their priorities. On average, faculty scored oral communication, written communication, decision-making and creativity as more important than did employers, while employers scored ethical values, project management, and persuasiveness as more important than did faculty. Interestingly, responsibility and accountability were perceived by both groups, on average, as the most important traits. Bennett (2002) combined surveys with content analysis of job advertisements to examine how employers ranked the importance of skills across the finance, general management, marketing, and human resource management domains. The inclusion of multiple disciplinary domains allows for interesting comparisons between them. Bennett (2002: 465) notes, “Advertisements for general management posts were significantly more likely to demand initiative, motivation, leadership and communication skills (relative to jobs in finance and human resource management).” In the survey component of that study, communication, teamwork, information technology skills, and organization ranked as the most important skills and attributes for employability.

While Tanyel et al. (1999) and Bennett (2002) examined a range of industry and job contexts, many authors have narrowed their attention to one domain. In the marketing context, McArthur et al. (2017) found that generic and personal traits such as motivation, written communication, time management, verbal communication, and attention to detail were the most mentioned desired skills and attributes in job advertisements, ahead of occupationally related knowledge or skills. Given Bennett’s (2002) findings, one may be tempted to argue that this could be limited to more people-oriented disciplines like marketing and management. However, the importance of these skills is supported even in data-driven, technically oriented fields such as data science (Fitzgerald et al., 2016), software development (Liebenberg et al., 2015), and accounting (Lee and Blaszczynski, 1999; Von Romburgh and Van Der Merwe, 2015). In fact, even in the context of entry-level data analytics job advertisements, soft skills such as communication, problem-solving, and decision-making were more frequently mentioned than technical proficiency (Cegielski and Jones-Farmer, 2016). This is further supported by Plice and Reinig (2007) who, based on surveys of recent information systems graduates, concluded that managerial skills development was important for sustaining career development.

Published work on employability has not been limited to the academic press. Burning Glass Technologies, for example, regularly reports on trends in skills requirements of employers across a variety of domains discovered through their comprehensive work coding thousands of job announcements (Burning Glass Technologies, 2019). More specifically, a practitioner-oriented report of hiring professionals in organizations revealed that their most desired knowledge and skill areas for college graduates included oral communications, teamwork/collaboration, professionalism/work ethic, written communications, and critical thinking/problem-solving (Casner-Lotto, 2006). This focus on soft skills development is echoed by a report sponsored by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation which suggests that many of these attributes of workforce readiness may be cultivated before students arrive in college (Lippman et al., 2008). That work in the context of high school student employability highlights the importance of competencies such as problem-solving, reasoning, creativity, listening, communication, and self-management, among others, in addition to discipline-specific knowledge. This is consistent with the academic work previously discussed. The thrust of both academic and practitioner-oriented streams is well summarized by an employer’s interview response noted by Andrews and Higson (2008: 417): “The discipline isn’t so important, it’s the other skills learned at university that are important. The analytical skills and problem-solving skills….”

Voices from both the academy and industry have also been persistent in calling attention to deficiencies in the perceived employability of graduates (Azevedo et al., 2012; Liebenberg et al., 2015). According to a report for the York College of Pennsylvania Center for Professional Excellence (Polk-Lepson Research Group, 2010), business leaders and human resource management professionals found that college graduates lacked the skill sets to meet the demands of the workplace. Another large-scale study, supported by the Society of Human Resource Management (SHRM) and other professional groups, cited significant concerns regarding the basic knowledge and applied skills of 21st-century entrants into the US workforce (Casner-Lotto, 2006). While not limited to college graduates’ employability, ManpowerGroup’s annual “Talent Shortage Survey” found that 27% of employers attribute their inability to fill a job to applicants lacking hard skills or human strengths (2018). In part reacting to a push for STEM education, Schulz (2012) notes in The Wall Street Journal,

The skills shortage is not just an absence of workers who can write computer code, operate complex graphics software or manipulate cultures in a biotech lab—as real as that scarcity is. Many people lack what the writer R.R. Reno has called ‘forms of social discipline’ that are indispensable components of a person’s human capital and that are needed for economic success.

LinkedIn’s “2019 Global Talent Trends” report, which is informed by both surveys of hiring managers and behavioral data gleaned from LinkedIn’s user base, echoes Schulz’s sentiment in noting that employers struggle to find applicants with adequate soft skills—specifically, creativity, persuasion, collaboration, adaptability, and time management (Chanler, 2019). This contention is also supported by Refai and Thompson (2015: 439), who note in the pharmacy employment context, “Despite being satisfied with graduates’ level of knowledge, employers were generally concerned about graduates’ ability to demonstrate some of the essential enterprise skills and especially their ability to demonstrate confidence and good communication skills.” Thus, there appears to be a consistent theme that soft skills are not only among the most important capabilities for employability, but that they are frequently lacking.

Threefold gap analysis

While there appears to be widespread agreement that graduates frequently fall short of the expectations of employers, especially in relation to their soft skills, the existing literature does not adequately address either the persistence of the skills and attributes gap or the root curricular causes. Moreover, much work in analyzing employer needs is limited either by a survey approach or by narrow disciplinary lens. Bennett’s (2002) work is a welcome departure from this, in that the author relied on job advertisements across business domains; however, the world of work has evolved dramatically since that research was published. Burning Glass Technologies’ (2019) approach of real-time coding of job advertisements is also a welcome departure from relying on surveys; however, given the nature of its business, its data are not publicly available. Thus, to address our main research question (“Are we teaching what employers want?”), we begin by establishing a new baseline for employer needs using publicly available information. We then compare our results with business programs’ stated goals to determine the alignment of curricular focus with those employer needs. Lastly, we compare both to accreditor prescriptions, a process which not only highlights potential root causes of the curriculum–employer needs misalignment but also informs the path toward remedying that misalignment.

Methodology

To assess skills and attributes desired by employers of new graduates, we content analyzed a sample of job advertisements from the top 10 metropolitan statistical areas in the United States as of June 2014 (New York, NY; Los Angeles, CA; Chicago, IL; Dallas, TX; Houston, TX; Washington, DC; Miami, FL; Philadelphia, PA; Atlanta, GA; and Boston, MA). Content analysis provides a useful tool for the quantitative assessment of textual information (Bos and Tarnai, 1999). This approach is especially fitting here, as Fitzgerald et al. (2016) suggested that workforce analysis, including analysis of job advertisement, could be an integral step in better aligning employer needs with curricular offerings. Several other researchers have heeded this call to content analyze job advertisements to assess employer needs (Bennett, 2002; Burning Glass Technologies, 2019; Cegielski and Jones-Farmer, 2016; McArthur et al. 2017; Todd and McKeen, 1995). This approach differs from more traditional approaches of surveying and/or interviewing employers in that such methods frequently limit the range of possible responses by providing a predetermined list of skills or attributes for respondents to judge, thus creating the possibility that emerging trends are overlooked.

We content analyzed 200 job advertisements in two 100 advertisement blocks at two points in time—summer 2014 and winter 2017. We searched for “entry management” on Indeed.com, a popular job search platform, limited to each of the 10 metropolitan statistical areas mentioned. We used personal judgment to avoid job advertisements that were not relevant to our focus on those jobs best suited for recent graduates of management programs (e.g. data entry positions). We then coded the first 10 relevant search results from each metropolitan area. Example job titles included “manager in training,” “management analyst,” and “account manager.” Rather than place skills and attributes into predetermined categories, we created a new marker for each new unique skill or attribute mentioned in an advertisement. This resulted in identifying 66 unique skills or attributes, populated by 2382 mentions. We then performed a frequency analysis to calculate the percentage of job advertisements in which each skill or attribute was mentioned. To avoid biasing our results toward unusually specific employer needs, which was important, given our general management focus, we eliminated those skills and attributes found in less than 10% of advertisements. This brought our final total of unique skills or attributes to 41.

After paring the list of unique markers to 41, we sorted the skills and attributes into the eight competency categories relevant and valuable to businesses developed by Azevedo et al. (2012), which were (1) influencing and persuading, (2) teamwork and relationship building, (3) critical and analytical skills, (4) self and time management, (5) leadership, (6) ability to see the bigger picture, (7) oral presentations, and (8) other communications. However, perhaps because of the evolving nature of work, these categories did not adequately cover all skills and attributes desired of graduates. Thus, we created additional categories of skills and attributes: innovation, operational efficiency, general business knowledge, level of experience, legal awareness, technology use, and quantitative skills. Adding these to those suggested by Azevedo et al. (2012), we arrived at 15 total categories of skills and attributes, across which we distributed the 41 remaining skill and attribute markers.

After establishing a baseline for employer needs, we performed a content analysis of business program learning goals to assess curricular priorities. AACSB (2018: 34) states, “Learning goals describe the knowledge and skills students should develop in a program and set expectations for what students should do with the knowledge and skills after completing a program.” As learning goals should reflect the value and priority schools place on the stated objective, they provide insight into curricular coverage (AACSB, 2018; Brink and Costigan, 2015). Moreover, in the accreditation and review processes, accreditors require business programs to map the coverage of their program learning goals across their curriculum to ensure introduction and reinforcement across several courses (AACSB, 2018). Thus, a skill or attribute mentioned in a learning goal is likely to be covered at multiple points in the program’s curriculum. Fittingly, previous work used this approach of content analyzing business program learning goals to assess whether business programs prioritized elements of oral communication—presenting, listening, and conversing—similarly to the workplace (Brink and Costigan, 2015).

We content analyzed the learning goals of 51 business programs using the same approach used to code employer needs. The 51 programs represent a wide geographical dispersion but were selected in part for their proximity to the metropolitan statistical areas covered by the job advertisement search. We also considered the size of the institution and the availability of information in determining which programs to analyze. The initial coding identified 30 distinct skill and attribute markers, populated by 430 mentions. Applying the 10% rule used previously, we pared this initial list of 40 markers to 18. We then categorized these 18 unique skills or attributes into the 15 categories used for the skills and attributes mentioned in job advertisements.

Lastly, to compare employer needs and curricular priorities to accreditor prescriptions, we examined the knowledge and skill areas provided in AACSB’s (2018) Standard 9, which specifies appropriate content coverage at the bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degree levels. Given our focus on recent graduates’ employability, we limited our analysis to the bachelor’s level. We categorized the skill and knowledge areas into the 15 categories determined through our content analysis of job announcements. As the scope of skills and attributes found in the standard was narrower than those found in either job advertisements or program learning goals, it was unnecessary to generate and then pare an exhaustive list of skill and attribute markers.

Results

Table 1 summarizes the results of the content analysis for both job advertisements and business program learning goals. The results indicate that self and time management, teamwork and relationship building, communication beyond presentations, leadership, and influencing and persuading are the top five most mentioned skills and attributes in job advertisements, which suggest that they are highly coveted by employers. The results indicate that critical and analytical skills, communications beyond presentations, general business knowledge, ability to see the bigger picture (frequently through a focus on global awareness), and oral presentations are the top five skills and attributes most prioritized by undergraduate business programs of those skills and attributes covered by job advertisements. Interestingly, ethical awareness and social responsibility, mentioned by 92.1% and 21.6% of business programs, respectively, were not mentioned in at least 10% of job advertisements and were, therefore, excluded from Table 1.

Table 1.

Employer needs versus curricular priorities.

Skill or attribute	Job advertisement. mentions (%)	Learning goal mentions (%)	Gap
Self and time management	88.0	0.0^a	88.0
Influencing and persuading	61.5	0.0^a	61.5
Leadership	64.5	19.6	44.9
Work experience	41.5	0.0^a	41.5
Operational efficiency	28.0	0.0^a	28.0
Innovation	18.5	0.0^a	18.5
Teamwork and relationship building	72.0	54.9	17.1
Quantitative skills	28.0	21.6	6.4
Legal awareness	25.5	21.6	3.9
Technology use	46.0	45.1	0.9
Oral presentations	53.0	70.6	−17.6
Other communications	72.0	94.1	−22.1
Critical and analytical skills	44.0	94.1	−50.1
General business knowledge	24.5	84.3	−59.8
Ability to see the bigger picture	10.5	74.5	−64.0

^aResults do not include those skills and attributes mentioned by less than 10% of programs.

Table 1 also summarizes the gap between the percentage of job advertisements that mention a particular skill or attribute and the percentage of programs that specify the same or similar skill in a program learning goal. Positive scores indicate a heavier relative focus by employers, while negative scores indicate a heavier relative focus by business schools. The most notable result is the 88-point gap between employers’ desire for graduates capable of self and time management and the number of business programs prioritizing self and time management. Additionally, employers tend to value influencing and persuading, leadership, work experience, operational efficiency, innovation, and teamwork more than business programs. In the other direction, business programs tend to value “bigger picture” thinking, which here includes global awareness, general business knowledge, critical and analytical skills, and communication more than employers, although the gap is much narrower for communication skills.

Table 2 summarizes a comparison between the skills and attributes generated from job advertisements and the content and skill area suggestions set forth in AACSB’s (2018) Standard 9. The skills and attributes generated from job advertisements are largely covered by AACSB’s accrediting standards. However, there are two notable exceptions: self and time management and influence and persuading. This is consistent with our findings regarding the largest gaps between employer needs and business program priorities.

Table 2.

Job advertisement generated skills and attributes versus AACSB’s Standard 9.

Job advertisements	Coverage in AACSB’s Standard 9
Self and time management	Not explicitly
Influencing and persuading	Not explicitly
Leadership	“group and individual behaviors in organizations”
Work experience	“integration of real-world business experiences”
Operational efficiency	“systems and processes in organizations, including planning and design, production/operations, supply chains…”
Innovation	Not explicitly
Teamwork and relationship building	“interpersonal relations and teamwork”
Quantitative skills	“statistical tools and techniques, data management, data analytics…”
Legal awareness	“legal context of organizations”
Technology use	“demonstration of technology agility”
Oral presentations	“able to communicate effectively orally”
Other communications	“able to communicate effectively in writing”
Critical and analytical skills	“analytical thinking”
General business knowledge	Widely covered
Ability to see the bigger picture	“reflective thinking”; societal awareness broadly

Discussion

In this article, we have sought to identify the gaps between what we teach and the skills and attributes employers desire in recent graduates, as identifying such gaps is a necessary step in remedying them. Not surprisingly, given the literature, our findings suggest that employers remain in need of graduates with developed soft skills, such as self-management, leadership, teamwork, and communication, more than “hard” knowledge and technical skills. While some of these skills, especially communication, appear to be a priority in business programs, others, especially self-management, are notably absent from program learning goals. This absence may be due in part to a similar absence of self-management skills in AACSB’s Standard 9. These findings hold important implications not only for business schools but also for accrediting bodies.

Implications for business schools

What can faculty and administrators in business schools do about the significant gaps between their curricular focus and employer needs? The answer is likely complicated. Andreas (2018) linked the perceived lack of graduates’ soft skills to declines in participation in religious, social, and civic organizations—organizations that promote opportunities for face-to-face social capital building—rather than to failures of the college classroom. Given this broader societal trend, faculty and administrators’ options may be limited. Andrews and Higson (2008) echo this concern for the social side of college life. Their work interviewing business graduates and employers across four countries (the United Kingdom, Austria, Slovenia, Romania) highlights the importance of the social side of the university in soft skills development. Unfortunately, social activities typically fall outside the scope of predominantly academic units. However, these findings may point to an opportunity for collaboration between academic and student affairs to tailor social activities toward the development of soft skills that can be readily deployed in the workplace.

Not all hope need be pinned on cross-campus collaboration or changes in social conditions. Several authors have identified curricular or pedagogical approaches that may narrow the skills gap through the integration into the curriculum of either work placements and other real-world work-based projects (Maleki, 2009; Murakami et al., 2009; O’Donovan, 2018; Paisey and Paisey, 2010) or other activities that may simulate real-world experiences (Burke et al., 2013), or at least provide lessons from others’ experiences (Riebe et al., 2013). For example, both Murakami et al. (2009) and Paisey and Paisey (2010) provide evidence that work placements may improve soft skills. Interestingly, Paisey and Paisey (2010) found that work placements improved students’ perceptions of their competence in time management relative to students who had not completed a work placement, which suggests that work placements may be a good tool for remedying business schools’ lack of focus on self-management. Where work placements are not feasible, authors have suggested that other work-based activities may work to remedy the soft skills gap. For example, Maleki (2009) provides several practical tips for implementing a real-world project-based undergraduate capstone course in the industrial engineering domain. Similarly, O’Leary (2015) details how a graduate-level consultancy project with an actual client can improve employability by incorporating real-world experiences into the course of study. While this particular case is limited to a graduate program, Maleki (2009) demonstrates that such an approach could be deployed for undergraduate students nearing degree completion.

Work-based learning may not be the only approach effective in remedying the soft skills gap. Van Romburgh and Van Der Merwe (2015) recommend regular revisions to curricula and more applied projects and experiential learning to narrow the skills gaps between first-year accounting trainees and what their jobs demanded. Burke et al. (2013) suggest that a case study competition can improve soft skills such as communication and problem-solving. Moreover, Riebe et al. (2013) detail the use of guest speakers to tune students to employability skills needs, an approach supported by Jones et al. (2013). Lastly, Yeadon-Lee and Hall (2013: 68) detail the introduction of action learning into an MBA curriculum to address graduates’ deficiencies in skills transferable to the workplace: “Action learning is, in its simplest form, an experience-based approach to learning that uses Revans’ (1982) premise that managers learn most effectively with, and from, other managers whilst dealing with the real world complexities of organizational life.” Echoing Van Romburgh and Van Der Merwe (2015), they also suggest pairing action learning with other experiential learning approaches. Thus, faculty and administrators in business schools have several promising curricular and pedagogical routes for encouraging soft skill development and the corresponding employability, even if larger societal issues or even on-campus social activities remain outside of their purview.

While these options may be promising for encouraging soft skills, the evidence is limited as to whether the skills served by these approaches include self-management specifically, with the notable exception of Paisey and Paisey (2010). Given their predominance in job advertisements and their absence from curricula, more must be done to enhance self-management skills specifically. In addition to the work placement approach, one option may be to incorporate theories and practices of the related concepts of self-leadership directly into the curriculum. Self-leadership, which is grounded in self-regulation theory and self-determination theory, combines behavioral strategies, natural reward strategies, and constructive thought patterns (Neck and Houghton, 2006) and is associated with a variety of positive organizational outcomes, including job performance (Manz, 1986). Self-leadership strategies such as feedback seeking, self-goal setting, and self-talk could be cultivated in business programs. This might have an added benefit of addressing the persistent trend of recent business graduates overestimating their capabilities relative to employer perceptions (Jackson, 2012).

Implications for accreditors

Accreditors likely have a significant role in remedying the skills and attributes gaps discovered in our analysis. AACSB in particular is the leading business accrediting body, and, as demonstrated by the close alignment between Standard 9 and common program learning goals, their influence is far-reaching. Thus, accreditors such as AACSB could work to improve the self-management skills of graduates from the programs they accredit by revising the standards to include self-management skills. While, like all changes to accrediting standards, there may be a lag between a standard change and widespread implementation, given the 5-year program review cycles, current discussions about impact suggest that such an implementation is possible.

Directions for future research

Our work here and its limitations point to interesting avenues for future research. First, we focused on the jobs likely pursued by recent graduates of management programs. More work is needed to examine the gaps between curricula and employer needs in other business disciplines, such as marketing, finance, and accounting. Second, to assess curricular focus, we content analyzed program-level learning goals from mostly AACSB-accredited programs. For many schools of business, the undergraduate program includes concentrations or majors across the functional areas of business. Thus, the overwhelming majority of the learning goals we analyzed are those sought for all undergraduate business majors, not just those with a management concentration. Future work could examine the learning goals of specific functional areas to assess whether their focus is consistent with the program-level goals analyzed here. Third, given the continually evolving nature of work, further work is needed to assess how the gaps presented here may be shifting over time. Our study was limited to 2014–2017, but future work could examine our results in light of more recent data.

Conclusion

While there is considerable overlap between what employers want and what business curricula currently prioritize, our work indicates that there remain significant gaps, especially in some soft skills such as self-management and influencing and persuading. Thus, to answer the question at the center of this effort, we cannot claim to be fully teaching what employers want. However, by identifying these gaps in a systematic way, we clarify the conversation about graduates’ employability, which is a necessary step in remedying the skills and attributes gaps. We have also suggested several avenues pulled from the extant literature that may offer opportunities to enhance the soft skills of our students. However, as employability benefits not only graduates and their programs, but also the workforce, community, and economy (Yorke, 2006), remedying employability deficiencies is probably a task best shared.

Footnotes

Declaration of conflicting interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

ORCID iD

Nicholas D. Rhew

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