Abstract
Malaysia has positioned itself as an internationalized education hub, attracting growing numbers of international doctoral students from China. Yet PhD degrees from Malaysian higher education providers (HEPs) are often perceived as inferior in China’s labor market, raising questions about how returnees construct their employability. This exploratory qualitative study examined how Chinese returnees with Malaysian-obtained PhDs perceive the attributes and PhD program resources that shape their employment prospects in Chinese higher education. Using snowball sampling, we interviewed 18 returnees through in-depth biographical interviews supplemented by a scroll-back approach drawing on their social media traces. Data were analyzed using thematic analysis informed by graduate capital and multiple-stakeholder perspectives. Findings indicate that human capital (PhD credentials, research skills, publications), social capital (guanxi and academic networks), psychological capital (resilience and adaptability), and agentic capital (self-awareness and strategic action) are central to employability. Participants also emphasized curriculum and research training, supervisor support, and opportunities to connect with academia as key resources, though supervision quality and academic networking were frequently perceived as insufficient in Malaysian HEPs. The study suggests that HEPs and policymakers should strengthen these resources and adopt integrated capital-based and multiple-stakeholder approaches to more effectively support international PhD students’ employability.
Keywords
Introduction
The internationalization of higher education in Malaysia has accelerated in recent years, with local higher education providers (HEPs) actively positioning themselves as regional hubs for cross-border study. Within this broader agenda, Chinese students form one of the largest international cohorts, especially at the doctoral level (Zhou et al., 2023). Many Chinese doctoral candidates are attracted by relatively affordable tuition fees, opportunities for English-medium research training, and geographical and cultural proximity compared with traditional Western destinations (Michael et al., 2021; Muftahu et al., 2023). This pattern has become even more pronounced in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic (Zhou et al., 2023), as shifting mobility conditions and risk calculations have encouraged students to consider regional options for overseas doctoral study.
As Chinese enrollment in Malaysian PhD programs continues to grow, questions are increasingly raised about how these programs are perceived in China and what this expansion means for the value and positioning of Malaysian doctoral education. In China, there exists a prevalent perception that PhD holders from Malaysian universities are comparatively weaker than their counterparts from other countries (Hu & Wang, 2024; N. Meng et al., 2025), which contrasts with Malaysia’s goal of establishing itself as a source of high-quality talent (Muftahu et al., 2023). Also, previous research suggests that overseas credentials, especially those obtained in non-Western or regional host countries, may not automatically confer a strong labor-market advantage and are increasingly subject to employers’ scrutiny regarding quality, relevance, and “local fit” (Y. Liu & Ye, 2021; Peng, 2025). This concern prompts critical questions regarding the academic rigor and overall educational experience provided by Malaysian HEPs, and the perceived inferiority of Malaysian-obtained PhDs could potentially impact the employability and professional success of these graduates upon their return to China.
The employability skills of graduates are paramount in determining their success in the job market (Kayyali, 2024). However, there exists a research gap in understanding the specific factors that contribute to the employability of Chinese returnees with Malaysian-obtained PhDs. While previous studies have explored general employability skills and outcomes in the context of Malaysian higher education (Bikar et al., 2023; Moo & Wan, 2023; Tee et al., 2024). In the broader literature on Chinese returnees, researchers have begun to document how different forms of capital (e.g., human, social, cultural, and psychological capital) and multi-level environmental factors shape employment outcomes for PhD holders trained in established educational systems, such as North America, Europe, and Australia (Y. Liu & Ye, 2021; Tao, 2023; Tran et al., 2021). However, little is known about how Chinese returnees with PhDs from emerging host countries such as Malaysia construct their employability, what attributes they see as essential, and which aspects of their doctoral programs they perceive as most (or least) helpful for subsequent employment. This leaves a clear gap in understanding a growing but under-researched cohort of international PhD graduates.
Thus, this study endeavors to address this gap by investigating the factors that contribute to the employability of Chinese returnees with Malaysian-obtained PhDs, with the ultimate purpose of generating context-specific insights that can inform doctoral education, institutional support, and policy initiatives in Malaysia and China, and of extending the graduate capital perspective to an emerging host-country context. Through in-depth interviews with these graduates, the research seeks to elucidate the specific skills, experiences, and perceptions that influence their employment prospects in China and aims to provide a nuanced understanding of the alignment between the skills acquired during doctoral studies at Malaysian HEPs and the expectations of the labor market in China. In particular, the research focuses on the following key questions, as emphasized by Li (2022) to be significant in understanding the employability outcomes of Chinese returnees with PhD degrees obtained from overseas HEPs:
What attributes do PhD recipients need after graduation to negotiate employability?
What resources provided within or around the PhD program are perceived as important for PhD holders’ careers in and beyond academia?
The significance of this study lies in its attention to a rapidly growing but under-researched group of Chinese PhD returnees from an emerging host country that has received limited focus in employability research. By centering returnees’ own accounts of what “counts” for employability, the study applies the graduate capital perspective to a new regional context and offers practical insights for Malaysian HEPs, Chinese employers, and policymakers seeking to strengthen doctoral training and support for international students’ career readiness.
Literature Review
Capital-Based and Multiple-Stakeholder Approaches to Graduate Employability
To examine how Chinese PhD returnees understand and negotiate their employability, this manuscript adopts the graduate capital perspective as its main analytical lens rather than aiming to build new theory or evaluate a specific intervention. Graduate employability refers to the accumulated knowledge, skills, attitude and attributes that students develop throughout their education, which are essential for them “to obtain and maintain employment and to adapt to industry needs” (Bikar et al., 2023, Literature Review, para. 5). In conceptualizing graduate employment, Pham (2023) and Tomlinson et al. (2017) highlight the notion of graduate attributes, which encompass a broad range of capitals crucial for successful career outcomes. These capitals include: human capital (cultivating advanced knowledge and skills at the graduate level to become well-rounded professionals), social capital (building networks and social relationships to enhance knowledge and access to target employment opportunities), cultural capital (understanding the culture of different sectors and organizations, and being able to present oneself and one’s profile in a credible and convincing manner), psychological capital (developing the resilience and adaptability necessary to thrive in a fluid job market and withstand challenges and pressures), identity capital (leveraging personal experiences, values, and achievements to build a strong professional profile and develop strategies to achieve career goals), and agentic capital (recognizing one’s strengths and weaknesses and setting appropriate goals or taking initiatives by effectively utilizing the other forms of capital). The strength of this conceptualization lies in its holistic approach to understanding employability. By incorporating various forms of capital, it acknowledges that graduate success is not solely dependent on academic knowledge but also on a wide array of personal and social factors (Donald, 2024; Wallis, 2021).
Nevertheless, a capital-oriented employability framework may not be sufficient to address all the complexities of the modern job market because it focuses primarily on the attributes and capitals individuals possess, without adequately considering the systemic and environmental factors that also play a significant role in employability outcomes (Donald, 2024; Kayyali, 2024). Therefore, Hardin-Ramanan et al. (2020) emphasize the concept of career readiness and propose a multiple-stakeholder approach, suggesting that a broader ecosystem, including universities, governmental and parastatal entities, and employers, plays a crucial role in enhancing students’ employability. Universities, for example, can integrate career readiness into their curricula by providing students with opportunities for experiential learning. Governmental and parastatal entities can support these efforts by creating policies and programs that foster collaboration between educational institutions and the private sector. Employers, on their part, can help ensure that graduates possess the skills and competencies that are in high demand by engaging with educational institutions to offer feedback on curriculum development and training programs. These efforts indicated a systematic and collaborative approach expected to enhance graduate employability (Niman & Chagnon, 2023).
The capital-based and multiple-stakeholder approaches collectively underpin the study. While various frameworks of graduate employability exist in the literature (see, e.g., Moumen & Mejjad, 2021), the strength of these frameworks lies in their connections across the micro (an individual’s skills and abilities), meso (the role of universities and their ability to align training with industry demands), and macro (policy-driven factors such as governmental and parastatal policies on education and employment, labor market conditions, and economic trends) levels of analysis of graduate employability, as emphasized by Boffo (2018) in general higher education settings and Moo and Wan (2023) specifically within Malaysian HEPs.
By combining a capital-based approach with a multi-stakeholder one, as shown in Figure 1, the study is able to link what Chinese PhD returnees bring to the labor market (their different forms of capital) with how those capitals are developed, recognized, and constrained within specific institutional and policy environments. This integrated framework is thus particularly suited to an emerging host-country context such as Malaysia, where questions of credential reputation, institutional capacity, and cross-border alignment between training and labor market expectations are especially salient (Hu, 2025; Zhou et al., 2023). It enables us to avoid attributing employability outcomes solely to individual deficits or solely to structural barriers (Donald, 2024; Zhao et al., 2022), and instead to examine how the interaction between graduates’ capitals and multi-level stakeholders jointly shapes their employment trajectories.
An integrated framework of graduate employability.
Previous Studies of Chinese Returnees’ Graduate Employability
Buttressed by these and similar theories, researchers have endeavored to study the employability of Chinese returnees with degrees obtained from overseas universities. For instance, Tran et al.’s (2021) qualitative study with 28 employers, returning graduates from Australia, and policymakers in the field of accounting showed mixed findings. While the study primarily indicated the importance of developing dual local and international guanxi (social relationships) through overseas study to enhance Chinese returnees’ employability, overseas credentials, typically seen as part of human capital, especially from Western countries, were not as highly valued in China as they were a decade ago. This weakness was compounded by returnees’ lack of cultural and psychological capital, evidenced by their limited localized knowledge needed to work in Chinese companies and their ability to adapt to the local environment.
Hao and Wen’s (2016) mixed-methods research demonstrated similar findings. Combining survey data from 156 Chinese postgraduates and interview data from 12 alumni from various fields of study, the researchers found that for Chinese returnees graduating from Australian HEPs, holding an international qualification might not be sufficient for employment success in China’s competitive labor market. Instead, intellectual capital such as human, social, and cultural capital was deemed significant for enhancing the returnees’ employability in their home country, as also reported in Singh and Fan’s (2021) qualitative investigation in the same context. These findings were equally reported in Tao’s (2023) qualitative study with Chinese international students in master’s programs in the United Kingdom. Contrary to the expectation that studying overseas would enhance employability, the participants felt that an overseas qualification did not provide any more “hard” currency compared to an equivalent degree in China. To compensate for this disadvantage, they recognized the need to develop “soft” currencies, especially social capital, to ensure their competitive edge in China’s labor market.
Amid the perception that an overseas degree was not highly valued in China’s employment market, Y. Liu and Ye (2021) investigated the impact of overseas study designations on the employment of 208 Chinese returnees. They found that obtaining degrees from developed countries in North America, Europe, and Australia contributed more to employability than degrees from Asian HEPs, potentially due to varying degrees of education quality. This finding highlights the influential role of geographical factors in returnees’ employment outcomes. However, Kiong et al.’s (2019) survey involving 160 Chinese returnees with degrees from Malaysian HEPs raised a different perspective. It suggested that overseas learning experience, as an important medium for enhancing human capital (e.g., a recognized university degree) and soft skills (e.g., communication skills, self-awareness, adaptability) akin to social, psychological, and agentic capitals, could positively impact graduates’ employability in China’s labor market.
While these studies mostly focused on Chinese returnees with a master’s degree or mixed it with an undergraduate degree, a specific understanding of PhD returnees’ employability is important because they are typically expected to possess advanced research skills, specialized knowledge, and a higher level of expertise in their field. In a general sense, Pham’s (2025) qualitative study involving 23 returnee graduates, who obtained PhDs in Australia and were from various countries and fields of study, highlighted that human capital (PhD qualifications and professional skills developed through doctoral studies) and social connections with supervisors and potential employers were important factors in determining employability in their home countries. Moreover, agentic features such as self-determination and strong beliefs also contributed to graduates’ employment outcomes. The importance of these attributes was also revealed for PhD returnees in China (Chen, 2024; L. Liu, 2023), where the competitive job market places a premium on human capital, social capital, and agency enactment.
In a more contextual study, S. Meng and Shen (2024) focused on Japanese-trained Chinese PhDs’ academic career attainments. Based on data obtained from 2,193 Chinese PhDs who were funded to study in Japan as doctoral students from 2008 to 2014, regression analysis demonstrated that participants’ pre-graduation production, especially academic output as a symbol of human capital, significantly contributed to employment outcomes, represented by their academic achievements in securing a job at a prestigious HEP in China. Beyond this micro level, the study also indicated meso-level institutional factors conducive to employability, such as the prestige of the hosting universities and supervisors’ academic ranks as a source of social capital. The combination of individual and social factors was also reflected in D. Liu et al.’s (2022) study adopting a bioecological perspective. By interviewing 31 returnees with PhD degrees obtained from various overseas countries, the study highlighted that employability for this cohort was co-shaped by personal characteristics and multi-layered environmental contexts. Personal characteristics were exemplified by a desire for stability (psychological capital), building and maintaining guanxi (social capital), and a lack of cultural understanding of the local workplace and academia (cultural capital). Environmental contexts included meso-level factors such as interactions with colleagues and macro-level factors such as social and political norms.
Based on the review of relevant studies, an important gap is identified. Previous studies have mostly focused on Chinese returnees from well-established destinations for overseas education (e.g., Australia) or have mixed the sources of returnees, with little understanding of how returnees from specific emerging hosting countries negotiate their employability. This context-specific understanding is important, as these countries may offer different educational experiences, resources, and institutional support compared to traditional destinations, which are under-investigated in academia. Also, previous studies, while generally emphasizing human capital, social capital, and psychological capital, have presented different views on specific attributes expected by the Chinese labor market, such as the role of an overseas degree. Given Malaysia’s positioning “as an international education hub” (Moo & Wan, 2023, p. 11) and the growing number of Chinese international PhD students pursuing doctoral studies there despite the perceived less favorable outlook from their home country (Hu & Wang, 2024), delving into the employability of this specific cohort is warranted. This context justifies the research design and highlights the need to explore the unique challenges and opportunities faced by Chinese returnees from Malaysian HEPs.
Methodology
Research Design and Participants
The study adopted an exploratory qualitative design to gain in-depth insights into the employability of Chinese PhD returnees from Malaysia. This design was practical since it allowed for a comprehensive understanding of the nuanced and context-specific factors influencing employability (Gray, 2022). The snowball sampling technique was used to identify and recruit participants, which was particularly suitable for this study because it enabled us to reach a relatively hard-to-access population (Wu & Thompson, 2021). The minimum inclusion criteria were: (a) being a Chinese national, (b) having completed a PhD at a Malaysian HEP, (c) having obtained the PhD within the past 2 years, and (d) having already returned to China or planning to return to China for employment. Focusing on recent graduates ensured that their employability experiences reflected current labor market conditions and helped reduce recall bias. By leveraging the networks and recommendations of initial participants who met these criteria, we identified additional eligible returnees. In total, 18 graduates were recruited with informed consent. Data collection and analysis occurred concurrently: after each round of interviews, we updated and refined our deductive, theory-informed codebook and inductively added more fine-grained codes where needed. By the time we had interviewed 16 participants, no new codes or themes were emerging within either the deductive framework or the inductive refinements, and the final two interviews confirmed rather than extended the existing analytic structure, indicating that qualitative saturation had been reached (Hennink & Kaiser, 2020).
Participants’ demographic information in Table 1 shows diversity in terms of gender, age, disciplines, types of Malaysian HEPs previously enrolled, years of work experience, and current positions. At the same time, all participants shared a key defining feature for this study: as PhD holders, they were either working in Chinese HEPs or actively seeking relevant jobs there, ensuring direct alignment with the research focus on academic and near-academic employability. Although participants were recruited through snowball sampling, the resulting characteristics broadly reflect the main fields and institutional pathways through which Chinese students typically pursue PhDs in Malaysia (e.g., education, STEM, business, media, and related disciplines) and the range of Chinese HEPs (from Project-985/211 universities to vocational colleges) that commonly employ returnees (Hu & Wang, 2024). This diversity was important for ensuring the perceptions identified in the analysis were grounded in experiences that cut across different disciplines, institutional types, and career stages.
Participants’ Demographic Information.
Data Collection
A biographical interpretive method was used to facilitate in-depth interviews with the participants online. A “single question for inducing narrative” was used as a prompt at the beginning of each interview (Edwards & Holland, 2023), with the question being, “Can you share your employment journey after graduating from Malaysia?.” While the participants responded, we carefully noted key phrases, which were elaborated upon in subsequent interviews conducted in a semi-structured manner. As per the research questions, the interview focused on the perceived important employability skills and beneficial resources—the latter being an overarching concept that included any materials, tools, sources, and services to facilitate learning and research (e.g., curriculum, academic training, supervision, library resources) (Jaber & Elayyan, 2018). Example questions included: “What specific skills do you believe were most important in securing your current job?,”“What employment skills do you think will help you find a job in universities?,”“What challenges have you faced when finding a job in China?,” and “Can you describe any resources or support services in Malaysia that significantly contributed to your learning and research?”
A scroll-back approach was also utilized to facilitate the interviews. We connected with participants through social media platforms such as WeChat and Weibo to gather more comprehensive information about their circumstances. Participants were encouraged to reflect on the connection between these contexts and their professional trajectories, acting as co-analysts during the in-depth interviews. Since the participants primarily used social media to stay connected with their home country, their narratives provided valuable insights. Probing questions were used to guide participants to specific points in their timelines, such as their overseas studies and career milestones. This method enabled us to collect longitudinal data efficiently, without the need for extended time typically required in real longitudinal research (Robards & Lincoln, 2017). Since the participants had varying experiences, the interview questions were revised for each case. Each individual interview lasted approximately 40 to 50 min.
Data Analysis
A hybrid (deductive–inductive) thematic approach was used to analyze participants’ interview responses (Azungah, 2018), which were transcribed and translated from Chinese to English. Drawing on the graduate capital and multiple-stakeholder frameworks that underpinned the study, we first developed a deductive coding frame and applied broad, theory-informed codes to the data, such as human capital, social capital, psychological capital, agentic capital, and key resources (e.g., curriculum and training, supervisor support, opportunities to connect with academia). At the same time, we remained open to inductive insights: within these broad categories, more fine-grained codes were generated inductively as we segmented the data into relevant paragraphs, sentences, and phrases. For example, in the first theme reported below, “PhD qualifications: the threshold,” we coded extracts such as “Without a PhD, you are not even considered for academic positions in China” as human capital—PhD credential as basic entry requirement, along with related segments describing the PhD as a minimum condition for being shortlisted. These specific, inductively derived codes were then clustered within the broader human capital category to form the higher-order theme that a Malaysia-obtained PhD functions as a necessary threshold for academic employability, even when its prestige was questioned.
Together with our research assistants, we coded the data collaboratively and frequently compared our codes to ensure consistency. Any discrepancies in coding were discussed in regular meetings, where we revisited the relevant excerpts, clarified code definitions, and refined the codebook until we reached agreement. As the analysis progressed, we iteratively grouped related codes into higher-order categories and reviewed them against the full data set to check whether they captured participants’ accounts comprehensively and coherently. This cyclical movement between the raw data, codes, and emerging themes helped ensure the final thematic structure remained closely grounded in participants’ narratives while still reflecting the theoretical lenses guiding the study.
Qualitative Trustworthiness
Throughout the study, we strived to maintain qualitative trustworthiness (Hennink et al., 2020) through several ways. Data triangulation was achieved by collecting data from multiple participants with varied demographic and professional backgrounds and, where relevant, drawing on both interview narratives and scroll-back materials to contextualize their accounts. Member checking was conducted informally during and after the interviews, as we paraphrased participants’ key points, invited clarification or correction, and, where necessary, followed up with them to confirm our understanding of critical episodes in their employment journeys. Peer debriefing involved regular discussions among the authors and research assistants throughout the coding and theme development process, during which we compared interpretations, challenged each other’s assumptions, and refined coding decisions until a shared understanding of the data was reached, thereby achieving investigator triangulation. Together, these strategies enhanced the credibility, dependability, and confirmability of the findings.
Results
Guided by the graduate capital perspective and the multiple-stakeholder approach outlined in the literature review, the analysis focused on how different forms of capital and program-level resources shaped participants’ employability. In the interviews, participants shared a common goal of securing positions in Chinese HEPs after graduating from Malaysia. Regardless of whether they had already found a job or were still seeking employment, they consistently emphasized several forms of graduate capital as essential: human capital (PhD qualifications, research skills, and publications), social capital (connections with the home country and academic networks), psychological capital (resilience and adaptability), and agentic capital (appropriate dispositions and strategic actions). In line with the multiple-stakeholder lens, they also identified specific resources that supported or constrained the development of these capitals, including curriculum and training, supervisor support, and opportunities for connecting with academia. Supplemental Appendix A lists the themes reported below, along with their corresponding codes.
Research Question 1: Attributes Needed to Negotiate Employability
PhD Qualifications: The Threshold
Participants unanimously agreed that holding a PhD was the threshold for entry into academic positions in China, making it an indispensable element of their employability. Participants highlighted that without this qualification, the opportunity to even apply for academic roles would be nonexistent, underscoring its critical importance in their career trajectories. A recurrently mentioned reason for this perception was that the PhD qualification was seen as a mark of credibility and competence due to China’s cultural emphasis on academic excellence and formal education (Gu et al., 2018), signifying that the holder had undergone rigorous academic training and possesses advanced research skills. Supplementing this traditional belief was China’s emerging neijuan (involution) culture, signifying the intense competition that compelled individuals to put in excessive effort to achieve gains (Qian & Bram, 2024). Consequently, obtaining a PhD was viewed as essential not only for teaching roles but also sometimes for administrative positions within Chinese universities, regardless of the institution’s level, be it prestigious universities, regular universities (yiben, erben, and sanben), or vocational colleges.
One male participant shared a detailed narrative that underscored the significance of their PhD qualification. After completing a master’s degree in accounting from a Project-985 university in China, he began applying for positions at several universities, including regular universities and vocational colleges. Initially, he was optimistic due to their strong academic record and research skills. However, he quickly realized that without the PhD qualification, his applications were consistently overlooked, prompting him to pursue further studies in Malaysia. It was not until he graduated and highlighted the newly earned PhD in his curriculum vitae that he began receiving interview invitations for teaching positions in universities and finally secured a job in an erben university 4 months after graduation.
“Without a PhD, you are not even considered for academic positions in China. It is the first thing they look at, the basic credential that you must have to even be in the running, especially given the increasing competition among graduates who are fighting for limited positions in universities.”
Although participants supposed that a PhD degree obtained from Malaysia might not be considered by employers in China’s HEPs as favorably as one obtained from a local university or well-established overseas study destinations, such as America and the United Kingdom, principally due to the perceived lower admission standards and ease of graduation, they still affirmed that obtaining a PhD degree significantly enhanced their human capital. This enhancement allowed them to meet the basic qualification requirements for academic positions, which was crucial in ensuring that their applications were considered and enabling them to be shortlisted for interviews.
Research Skills and Publications: The Stepping-Stone
Strong research skills and impressive publication records, important forms of human capital, came into play when participants believed that their Malaysia-obtained PhD degree was somehow discriminated against by Chinese employers. Participants highlighted that, in such instances, showcasing their research capabilities and publication achievements became crucial in offsetting any potential biases. Specifically, they emphasized that the ability to design and conduct rigorous research projects, analyze data, and present findings effectively were critical competencies that Chinese employers in HEPs were looking for (Ma & Ye, 2023). Having a robust publication record was also essential in demonstrating their academic prowess and research productivity. Despite the perceived lower prestige of their degree, they believed that their extensive list of publications especially in reputable journals helped them stand out. This was particularly important when applying for positions at top-tier universities, where research output was highly valued in China.
One female participant studying computer science recounted her experience. Aware that a PhD degree obtained in Malaysia might be less competitive, she still applied for a lecturer position at a prestigious Chinese university. Despite competing against graduates from top-ranked universities worldwide, she stood out by having over ten publications, most of which were indexed in journals of the Social Sciences Citation Index or the Science Citation Index Expanded. The employer highly valued her research output and competency, ultimately offering her a position with satisfying remuneration.
“If a PhD degree is the entry ticket, then research competence and output are the stepping-stone to securing a position within a university. Indeed, a Malaysia-obtained PhD degree can be less competitive, but Chinese universities tend to focus more on a candidate’s research output as an important indicator of their development potential.”
The reason for this emphasis on research was the “publish or perish” or “papers only” climate within Chinese HEPs (Hu et al., 2025). Participants highlighted that having strong research capabilities was not only crucial for the short-term success of obtaining a job but also for long-term opportunities for professional development, such as promotion and better remuneration. This was evident regardless of the levels of the HEPs they were working in or planning to apply to. Sometimes, this climate was reflected in the “up or out” policy, which explicitly stated that failure to meet promotion requirements—most of which were related to research output—within the probationary period would force a teacher to resign. As such, research skills and publications became important human capital that significantly enhanced PhD holders’ employability.
Social Connections: The Embellishment
Participants also spotlighted the importance of establishing and maintaining social connections, especially with academics and employers within Chinese HEPs. These connections were built through various means, such as social media, and new acquaintances made through existing connections with friends, alumni, supervisors, and family members. With human capital, such as PhD qualifications and research competency, playing a fundamental role, this social capital was perceived to embellish PhD holders’ employability. Influenced by China’s social culture of guanxi (D. Liu et al., 2022), participants believed having extensive social connections served several purposes: accessing more employment opportunities, leveraging insider connections to find better job opportunities or gain a competitive edge during the recruitment process, and improving productivity in the workplace.
One female participant specializing in education management bluntly shared her story. With a less impressive academic background—having obtained her PhD from a Malaysian HEP without a global ranking, completing her previous education at a Chinese erben university, and having only two publications indexed in Scopus—she was recommended by her PhD peer to apply for a lecturer position at a vocational college in her hometown. Recognizing her academic weaknesses, she asked her parents and friends to pull some strings. Using guanxi built with insiders from the specific college, she was further given the green light in the recruitment process. After working at that college for a few months, she had also built good relationships with her colleagues and leaders, which made her professional life more manageable and provided her with additional support and opportunities.
“Social connections play an embellishing role for me, especially considering that my employment competitiveness is not strong enough. Building good relationships with alumni, insiders, and academics before employment, and with colleagues and leaders after employment, has made my employment easier than expected.”
Although this experience was a mix of positivity (e.g., acquaintances’ recommendations of job opportunities and getting along well with colleagues) and negativity (e.g., pulling strings), it demonstrated the importance of social capital in enhancing graduates’ employability. Particularly for participants with less impressive education and research backgrounds, they believed extensive social connections within the higher education industry provided a “crowning touch” for their real but not perfect human capital.
Resilience and Adaptability: The Necessities
Participants also mentioned the importance of resilience and adaptability in increasing employability, with the former highlighted as a crucial trait for navigating the competitive and often demanding academic job market in China and the latter seen as essential for adjusting to new environments and expectations. Interestingly, many participants stressed that maintaining this psychological capital stemmed from the necessity of confronting the perceived inferiority of a Malaysia-obtained PhD within China’s HEPs. Having invested years of effort in doctoral research, they felt they deserved fairer treatment but admitted the need to adopt a positive attitude towards employment amid the social belief of “diploma mills in Southeast Asia” (i.e., a stereotype characterized by the perception that higher education in some Southeast Asian countries could be of low quality) within China (Hu & Wang, 2024).
A female participant shared her experience of feeling discriminated against, though she obtained her PhD from a top-ranked Malaysian HEP. Upon graduation, she was struggling to secure an ideal teaching job at a university. Her job applications were rejected, whether they were for yiben or erben universities or vocational colleges. She was explicitly informed by employers that a Malaysian-obtained PhD would not be considered eligible for interviews, without any reasons given. However, she refused to let this setback deter her. She continued to apply for positions while adjusting her job search strategies and expanding her network within the academic community. Her perseverance eventually paid off when she was offered a teaching position at an erben university, where her dedication and resilience were recognized.
“This experience has taught me the importance of resilience in employment. Despite any potential setbacks, we should always stay positive and adjust our mentality … As returnees, we should also strive to adapt to Chinese society and the conventions of employment.”
This psychological capital was also deemed important when some participants started working in HEPs. They were under considerable pressure to prepare and deliver classes, ensure high research output to meet institutional requirements, and sometimes handle administrative work and student affairs. These multiple roles made it necessary for participants to stay resilient and mentally adjust themselves to the career journey in universities.
Agentic Dispositions and Actions: The Drivers
Two forms of agency were deemed important in post-doctoral employment: dispositions and actions. The former was mainly represented by participants’ awareness of and reflection on their strengths and weaknesses (Pham, 2025), particularly associated with the aforementioned human capital, social capital, and psychological capital. This involved a deep introspection where individuals assessed their competencies and areas needing improvement. Actions, on the other hand, referred to participants’ initiatives and strategic career planning (Kayyali, 2024). They were characterized by proactive behaviors aimed at enhancing their employability. Participants often engaged in strategic career planning, which included setting specific career goals, identifying potential job opportunities, and developing a roadmap to achieve these goals. This planning was not static; it evolved as they gained more experience and feedback. They also took the initiative to seek out professional development opportunities, such as attending workshops, conferences, and training sessions, which not only broadened their skill set but also expanded their professional networks.
Moreover, the interplay between dispositions and actions was crucial. A strong sense of self-awareness (disposition) often informed the strategic actions participants took. For instance, a male participant, recognizing his weakness in publications upon graduation, shared how he sought for additional opportunities beyond the PhD curriculum and research to improve his academic competence. Aiming to publish high-impact journal articles in the field of finance, he took one-on-one tutoring courses delivered by an expert researcher in China, which enhanced his understanding of research methodologies, finance research trends, and academic writing. With his own effort and by collaborating with the expert, he finally published his research in a recognized journal indexed in Social Sciences Citation Index, which helped him gain recognition in subsequent interviews.
“To find a good job, it is essential to clearly understand one’s strengths and weaknesses and to continually self-reflect during the job search process. As returnees, we should not only adapt to China’s employment environment but also make strategic plans and take actions to fully utilize our abilities.”
Research Question 2: Perceived Important Resources
Curriculum and Training: The Preparation
The curriculum design of PhD programs and the academic training provided on campus were considered crucial preparation for participants’ professional development and employment, as they significantly increased their human capital, particularly by enhancing the likelihood of graduating on time and acquiring solid research skills. Universally, participants graduating from both public and private HEPs appreciated the offer of research methodology and academic writing courses during the first semester of their PhD journey in Malaysia (Saeed et al., 2021). The availability of these courses early in their programs helped participants immediately apply what they learned to their research projects, thereby improving the quality and coherence of their work. Additionally, some HEPs provided extra workshops and tutoring on advanced statistical methods and the use of software tools such as the Statistical Package for Social Sciences and NVivo. They also offered seminars and guest lectures featuring industry experts and accomplished academics beyond the prescribed curriculum to enhance students’ academic skills. These opportunities were instrumental in equipping students with practical skills that were highly valued in China’s academia and their targeted job market.
“[Some] Malaysian universities provide compulsory courses in research methodology and academic writing for PhD students, which differs from the curriculum design in other countries. Additionally, there are numerous learning opportunities, such as workshops and lectures on academic research. I find these very helpful in improving my knowledge and skills, which are important not only for my PhD studies but also for my future career.”
Supervisor Support: The Foundation
Participants considered sufficient and appropriate supervisor support crucial for improving various forms of capital, such as human capital (e.g., obtaining the PhD degree), psychological capital (e.g., bolstering confidence in becoming an independent researcher), social capital (e.g., making new acquaintances with peers and academics through supervisors’ social networks), and agentic capital (e.g., recognizing one’s strengths and weaknesses through supervisor feedback). This highlighted the fundamental role played by supervisors in doctoral research and students’ professional development (Fulgence, 2019). Specifically, supervisors helped students navigate the complexities of their research projects and offered insights and expertise that facilitated the development of rigorous and impactful research, which were essential for students’ academic and professional growth. Furthermore, supervisors often acted as mentors (Tokalić, 2023), who opened doors for students to collaborative research opportunities, conferences, and workshops, and provided emotional support and encouragement, which were vital for improving social networks and resilience throughout the demanding PhD journey.
However, almost all participants maintained that supervisor support was insufficient in the HEPs they had previously attended. Due to supervisors’ heavy schedules and multiple roles within institutions, along with the imbalanced supervisor-supervisee ratio caused by a sudden increase in international student enrollment (Hu & Wang, 2024), they often failed to offer prompt feedback and support, impacting students’ perceived employability development. For example, a female student graduating with a degree in teaching English as a second language said that she had to wait for days and sometimes even weeks for her supervisors’ responses regarding her research progress over emails or social media. While she acknowledged that this late response and lack of support were understandable given the circumstances, she regretted not receiving the necessary support and had to rely mostly on herself and her peers to learn and progress.
“It always took a long time for my supervisors to respond to my inquiries or messages on WhatsApp or Telegram. I understand they were busy, but without their feedback and support, I could not identify my deficiencies, develop my academic skills, or integrate into their social and academic networks. This significantly affected my confidence in my PhD studies and beyond, particularly regarding future employment, which would require strong academic skills and networking within academia.”
Opportunities for Connecting with Academia: The Bridge
Participants also highlighted the importance of connecting with academia in consolidating their graduate employability because this connection with academics, industry professionals, and potential employers could improve their social capital and even human capital. These connections enabled participants to stay informed about job openings, industry trends, and best practices, which were invaluable for their career development. However, participants noted an absence of this connection from their PhD programs on multiple dimensions.
Within a university, the connections that could be established were typically limited to supervisors and fellow students due to institutional clan culture (Al Issa, 2019), which restricted participants’ engagement within the university community, immediate networking opportunities, and potential for professional growth. This insular culture often resulted in participants being confined to their immediate academic circles, limiting their exposure to diverse perspectives and opportunities. Additionally, there tended to be a disconnection between Malaysian HEPs and Chinese HEPs (Abd Rahman, 2022). This disconnection resulted in limited cross-institutional collaborations, fewer opportunities for joint research projects, and reduced access to diverse employment information. Participants found that the lack of strong ties between Malaysia and China meant they had fewer chances to connect with potential employers and industry professionals in China, a crucial market for their future careers. Moreover, Malaysian HEPs often had weaker links with the global academic community because of limited resources, less established international partnerships, and a focus on local rather than global academic priorities (Da, 2022). This limited their students’ access to international collaborations, conferences, and research funding—important mediums for developing human capital and social capital—further affecting their employment prospects.
“I found it difficult to approach PhD students in my field, both within my university and from other universities, to share employment information … As an international student, I felt lost in China’s labor market, unaware of the latest requirements and policies … I was confined to Malaysia’s academic community, knowing little about what was happening beyond it. Universities should have established these links for us.”
Discussion
The research highlights several issues that warrant further investigation in comparison with previous literature. Firstly, as shown in the literature review, an overseas degree might be questioned in China’s labor market (Singh & Fan, 2021; Tao, 2023; Tran et al., 2021). However, this study indicates that for Chinese international students graduating from Malaysian HEPs, PhD qualifications serve as the threshold for further employment in China’s HEPs, supplemented by robust research skills and publication records, whose role is indisputable for PhD returnees (Chen, 2024; L. Liu, 2023; S. Meng & Shen, 2024). This overall strong emphasis on human capital suggests that Chinese employers highly value tangible academic qualifications and research competencies as critical indicators of a candidate’s potential contribution to academia and industry.
However, strong human capital tends to be a stepping stone to employment rather than a necessity, as participants highlighted the role of social capital in maximizing their employment outcomes despite their relatively weak academic achievements, a belief documented in the literature (Singh & Fan, 2021; Tao, 2023). Specifically, while previous research has highlighted the importance of social capital without disclosing how it works in China’s guanxi-oriented society, this study suggests that social capital may play two different roles. On a favorable side, extensive social connections enhance a returnee’s employability by accessing more employment opportunities from insiders and referrals and improving productivity at the workplace through effective communication with others. This aligns with the general expectation of how social capital exerts its potential in employment (Donald, 2024; Moumen & Mejjad, 2021). Social capital facilitates smoother transitions into new roles and helps returnees adapt to new environments by providing support, guidance, and resources that are otherwise inaccessible.
However, a less favorable role of social capital, at least in China’s context, is the use of social networks to pull strings and gain preferential treatment, an undeniable social phenomenon (Tang, 2022). In such cases, PhD returnees with strong guanxi but weaker academic credentials may secure desirable positions, leading to the prioritization of connections over qualifications. This dual nature of social capital underscores the complexity of the employment landscape in China, where personal connections can both aid and complicate career progression. It highlights the potential for social capital to perpetuate inequalities and hinder merit-based advancements (Pena-López et al., 2021), causing frustration among highly qualified individuals who lack influential networks.
Additionally, psychological capital, such as resilience and adaptability, is essential for PhD returnees in China, a finding not highlighted in previous similar research. A possible reason for this could be that a Malaysian degree is generally considered inferior to degrees obtained from countries such as Australia, America, and the United Kingdom (Y. Liu & Ye, 2021), the contexts where most of the reviewed studies were conducted. However, given China’s competitive employment landscape and the increasing number of highly educated individuals exceeding the job market demand (Tang, 2022), the importance of psychological capital becomes evident. For PhD returnees, the ability to effectively cope with and adapt to the highly competitive and often uncertain job market conditions in China becomes a critical determinant of their employability and career success.
Agentic capital plays a synergistic role in maximizing other types of capital, and dispositions of self-reflection on one’s strengths and weaknesses and corresponding actions that enhance personal and professional development are crucial. Although previous research has implicitly indicated the importance of agentic capital, typically characterized by students’ self-awareness of strengths and weaknesses in employability and recognition of the need to make strategic plans (L. Liu, 2023; Tao, 2023; Tran et al., 2021), an explicit focus on identifying agentic capital as an essential attribute seems to be missing in research on graduates in general and Chinese returnees in particular. This is principally because this notion is “relatively new in the field of international graduates’ employability” (Pham, 2021, p. 4). However, by fostering agentic capital, graduates can better navigate their career paths, actively seek opportunities for growth, and effectively utilize their existing human, social, and psychological capital. This proactive approach allows them to set achievable career goals, adapt to changing job market conditions, and continuously improve their skills and knowledge, ultimately enhancing their employability.
Underpinned by the idea that graduate employment can be influenced by various socio-cultural factors (Hardin-Ramanan et al., 2020), the study also highlights the importance of several resources, which should be principally provided by Malaysian HEPs but are beyond institutional support, in honing Chinese returnees’ employability. For example, the provision of academic courses as requisites for PhD research within Malaysian HEPs aligns with Chinese students’ emphasis on human capital and desire to improve it. This is consistent with the proposal that structured academic programs significantly contribute to the development of human capital, providing students with the knowledge and skills needed to succeed in the job market (Pham, 2025). Considering that coursework specifically designed for students to improve their academic skills is generally missing from PhD curriculums provided worldwide (Jegede, 2021), Malaysian HEPs are in a unique position to fill this gap by integrating comprehensive academic and professional skills courses into their doctoral programs.
However, the quality of PhD supervision, though deemed vital, is perceived to be unsatisfactory within Malaysian HEPs. This influences students’ human capital (e.g., obtaining the PhD degree), psychological capital (e.g., bolstering confidence in becoming an independent researcher), social capital (e.g., making new acquaintances with peers and academics through supervisors’ social networks), and agentic capital (e.g., recognizing one’s strengths and weaknesses through supervisor feedback). This issue, long-standing in Malaysia (Krauss & Ismail, 2010), contradicts the expectation from the local academic community that supervisors should be available, provide sufficient supervision and knowledge, and create an engaging education and research environment for international students (Mydin & Surat, 2021), as well as the general expectation for supervisors to be not only mentors but also facilitators of comprehensive student development (Tokalić, 2023). Additionally, there is a multi-level absence within, among, and beyond Malaysian HEPs, characterized by limited opportunities to make acquaintances with peers and academic staff within the same institution, seek cooperation with other universities in Malaysia, build academic connections with HEPs and academics in China, and engage with the global academia. This significantly hampers students’ development of social capital and may further limit their opportunities to improve human capital, stifling their overall academic and professional growth (Pham, 2021).
Consequently, both the capital-based approach and the multiple-stakeholder approach should be adopted to understand and improve international students’ employability in Malaysia. The capital-based lens helps clarify what kinds of attributes PhD returnees mobilize (e.g., human, social, psychological, and agentic capital), while the multiple-stakeholder perspective draws attention to who shapes these capitals and where interventions are needed (e.g., host institutions, supervisors, employers, and policy actors in both Malaysia and China). Together, these perspectives move beyond simplistic narratives of “degree quality” (Kayyali, 2024) to show how employability emerges from the interaction between individual attributes and program-level, institutional, and systemic conditions across sending and receiving countries.
Theoretically, this study advances the graduate capital literature in several ways. First, it makes explicit the centrality of psychological and agentic capital in an emerging-destination context where degrees are stigmatized and competition is intense. Prior work has often treated resilience, adaptability, and proactive career behavior as background conditions (Donald, 2024; Hu & Wang, 2024; Zhao et al., 2022); our findings suggest that, for Chinese PhD returnees from Malaysia, these attributes are core to employability rather than peripheral. Second, we unpack the dual nature of social capital in a guanxi-oriented labor market, showing how the same networks can function as both legitimate support and a mechanism for reproducing inequality. This nuance complicates more uniformly positive accounts of social capital (Pena-López et al., 2021) and points to the need for future research that interrogates how different forms of networking are evaluated by employers and peers. Third, by applying the graduate capital framework to an emerging host country, the study extends existing work that has focused predominantly on Western destinations and highlights the importance of host-country reputation and cross-border institutional linkages as part of the wider ecology of employability.
For practice, the findings underscore several priorities for Malaysian HEPs. The positive evaluations of research methods, academic writing courses, and skills-focused workshops suggest structured, front-loaded training is a strength that should be consolidated and more deliberately framed as employability preparation rather than merely as support for thesis completion. At the same time, the persistent concerns about supervision and limited academic connectivity indicate clear areas for institutional reform. Malaysian HEPs need to invest in supervisor development, workload management, and clearer expectations around feedback and mentoring, especially for international doctoral students who lack local networks. Parallel efforts are needed to build stronger institutional bridges with other Malaysian universities, Chinese HEPs, and global academic communities, through joint seminars, co-supervision schemes, alumni networks, and targeted career services for international PhD students. Such initiatives would directly address the gaps in social and human capital that participants identified and signal a more intentional commitment to international graduates’ long-term employability.
The study also has implications for Chinese employers and policymakers. The strong reliance on human capital indicators such as publications and research skills suggests that hiring practices are already looking beyond the simple label of “overseas degree.” However, the stigma attached to Malaysia-obtained PhDs and the uneven use of guanxi highlight the need for more transparent, competency-based evaluation criteria that recognize demonstrable research output, teaching ability, and professional skills, regardless of where the degree was obtained. Policies and institutional guidelines that encourage fairer assessment of international credentials, while guarding against nepotistic uses of social capital, could help reduce the current misalignment between Malaysia’s aspirations as an education hub and the reception of its graduates in China.
Conclusion
The study indicates that Chinese returnees with Malaysia-obtained PhDs primarily make sense of their employability through four interrelated forms of graduate capital: human (credentials, research skills, publications), social (guanxi and academic networks), psychological (resilience and adaptability), and agentic (self-awareness and strategic action). It also highlights curriculum and research training, supervisor support, and opportunities to connect with academia as key program-level resources, although supervision quality and academic networking were often described as inadequate in Malaysian HEPs. By contrast, cultural capital (understanding sectoral and organizational norms) and identity capital (deliberately shaping and projecting a professional profile) featured much less prominently in participants’ accounts, raising questions about whether these dimensions are less expected in Chinese academic labor markets, less visible to this cohort, or simply more difficult for them to articulate. Similarly, while core academic resources were frequently mentioned, other potential institutional supports (e.g., targeted career services, formal mentorship schemes, structured industry collaborations, and active alumni networks) seemed underdeveloped or underutilized in participants’ narratives.
This study has several limitations that should be acknowledged. First, the data come from a relatively small, snowball-sampled group of 18 Chinese returnees with Malaysia-obtained PhDs who were either employed in or seeking positions in Chinese HEPs, which limits the transferability of the findings to other cohorts (e.g., those entering industry, working outside China, or holding non-academic roles). Second, the analysis is based on self-reported perceptions collected through retrospective interviews and scroll-back materials, which capture how participants understand their employability rather than directly measuring employment outcomes or employers’ evaluations, and may therefore be influenced by recall bias and self-presentation. Third, the study was primarily grounded in the graduate capital and multiple-stakeholder frameworks; other theoretical lenses might foreground different aspects of the same data. Fourth, the study did not include other key stakeholders such as Malaysian supervisors, program leaders, or Chinese hiring committees, so it cannot fully capture how employability is co-constructed across institutions or systematically compare returnees’ self-perceptions with employers’ expectations. Finally, the cross-sectional focus on graduates within 2 years of completion provides only a snapshot of early career transitions and does not show how different forms of capital and resources play out over longer professional trajectories.
Future research could build on this study in several complementary directions. Multi-stakeholder and multi-sited studies that incorporate Malaysian HEP staff, Chinese employers, and policymakers would allow for a more comprehensive understanding of how employability is negotiated across sending and receiving contexts and where misalignments arise. Comparative research across emerging host countries (e.g., Malaysia and other Asian or Southeast Asian destinations) and more established destinations could clarify which patterns identified here (e.g., the heightened importance of psychological and agentic capital under credential stigma) are context-specific and which reflect broader dynamics in the global doctoral labor market. Longitudinal designs following Chinese PhD students from enrollment through several years post-graduation would help trace how different forms of capital are accumulated, converted, or devalued over time, and how institutional interventions (e.g., enhanced supervision models, structured career services, China–Malaysia partnership programs) affect trajectories. Finally, more focused work on cultural and identity capital—how returnees learn to “read” organizational cultures, project credible professional identities across institutional tiers, and negotiate their status as Malaysia-trained academics—possibly using mixed-methods designs that combine qualitative and survey data, would deepen understanding of underexplored but potentially important dimensions of employability in this context.
Supplemental Material
sj-docx-1-sgo-10.1177_21582440261422103 – Supplemental material for What Really Contributes to the Employability of Chinese Returnees with Malaysian-Obtained PhDs in and beyond Academia?
Supplemental material, sj-docx-1-sgo-10.1177_21582440261422103 for What Really Contributes to the Employability of Chinese Returnees with Malaysian-Obtained PhDs in and beyond Academia? by Wanyu Wang and Hengzhi Hu in SAGE Open
Footnotes
Ethical Considerations
This study adhered to established ethical guidelines for qualitative research involving human participants. Ethical approval was obtained from the research ethics committee of Baicheng Normal University, ensuring that all procedures were in accordance with institutional and international standards for research integrity and participant protection. Informed consent was obtained from all participants prior to data collection.
Consent to Participate
Written informed consent was obtained from all participants of the study.
Funding
The authors disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This research was supported by Jilin Provincial Department of Education (Project No. JJKH20251469SK).
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Data Availability Statement
The data used in the study are available from the authors upon reasonable request.
Supplemental Material
Supplemental material for this article is available online.
References
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