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Week 2.pptx
- 1. What are Employability Skills? LGB506: Industrial Placement
- 2. Session Overview • Understand the term ‘employability skills’ • Investigate the importance of employability skills for recruitment and competence within the workplace • Analyse your current level of employability skills • Understand the learning process and how skills are learnt
- 3. What are Employability Skills? Definition • Social behaviours and skills are personal • Do not always come naturally • Can be applied in a variety of situations • They are transferable ‘A set of achievements – skills, understanding 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’ (Yorke, 2006) ‘Employability skills are a set of social behaviours and skills that you can learn to help you interact and work with other people in a variety of different situations’ (Hind and Moss 2007:2)
- 4. Employability Skills Model Mc Quaid et al (2006) Insert Tina’s slide from Employability Skills: Employability Skills Model (slide 4)
- 5. Employability Skills: Individual Factors • Skills and attributes • Personal competencies • Qualifications • Educational attainment • Work Based knowledge • Work history • Health and wellbeing • Job seeking approach • Adaptability • Mobility (McQuaid, Green and Danson(2006) • Self Management • Team-working • Business and customer awareness • Problem solving • Entrepreneurship and enterprise • Positive Attitude • Communication and literacy • Application of number • Application of Information Technology (CBI Voice for British Businesses, 2009) Individual factors are the employability skills in which this module is concerned with: A ‘set of basic/generic skills and attitudinal/behavioural characteristics that are believed to be essential for individuals to secure and sustain employment, and also to progress in the Workplace’ (Belt, Drake and Chapman 2010)
- 6. PROPERTIES Allow user to leave interaction: After viewing all the steps Show ‘Next Slide’ Button: Show always Completion Button Label: Next Slide
- 7. Skills Audit A skills audit is essential self-evaluation process to establish a baseline for your skills and competencies, it can highlight areas of strength as well as areas to improve and can help to develop a training programme to where you will be motivated towards converting weaknesses into strengths, thus improving your chances of employment within a certain sector Insert skills audit – interactive whereby students select 1-5 for each skill.
- 8. Why Does Employability Matter? • Increasing competition in the labour market means that candidates with skills and aptitudes beyond academic achievement have more to offer. • All of your activities including academic work, hobbies, participation in clubs or teams, voluntary work or part time jobs allow you to develop skills. • You need to be able to make the link between your skills and what employers are looking for and how analysing your skills can help your chances.
- 9. What is Learning? ‘Learning is purposeful activity aimed at acquisition of skills, knowledge and ways of thinking that improve effectiveness in future situations.’ (Cameron, 2008: 51) Learning occurs from the moment you are born, and never ceases. It is important however, to know how you learn; managers or leaders who know how they learn are more effective than those that lack awareness (Cameron, 2008) Learning has traditionally been seen as acquiring knowledge such as teachers or lecturers telling students information and their learning is then judged by an exam. This passive way of learning is not enough in many situations and is more about what you can ‘do’ rather than what you ‘know’. This can be the case when learning and developing the skills needed for employability, where a more active type of learning is necessary (Hind and Moss, 2011) Many organisations have a set of occupational standards or competence frameworks which can be set internally and can be specific for certain job roles or sectors of the business. These are used as a basis for recruitment and employee development. Potential or current employees must evidence their competencies against these standards. It is therefore not only important to ‘know’ the information, but to also be able to ‘apply this.’ A Learning Skills Audit can be used to assess employees current skills levels and areas for training and development (Hind and Moss, 2011)
- 10. How are Employability Skills developed? Experiential Learning Cycle (Kolb, 1984) Insert the engage from Tina’s: Reflective practice: experiential learning cycle
- 11. Learning Styles Audio, Visual and Kinaesthetic Learning If learning is to be effective, feedback and reflection is important. You should seek feedback on your actions and how you think and to constantly reflect on your practice and your experience (Cameron, 2008) People vary in the way they learn; listening, reading, writing or doing (Drucker, 1999). These can be grouped further as audio, visual or kinaesthetic learning styles. Most people will have a preferred or dominant learning style and in order to learn most effectively, it is essential to understand your own learning style, but to also ensure that you are open to engage with a range of styles and so to encourage whole brain learning. Use the link below to download the Learning Styles Questionnaire to assess your preferred learning style. Link Example
- 13. Methods of improving your Employability Skills • Work Experience • Internships • Placements • Voluntary work • Specific courses/ training • Attending conferences • Self-guided reading • Qualifications • Shadowing • Extra-curricular activity • Membership of professional body • Practice: Trial and error!
- 14. Education and Skills Survey 0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100% Foreign language skills Bus. & customer awareness Int. cultural awareness Relevant work experience Self management Problem solving Knoweldge about chosen job Positive attitude to work Team work Basic literacy Basic numeracy Use of IT Very Satisfied Satisfied Not Satisfied Adapted from CBI, 2010)
- 15. What Skills do Employers Look for in a Graduate? ‘Many recruiters commented that irrespective of the academic results that a graduate had achieved, it would be very hard for an applicant to demonstrate the skills and competencies that they were looking for if they’d not had any work experience.’ High Fliers Research (2011:29) A degree allows a graduate to enter the sector, but it is employability skills that will differentiate them from the crowd and therefore be more likely to secure the position (Trought, 2011) Variation occurs between employers as to what they are looking for in their employees as some jobs require specific skills or competencies. There are however, a range of transferable ‘employability skills’ that have been discussed throughout this session that are commonly requested by graduate employers. You can develop these skills during your work experience, your studies and your extracurricular activities. “Over three quarters (78 per cent) of the firms who responded to the confederation of British Industrys’ 2009 Education and Skills Survey said employability skills was one of the most important factors when recruiting graduates, along with a positive attitude (72 per cent) and relevant work experience/industry placement (54 per cent)” • Employability Skills • Positive attitude • Work experience (CBI, 2009: 11)
- 16. Why are employability skills important to employers? • Increased Productivity • Reduced wastage • Cost savings • Health and safety – reduced accident rates • Absence management • Recruitment and retention • Increased staff morale • Improved reputation • Improved organisational relationships • Improved competitiveness • Improved ability to change • Improved management of change • Improved leadership and management (Asset Skills 2008)
- 17. Personal Development Planning Reflection is a key part of the learning process and by reflecting upon the different situations you have found yourself in or by observing others you can reflect on your own abilities and identify your strengths and weakness. You will be unable to develop your employability skills if you are unaware of your current skills set. By reflecting on your current abilities with regards your employability skills and the completion of the Skills Audit Worksheet highlighted your areas of strength and areas of improvement. This constructive reflection can help to form a Personal Development Plan (PDP) that will help you continually develop your personal skills. A PDP is a structured way to think about the employability skills that you need to develop further and also the means by which such development will be achieved and measured. Benefits of a PDP: • Clearly identifies the Employability Skill you need to develop further. • Able to devise a personal training or development programme that will enable you to improve your Employability Skills. • Sets objectives and timescales that will help to keep you motivated and will allow you to assess the progress you are making, which can be regularly reviewed • You will be in control of your learning and personal development, the pace of learning and the Employability skills you will be developing • Develop your self –confidence: this will improve as your employability skills develop. (Hind and Moss, 2011)
- 18. Independent Learning Task • Research a Career you are interested in and identify an advertised job description and person specification. Compare your current skills set, both areas of strength and areas to improve, as identified from your undertaking of the Skills Audit Worksheet, with those highlighted by the job description and personal specification • For strengths: highlight evidence to support these i.e. instances where you have displayed/ demonstrated or developed this skill. • For areas to improve: complete an action plan on how you will improve these areas: template is provided on Learnzone
- 19. In Conclusion… • There are a range of employability skills which are described as a set of social behaviours and skills that you can learn, helping you to work with and interact with others in a range of situations • Employability skills are important for employers when they are recruiting as well as on going within their organisation • Analysing your employability skills is important to establish areas for improvement and for identifying training needs • The learning process is an on going, active process which requires feedback and reflection on an experience to ensure learning takes place Useful websites-Career Tools: www.prospects.ac.uk https://nationalcareersservice.direct.gov.uk
- 20. References Asset Skills (2008) A Skills Toolkit for Employers, Skills for Business Network Employability Guide, Asett Skills SSC, Exeter, UK Belt, V. Drake, P. Chapman, K (2010), Employability Skills: A Research and Policy Briefing, UK Commission for Employment and Skills (UKCES), UK). CBI The Voice of British Businesses (2009) Future Fit Preparing Graduates for the World of Work, CBI and the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills. High Fliers Research (2011) The Graduate Market in 2011. www.highfliers.co.uk/download/GMReport11.pdf (accessed June 2011) Hind, D and Moss, S (2011) Employability Skills. (Second Edition). Business Education Publishers, Sunderland, UK. Kolb, D.A., Rubin, I.M. and Mackintyre, J.M. (1984) Organisational Psychology (4th Edition). Prentice Hall. McQuaid, R., Green A. and Danson M. (2006) The Concept of Employability, Employability and Local Labour Market Policy. Routledge: Abingdon. Yorke, M (2006) Learning and skills Series One: Employability: What it is and what it is not. Higher Education Academy, Enhancing Student Employability Co-ordination Team.
Notas del editor
- There are many different definitions and discussion around employability and the desired employability skills by employers. Different definitions of employability skills will be discussed exploring further the different skills identified by different academic commentators and industry specialists. The UK Commission for Employment and Skills (UKCES), state that “The term ‘employability’ has been used for many years by policy-makers and researchers in the context of debates about employment and labour markets. It has been defined in different ways, with much depending on the group to which it is applied (e.g. unemployed people or the existing workforce). However, there is agreement at a very general level that employability relates to the ability to be in employment, and, in particular, the set of characteristics that increase the chances of an individual being in work.
- McQuaid et al (2006) attempts to identify the full range of factors that could influence the ability to gain employment. These factors are identified as individual factors, personal circumstances and demand factors. You can click on each of these factors to see examples of things that could impact on an individuals employability. Which one of these factors could you control or change to help increase your employability? McQuaid et al (2006) argue that all of the above factors need to be considered when assessing an individual’s ability to move into or within employment, or their employability. However for this module we are concerned specifically with the employability skills element of this bigger picture, which fall within McQuaid’s ‘individual factors’. By this we mean the set of basic/generic skills and attitudinal/behavioural characteristics that are believed to be essential for individuals to secure and sustain employment, and also to progress in the workplace.
- Employability Skills: A Research and Policy Briefing, UK Commission for Employment and Skills (UKCES), UK). The individual factors that organisations may be concerned with according to McQuaid et al (2006 can be seen on the left hand side of the slide. Similarly the CBI Voice for British Businesses further identified individual factors of employability skills which are highlighted on the right hand side. There has been so much debate on these different employability skills nevertheless it is essential within a competitive job market that you stand out from the crowd and communicate and demonstrate these skills.
- Insert Tina's Slide- from Employability Skills “Employability skills are thus 'the skills almost everyone needs to do almost any job' (UK Commission, 2009b, p.10). Whilst the underpinning skills of numeracy, language and basic IT skills are fundamental to employability, it is the additional skills associated with attitudes and behaviours that are paramount (shown in the four boxes in the diagram above).
- A skills audit is essential to establish a baseline for your skills and competencies, it can highlight areas of strength as well as areas to improve and can help to develop a training programme to improve your chances of employment within a certain sector. Complete the skills audit, noting down a score between 1-5 for each of the skills listed. This can form a baseline measure of your skills prior to your placement. This will highlight any areas you may wish to consider or address on your placement. You should complete this once again after your period of work experience to ascertain any improvements made.
- You can complete this again after your placement to see where you have improved your employability skills
- Learning from experiences is a concept derived from the work of Kolb (1984) which is still acknowledged today by academics, teachers, managers and trainers as a seminal theory which demonstrates the understanding of human learning behaviour. This example of a learning cycle is part of a much broader range of discussions around experiential learning and reflective practice, however it is a very useful model to understand why we should consider reflecting upon your experiences during your work placement. Learning is a continuous, active process and not just about acquiring knowledge. Its about UNDERSTANDING situations in order to respond appropriately- when the context changes you are not going to do what you did before- you need to understand what you did and why it went well/ badly. Concrete experience: Active process: an active process generates expereinces. planned or accidental in our everyday lives- something new you have been asked to do, a course, a workshop, a presentation, could be an experience on your course Reflective Practice: Actively think about your experience: make sense of your experience in light of existing ideas and concepts- what was the significance to you? Abstract conceptualisation: Analyse the experience and develop ideas: change your ideas to make better sense of the experience. How could you do this next time? Think about theories/ principles beyond your experience that can be applied to similar situations. This will lead to successful behaviour next time Active experimentation: Try out what you have learnt, experimenting with ideas/ solutions you have considered. Use learning by experimenting in different situations- creativity, decision making, problem solving Creating an experience so The cycle starts again to further develop your understanding If parts are missing, learning will not take place- you could do something ineffectively for years: experience without reflection will teach you nothing. Kolb D.A. (1984) 'Experiential Learning experience as a source of learning and development', New Jersey: Prentice Hall
- Link to learning styles questionnaire- I have a copy of this.
- Insert Tina’s engage from Reflective Practice: Learning Styles
- SCRIPT: There are many different way for you to improve your employability skills and thus increase your chances of becoming successfully employed. Work experience, internships, placements and voluntary work are four ways to develop your skills and are ways this module fully supports and promotes and that you will have to engage with in order to pass the module. This provides you with the opportunity to develop your knowledge and skills required for a particular job role or across a range of job roles if your placement is split accross more than one organisation or within different departments in the same organisation. You are able to develop skills whilst on the job, providing you with a hands on learning experience. You can also develop your skills by attending specific courses or training which may relate to a particular job role or an aspect required by the job role such as first aid training or a coaching course for example. You may wish to attend conferences where networking can take place with a range of potential employers or people or organisations that can assist you. Reading around particular topic areas you feel you should be more knowledgeable around can also help you with a job role or within interview. Having additional qualifications on your CV can be very attractive for employers, and can demonstrate that you are always willing to learn whilst also providing specific expertise an organisation maybe looking for. Shadowing somebody within a particular field you are interested in entering can provide you with valuable insight to the job role and what it entails, which will not only provide you with industry relevant experience but also may highlight skills gaps you need to fill in order to be successful in that job. Extra-curricular activity such as playing sports, being a member of a society or committee can develop skills such as communication, leadership and teamwork which are key attributes employers look for. Being a member of a professional body such as those discussed in session one can provide you with support in gaining additional qualifications, knowledge and skills via training courses and workshops as well networking events. Sometimes developing skills is about trial and error and perfecting these by practising- this can be supported by work experience or placement.
- Insert Tina’s slide: Employability Skills- Education and Skills Survey SCRIPT: An educational and skills survey carried out by the CBI Voice of British Businesses attempted to identify how satisfied employers were with graduates' employability skills. It is evident from the results that over 50% of employers were satisfied or very satisfied however, it is also evident that there are areas that need to be improved. Even though literacy, numeracy and IT skills are used and developed further within your degree it is evident that employers are still not completely satisfied. The areas that need most improvement are languages, business and customer awareness, cultural awareness and relevant work experience. Time and time again it is evident how important work experience is for your future career. As well as possessing the relevant skills, it is important you are able to evidence that you have these through examples generated from relevant work experience.
- SCRIPT: Trought suggested that a degree allows a graduate to enter the sector, but it is their employability skills that will differentiate them from the crowd and be more likely to secure them a position. It is therefore not enough to simply have a degree certificate. Variation occurs between employers as to what they are looking for in their employees as some jobs require specific skills or competencies. There are however, a range of transferable ‘employability skills’ that have been discussed throughout this session that are commonly requested by graduate employers. You can develop these skills during your work experience, your studies and your extracurricular activities. In a survey conducted by the Confederation of British Industrys’ Education and Skills Survey in 2009, 78% of the firms who responded said that employability skills was one of the most important factors when recruiting graduates, along with a positive attitude (72 per cent) and relevant work experience/industry placement (54 per cent) Therefore from this industry insight into graduate recruitment, the three most important factors that organisations look for in graduates are that they have a high level of employability Skills, possess a Positive attitude and have relevant work experience.
- There are many benefits for an organisation to developing the employability skills of its employees, as well as recruiting staff with already well established employability skills. These benefits to the organisation are listed which are based on the skills for business network employability guide (2008). It can be seen if staff have high employability skills they will be more creative and more dynamic allowing the organisation to manage change and become more competitive. Staff with good employability skills will be more successful at work reducing time off sick, increasing productivity and reducing wastage.
- Reflection is a key part of the learning process and will be an area we will cover further in session 4. By reflecting upon the different situations you have found yourself in or by observing others you can reflect on your own abilities and identify your strengths and weakness. You will be unable to develop the employability skills employers are so keen on looking for if you are unaware of your current skills set. By reflecting on your current abilities with regards your employability skills and by completing measurement tools such as the Skills Audit Worksheet, earlier in this session, you are able to identify your areas of strength and areas for improvement. This constructive reflection can help to form a Personal Development Plan (PDP) that will help you continually develop your personal skills. A PDP is a structured way to think about the employability skills that you need to develop further and also the means by which such development will be achieved and measured. Hind and Moss state that there are many benefits to a PDP. These include it providing you with a clear training programme, tailored to your specific needs, that you will be able to control. It also details clear timescales for you to work to, but also to enable you to measure your progress against.
- This may need to go on Learnzone rather than here?
- In conclusion there a range of employability skills, which are described as a set of social behaviours and skills that you can learn, helping you to work with and interact with others in a range of situations Employability skills are very important for employers and a key element they look for when they are recruiting as well as develpoing within their workforce as an on going process within their organisation Analysing your employability skills is important to establish areas for improvement and for identifying training needs, which can form part of a Personal Development plan The learning process is an on going, active process which requires feedback and reflection on an experience to ensure learning takes place. You may find it useful to visit the websites highlighted on the slide for support in developing your employability skills and personal development plans.