» Why is GradStart for Universities needed?

The university perspective

The government, and other organisations, such as The Complete University Guide and The guardian, publish league tables of graduates’ prospects by university. These tables, which are almost too simplistic, nevertheless heavily influence good potential students and their parents, in their choice of university.

A vicious circle sets in: universities languishing in the bottom half of the tables fail to attract good applicants; those that do apply are likely to obtain less good jobs on graduating and take longer to do it. Which means that the universities stay in the bottom half of the tables.

No university wants to be in this position (which usually bears no relation to the quality of the teaching or the academic staff). But it is difficult for some of them to do anything about it, because they do not have the resources nor skills the required.

What is needed is an injection of energy and resources from outside. The GradStart for Universities programme works with undergraduates to help them “raise their game” (see the paper, About GradStart for Universities).

It is a programme based in emotional intelligence and soft skills development.

GradStart creates a context—a ‘facilitating environment’—in which the students are empowered to accelerate their personal development, getting better job offers quicker, and getting through the door of their first full time employer.

A CBI Education and Skills survey [1] found that the four most important factors employers weighed up when recruiting university leavers are:

attitudes and aptitudes to work (89%)
degree subject (68%)
relevant work experience / industrial placement (68%)
degree class (61%).

GradStart explicitly addresses the first and third of these:

improving (in some cases substantially) their engagement with the process of job seeking—this requires working with them on their personal characteristics and personal management skills
developing their skills in applying for jobs, internships and other work experience opportunities—this includes interview skills, written communication skills, in addition to others.

The business perspective

Research says

1 in 4 graduates is likely to leave their first employer within 12 months (CEB [2]).
SMEs (~50%) lag behind large employers (86%) when it comes to employing at least one young person, despite providing 3 out 5 private sector jobs (CIPD [3]).
6 out of 10 (63%) employers are concerned about low levels of skills being the biggest threat to the UK’s competitiveness as a place to employ people (CBI [4]).
In the United Kingdom 83% of employees are not engaged or actively disengaged. This is only slightly better than the worldwide average of 87% (Gallup [5]).

For businesses, that means

In the UK, less than 1 employee in 6 (17%) is engaged at work, and companies with low engagement suffer (Gallup [6]):

poorer customer ratings, which results in lost business because potential customers go to competitors.
reduced profitability, which limits the ability to invest in the future of the business.
decreased productivity, which slows the growth of the company.
higher employee churn, which increases recruitment and staff development costs.
greater absenteeism, which increases the workload of colleagues and create additional organisational challenges for management.

Clearly, if businesses are presented with a selection of motivated, self-reliant graduate applicants, all the problems above are reduced. Of course, if the situation is to be fully improved, businesses have to play their part and that is something which GradStart and its associates are applying themselves to in other initiatives.

[1] The CBI/Pearson: Gateway to Growth—Education and Skills Survey, July 2014 is available here. This subject is addressed further in Delivery of Employability Skills Training—A Discussion Document prepared for Middlesex University, Akonia, 31 July 2014
[2] CEB/SHL Talent Measurement: Hire and Inspire – A new approach to Graduate recruitment 2014 – p4
[3] CIPD: Learning to Work – Survey report March 2015 – p2-3
[4] CBI/Accenture: Growth for Everyone: Employment trends survey 2014 – p7
[5] Gallup: State of the Global Workplace: Employee Engagement Insights for Business Leaders Worldwide 2013 – p91, p117
[6] ibid – p20-22

Related material:
> Helping students get better jobs : GradStart programme overview
> The value of soft skills to the UK economy
> GradStart taster sessions
> GradStart
> Blog: Employability: why are students not engaged?
> Blog: Employability: what stops it?