 Why our graduates are poor
performers in job market
by Vincent Obiro Orute
We are an educated continent, yes. Our universities are
churning out graduates faster than our municipal councils can collect garbage.
We are flooded with hopeful youth flashing their degree certificates. But, why
then are employers having difficulties in identifying the right candidates?
Recruitment in this continent has become a needle in haystack project.
Considering the number of desperate graduates who are ready to do "any kind of
job" the situation is akin to the saying "Water, water everywhere, and not a
drop to drink."
Academia versus the business world I wonder how often the
university curriculum developers and the lecturers meet with corporate
enterprises to agree on market requirements. How many of these very educated
lecturers have hands on experience in running companies? Is there a rule that
separates the academic world from the business world? Today, many of our fresh
university graduates have a lot of knowledge that is not immediately applicable
in a real life situation.
Most prospective employers assume that the degree certificate
is evidence that you can learn fast and that the candidate has the intellectual
ability to cope with the job. They do not necessarily want the fresh graduate to
run the show immediately. They want them to learn. For a general management
trainee job, they will interview the engineering as well as the business
graduate.
However, many employers have been faced with the situation
where the student has done well reproducing what has been taught. They are
specialists at role learning. Many employers have also been disappointed to find
out that their best candidate has difficulties learning at work for lack of
spoon feeding. The learning game is different in today’s corporate world. They
show you A while you are performing A, then they expect you to apply those
principles to B through Z.
The graduates English, both spoken and written, deteriorates
by the day. You have to ask three questions for every statement they make just
to understand what they are talking about. And even then, it seems our graduates
are trained not to answer questions.
As for writing skills, pass me the antacid. How are you going
to work together if you can’t communicate in clear English?
What about communication with clients. Many managers have
wished the ground would open up and swallow them when their star management
trainee uses unacceptable slang with their top client. Managers have to make the
time to edit and rewrite all communications to clients.
Today, our management trainees are so poor when it comes to
communicating to clients to an extent that no prospective employer would want to
offer them a job.
In an education system like ours, where most students drop
Science subjects at an early age, you end up graduating as a specialist in one
area and be clueless in other important areas.
Today, employers are looking for multi-skilled people and not
specialists. They want Accountants who are also good at Computers and have some
knowledge of human resource management. They want self sufficient people who do
not wait for other functional departments to provide detailed information, but
are able to ask the right questions so as to get the information they need.
Organizations that matter are looking for employees who have a
give and take mentality -employees who have thought through their personal goals
and can match them to the company’s strategies. Gone are the days when companies
took care of employees. Today, they take care of each other. This means that
they take the trouble to understand the joys and the pains each is undergoing.
Many candidates have the mentality that if they work very hard
to complete instructions given, they are model employees. Employers are looking
for more than that.
They are looking for self starters. They are looking for
creative and innovative employees with entrepreneurial minds.
Would it not be interesting if university lecturers did
internships with the same companies that their students apply to for jobs? Would
it not be interesting to see if their theory works better than their end
products?.
Perhaps it is time that our corporate enterprises formed a
university after university. After all, a lot of time and money is being spent
on recruitment and retraining. The candidate who makes it must be able to learn.
Better still, they should have superior ability to unlearn old ways and replace
them with new ones.
The learning curve is steep and employers are in a hurry to
see results.
Vincent Obiro Orute is a Seasoned banker and Micro-finance
Expert.
Email:
orutev@yahoo.com
| 
