隨著社會的快速發展，企業之間的競爭也越來越激烈，雇主們對畢業生的需求不僅僅是關注學歷，更關注的是他們的就業能力。為了在激烈的競爭中贏得競爭對手，雇主希望擁有廣泛技能的畢業生將工作環境帶入其中，并需要有多種技能的員工來履行許多不同的角色。因此，進入職場的畢業生必須具備雇主所需要的技能。
為了使我們在未來的就業市場中更具競爭力，首先要了解雇主對畢業生的就業技能，然后根據就業能力，進行個人SWOT分析，制定改善自己的行動計劃。

 

Introduction 簡介

 

With the rapid development of society, the competitions between companies are also increasing, what the employers want for the graduates are not only focus on the degree but pay more attention to their employability skills. In order to win their competitors in the fierce competition, employers want graduates who have a wide range of skills to bring to the work environment and need the employees with multi-skilled to fulfil many different roles. （Foster, 1998, p.4）. So graduates who coming into the workforce must have the skills needed by employers.

 

With the purpose of making ourselves become more competitive in the future job market first we should find out what the employability skills the employer want for graduates, then according to the employability skills do the personal SWOT analysis and make an action plan to improve ourselves.

 

Discussion of employability skills

 

What skills do employers want

 

'Employability skills are defined as skills required not only to gain employment, but also to progress within an enterprise so as to achieve one's potential and contribute successfully to enterprise strategic directions.' (DEST 2002a)

 

Today, despite the degree, companies are paying more attention to the employability skills of the graduates, but there is no uniform standard of employability skills. What employability skills the graduates should have are depend on company's actual operating conditions and different companies have different standards. Through a wide range of literature research, the result of what the employability skills needed by companies are almost the same, and can be roughly divided into the following eight basic skills: Communication skills, Teamwork skills, Problem solving skills , Self management skills, Planning and organizing skills, Technology skills, Life-long learning skills and Initiative and enterprise skills. (MONASH, nd)

 

Why do companies want these skills?

 

Communication skills

 

"The CIPD's views are based on the latest CIPD/KPMG quarterly Labor Market Outlook, a survey of over 1,400 UK employers, the key attributes employers look for in school leaver recruits are communication skills (40% of employers rank this in their top three required attributes), work ethic (39%) and personality (32%)." (CIPD,2006) .Communication happens all the time in the workplace, having effective communication skills can make us have a good relationship with colleagues and superiors ,thus can create a good working environment and help us complete the work more efficiently. What's more , have good communication skills not only can make the existing customers become more satisfy with the products and services provided by our company but also can attract more clients cooperate with us .#p#分頁標題#e#

 

Teamwork skills

 

In Today's society, only have the individual working ability is not enough, more and more works need a group of people to complete together .Work in groups can speed up the progress of work and also through brainstorming to create a better idea of the company

 

Problem solving skills

 

In this competitive world, companies will faced various problems at any time, solving the problem successfully enable the company ride out the storm or it will fail.

 

Self-management skills

 

'Companies also need graduates have self-management skills to complete the work alone or almost alone, without the need for someone to stand over the employees constantly and tell them want to do.'（Foster, 1998, p.14）.

 

Planning and organizing skills

 

Employers need graduates to make plans and organize the limited sources to achieve both short and long-term goals of company.

 

Technology skills

 

In the technological age, technology skills become increasingly important, company need employees use computers and telecommunications systems proficiency, understanding current trends and gathering information to predict the company's operating condition through technology.

 

Life-long learning skills

 

In order to make the company development sustainably, only require employee continuous learning can let the company keep pace with this rapid-developing society, and employees who have the life-long learning skills can also bring benefits to the company.

 

Initiative and enterprise skills

 

Employees recruited by the company are all with multi-skilled, the company may frequent transfer their employees to different departments and to take different roles within a company. (Heather and Peter, 2006, p.2) .So this require the employee have the initiative and enterprise skills to adjust themselves easily to new situations and can take the job quickly.

 

Personal SWOT Analysis

 

After identify the employability skills that needed by companies, I make a personal SWOT analysis based on actual experience and self assessment test through the internet.

 

Strengths :

 

I have good team work and organizing skills. According to the results of my self assessment test, I have a great mark in humanistic-encouraging and affiliative. (See Appendix 1) In the group work I can build on ideas with other members and as team leader I usually will make plans to allocate tasks to the group members to make sure everyone enjoys the tasks they are assigned to.#p#分頁標題#e#

 

I am good at Self management. I can management my time well and get thing done without being pushed. Usually I will write down the things what I need to do and sort them out according to the importance and the time sequence. After that I will write them to the calendar so that I can know clearly what and when should I do next

 

I do well in learning. I willing to put in time and effort to learn new skills. As a student, beside the major I also join the free English class and the Assessment Centres mini module to improve myself.

 

I have technology skills. I am not only having the basic computer skills but also can use specialised software packages. Since I have learned the business decision modelling in my first year and now I also learning the applied management and decision modelling, all of them need to use the specialised software packages so I learned how to use them in the course.

 

Weaknesses

 

I have no employment experience, even the part-time job experience.

 

I am weak in problem solving; when I face problems usually I can not see all sides of them and can not provide good solution of them.

 

My Communication skills are weak. I am an introvert (Result in appendix ) and I am not good at communicate with others .I feel shy when I talking to strangers.

 

Opportunities

 

I can find a part-time job through the "future" of our school to learn new skills to enhance my CV.

 

I am more employable than others if I get work experience in UK. 65% of international employers indicate that they are more willing to employ graduates with overseas work experience. (Archer and Davison, 2008.).

 

I have an opportunity to get a good job if I return to China after I graduate. 'China is widely expected to become the world's largest human capital market in the future, requiring an explosive number of talented professionals. Companies seeking to hire Mainland Chinese returnees: born and raised in China, studied/worked in the U.S. or Europe and then returned to China. They offer international experience, plus language and cultural skills but are in short supply' (Davy, Lau).

 

I can enjoy a variety of preferential policies for overseas student which provided by the Chinese government if I back to China.

 

Threats

 

In recent years, "explosive" growth trends of Chinese overseas students choose to return home which will increase the competition of getting jobs in China.

 

Employment pressure both in China and UK. 'Not only Chinese graduates for job-hunting with anxiety, graduates of British also face the same problem. The jobs shortage was blamed on a "substantial backlog" in the number of jobless graduates from previous years - creating additional pressure on the employment market in 2010.' (Articlesbase, 2010).#p#分頁標題#e#

 

Personal Action Plan

 

After I finished the personal SWOT analysis, according to my own situation I make an action plan base on SMART

 

Skill to be improved

 

Specific Actions

 

Measure

 

Target date

 

Communication skills:

 

Participating in the activities that organized by school community orinvolvingin the school communitydirectly.

 

Make a lot of friends.

 

Take the initiative in making acquaintances.

 

Do not feel nervous when talking to strangers

 

Next month

 

Take the mini module about communication that provided by the "future" in our school

 

Presenting and participating in class discussions

 

Semester 2

 

Through the IELTStestto improve my English speaking, writing, reading and listening skills.

 

Take the IELTS test

 

Christmas

 

holidays

 

Problem solving skills

 

Apply for the volunteer opportunities provide by the "future"Helping people solve problem while improving my problem solving skills.

 

Become a volunteer

 

Semester 2

 

Analysis the requirements of school assignments

 

Meet the assignment requirements of teachers

 

Deadline of

 

assignments

 

Initiative and enterprise skills

 

Find part-time jobs in our school or become a volunteer

 

Get part-time jobs, become a volunteer

 

Semester 2

 

Become a trainee of a company

 

for 1-2week

 

Work in a company as a trainee

 

Christmas holidays

 

Teamwork skills

 

Working on group assignments

 

Do the Group work assignments

 

Deadline of group

 

assignments

 

Planning and organisation skills

 

Arranging study and daily lives at university

 

Make plans everyday and do thing according to plans#p#分頁標題#e#

 

Everyday

 

Self-management skills

 

Summing upthe

 

gaps in skills and knowledge

 

Doself-reflection whenteachers give assignment feedback

 

At the end of semester 1

 

Learning skills

 

Learning new skills that needed by employers

 

Attend courses and finish courses

 

Semester 2

 

Technology skills

 

Learn something about Photoshop or database.

 

Participatethe relevant courses

 

During semester 2

 

Conclusion 結論

 

There is no doubt that employees who having a good degree will gain an excellent starting point, since a good degree helps employees open the door of finding a job, however, a degree alone is not enough, employers want much more from their graduate employees, they want employees can bring benefits to the company and let the company in an invincible position during the fierce competition. Through extensive research I summed up eight kinds of employability skills that most needed by companies. And I made a personal SWOT analysis based on employability skills and self assessment test through the internet and actual experience which made me become more aware of myself. After that I made an action plan for myself. I'll stick to the plan and I hope that it would help me improve my employability skills after I finish it .And get a good job in the competitive job market after I graduate.