Key points:
- A new survey reveals that many business leaders believe Gen Z grads are unprepared today’s workplace
- Recent college graduates may have a hard time finding employment
- See related article: How to help your students prepare for a career
According to survey results from Intelligent.com, a resource for online degree rankings and higher education planning, 40 percent of business leaders say recent college graduates are ‘very’ or ‘somewhat’ unprepared for the workforce. Among this group, 70 percent say recent college graduates lack preparedness due to their ‘work ethic,’ 70 percent say ‘communication skills,’ 71 percent say ‘entitlement,’ and 43 percent say ‘technological skills.’
Additionally, of the same group of respondents, 88 percent say college graduates from the last three years are less prepared for the workforce than in years prior.
The survey investigates how business leaders perceive recent college graduates and shares insight into why recent college graduates may be unprepared for the workforce. Overall, Intelligent.com researchers collected and analyzed responses from 1,243 business leaders.
“Actually, nobody is prepared for the workplace of 2023,” says Professor of Strategic
Communication at Ithaca College and Principal of Gayeski Analytics Diane Gayeski, Ph.D. “It’s changed dramatically because the digital transformation and hybrid workforce trends that began a decade ago accelerated during the COVID-19 lockdowns, and both methods and attitudes towards work are now vastly different.”
The vast majority (94 percent) of business leaders who feel recent college graduates lack preparedness say they avoid hiring them at times. In fact, 7 percent say they do all the time, and 27 percent say most of the time. Additionally, 40 percent say they sometimes avoid hiring recent grads, while 20 percent say they rarely do. Only 6 percent of business leaders say they never do.
In the past 3 years, 39 percent of business leaders who don’t think recent college graduates are prepared say they’ve fired one. Of this group, 83 percent say they have fired more than one, and 5 percent have fired more than 10.
Survey results also indicate that among business leaders who feel recent graduates lack preparedness, 7 percent say they ‘always’ avoid hiring recent college graduates, 27 percent say ‘most of the time,’ and 40 percent say ‘sometimes.’
Furthermore, 62 percent of these respondents blame ‘culture’ for lack of preparedness, 50 percent say ‘parents,’ 48 percent say the ‘pandemic,’ and 46 percent say ‘educators.’
This press release originally appeared online.
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