This document proposes a new approach for universities to enhance PhD, MSc, and other post-graduate students' employment prospects. It suggests that business schools embed more distinct job role skills development into their programs. Students would choose a job role to focus on, develop an employment strategy with a career coach, and acquire the core job skills, relationships, certifications, work experience, and mentoring needed for that role. This would help students secure employment and improve the university's rankings, reputation, enrollment, income and graduates' satisfaction. Examples of job roles and their required hard skills are provided, such as research analyst, project manager, business analyst, and data analyst roles.

1. A
Proposed Programme for Drastically Enhancing the
Employment Prospects of PhD, MSc & Other Candidates
through a New Approach to Learning ‘Hard Skills’ of
Distinct Job Roles
▪ Know what is likely missing in 70% of Business School’s Training of PG & UG (THE PROBLEM!)
▪ Know the Current Realities of PG (PhD & Master’s) Un(der)employment Situation (REALITIES & STATISTICS)
▪ Learn How Doing Something Different Would BENEFIT the School; What More Business Schools Can Start Doing to
Remedy This Situation (THE PROPOSAL); & How I can Contribute to Solving the PG un(der)employment Challenge
Ita John, PhD Int’l Business & Entrepreneurship Development
https://www.linkedin.com/in/itajohn-employability-uk/

2. THE PROBLEM
► Observed Insufficient Preparation of PG
students for the ‘Hard Skills’ in Specific
Job Roles Needed in Today’s Extremely
Competitive Job Market
► Inability of Business Schools/Faculties to
Achieve Ideally a 100% PG Employability
Rate

3. REALITIES & STATISTICS
http://www.universitiesuk.ac.uk/facts-and-stats/data-and-analysis/Documents/facts-and-figures-2016.pdf
My comment: low official Stats CAN
HIDE REALITIES & fail to capture
what exactly happens for most people
1-9 months after graduation─ where
most PGs are job searching!
Statisticians most likely meet people
when they had gotten jobs!

4. Comparable Statistics- USA

5. Comparable Statistics 2- USA

6. Comparable Statistics 3- USA

7. UK (Post)Graduate un(der)employment is REAL & Huge!
Source: Labour Force Survey - Office for National Statistics
“Nearly half of employed recent graduates were working in a non-graduate role” ─receptionists, sales
assistants, many types of factory workers, care workers and home carers, etc. Professors Peter Elias and Kate
Purcell of the University of Warwick
https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/employmentandemployeetypes/articles/graduatesintheuklabourmarket/2013-11-
19

8. Likely BENEFITS to the University for using the
Proposed Employability Enhancement Strategy
Increase in
► PG Employability to Circa 100%
► University’s Ranking on PG Employability
► Graduates’ Satisfaction
► University’s Reputation Resulting from Above Achievements
► Rate of Recommendations to Friends & Family
► Enrolment
► University’s Income

9. THE PROPOSAL (the new strategy)
Universities and business faculties should embed more
distinct job role skills development initiatives, projects and
experiences into their courses in more effective ways:
The proposal in detail
► N/B: Doctoral students’ research topics in the business
faculty rarely relate perfectly to their future distinct job
role. Therefore, far more useful for the ‘world of work’
would be training, in addition to the PhD, in the ‘hard skills’
needed in the distinct job role of the candidate’s envisaged
field of employment
Contd.

10. The Proposal in detail (contd.)
► Within six months of starting their course, students should
be encouraged to choose from a maximum of three distinct
fields of real-world job roles initially but work to focus on one.
► Students would then work with a career coach to develop
effective employment strategies. Identifying and working on
these strategies alongside their academic studies would alleviate
the stress and pressure of delaying until after graduation.
These strategies would include
a. Identifying the ‘core job skills’ of each distinctive job role.
(I have already researched and identified numerous such roles and
skills - see appendix below for a few examples)
b. How to acquire those skills

11. The Proposal in detail (contd.)
c. Most importantly, how to build RELATIONSHIP
that will yield job referrals
c. How to acquire PROFESSIONAL CERTIFICATION to
confer further legitimacy
d. How to get WORK EXPERIENCE in the chosen job role
e. Throughout the doctoral (or any other programmes)
MONITORING candidates’ employability progress
based on the individual’s career strategy determined
earlier with the coach

12. The Proposal in detail (contd.)
f. MENTORING the doctoral, master’s (and other graduates involved)
until employment is secured – i.e.,
✓assisting with innovative CVs (i.e., every bullet point
drafted based on Transferable skills Technical
experience Quantified results concept); sound covering
letters, LinkedIn best job finding tips, & sample emails
on building ‘job referral’ relationships
✓exposing to best job boards
✓tips on getting accepted by companies for relevant part-
time work experience to build CV as in above
✓coaching on interview techniques
✓information sharing
✓peer-to-peer networking

13. Appendix-suggested ‘hard skills’-choose 1!
► Research analyst, or market research analyst roles- and choosing to focus
on either equity, credit risk, investment banking, energy/utilities, real estates, or
fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) research analyst role, etc.
► Project management skills- to focus as PMO, RAD, Resource analyst, with
Prince 2 certifications
► Business analysis skills – to focus as a tester, change analyst, reporting
analyst, with British Computer Society (BCS) certifications
► Lean and agile management skills
► International Financial Reporting Standards skills (IFRS) - for accountants,
AAT, ACCA, CPA, CIMA, and Chartered Financial Analyst certifications (CFA III).
Contd.

14. Appendix- suggested ‘hard skills’ (contd.)
► Risk and credit management skills - with FRM (Financial Risk
Manager), CAIA (Chartered Alternative Investment Analyst), IMC
(Investment Management Certificate) certifications
► Sales and marketing - (Customer Relationship Management
CRM, CIM, with Market Research Society certifications)
► *Data analyst roles- I.T skills such as SPSS, Python and R
programming languages for data analysis, SQL (structured
query language), Excel (Visual basics applications VBA, Macros,
Vlookup, Conditional Formatting, Simulations, Pivot Tables, and
Dashboards), Tableau, QlikView, Visio, etc.
Thank You!