A recent survey conducted by Career Advisory & Assessment Service has showed that 76.61% of employers in Pakistan are unhappy with caliber level of university graduates with respect to industry requirements. While another 94.74% of employers reckon that lack of advisory facilities in universities lead to the point where students opt for subjects that do not match their personalities. More than 70% employers do not consider grades as an evaluation criteria, 79% of employers prefer the personal development and 74% are craved for better soft skills of candidates. Now what these stats are showing? Misery of our education system where only rate racers of getting degrees exist. Or industrial talent acquisition programs are not suitable in Pakistan. There are many reasons backing up this situation.
The lead driver for the situation is absence or weak linkage/cooperation between academia & industry. As Universities are just getting focus on number of graduates passing out without considering the market situation and industry analysis. And offering the programs that are not complying with industry requirement. Meanwhile industries are just demanding the certain level of capabilities without deeming the level of education, learning facilities and career guidance services in universities. The ultimate result leads to increased unemployment rate and depression in society. As here universities are enrolling on bulk in Business Administration segment without knowing past business graduates are still jobless or doing low-level jobs because market has been saturated.
The syllabus of subjects is also a reason for this collapse. Outdated contents or foreign techniques of practicing created the conflicts in coping up with local needs. As business graduates are being studied the ways of doing business that had practiced in North America and Europe in 20th century. Graduates just know how Kentucky Fried Chicken’s Colonel Sanders developed his old age yearning into real business empire in fast food industry but even didn’t hear the name of Hakim Muhammad Saeed and his project City of Wisdom (Madina-tul-Hikmat) during their studies. Their projects cover the Aramco & British Petroleum but rarely headed towards PSO & Attock Petroleum.
Local information for their concern subjects is scarce and teachers also unaware of that. With the subject contents defects, the teaching methods, pedagogy and grades evaluation criteria are not effective too. Lads don’t know how to convey their message to companies, in form of Resumes, interviews etc., even after getting their degrees. And guidance for career path is totally missing in universities. Advisory councils are rare and if present ineffective in most universities. This time urges us to reshape the system that delivers fruitful results for academics and industries both.
It is necessary to forge a plate form that combines the industry and university on same point where both heed to each other’s needs and manifesto. University should manage the office for industrial linkage and take feedback from them. Alumni of universities are also best source of feedback and real informer of industry. Their response can help academia to develop the strategies for future programs.
At the time of admission, Students should be advised for peculiar subjects which they excelled previously and yearn to move on. And after passing out, post-degree situations of each student should consider. Similarly, industrial manager should visit and deliver the lectures on job exposure and know-how of environment outside university. Talent acquisitions teams and faculty members should arrange the meetings on monthly basis to share their working for better output. Ultimately, the cooperation of theory and practice is main key to success. Therefore all efforts should be assert to make result-oriented collaboration by all stake holders.
