Longitudinal research on graduates transitions to the labour market (Holden and Hamblett, 2007; Nabi et al., 2010) also illustrates that graduates initial experiences of the labour market can confirm or disrupt emerging work-related identities. Consensus theory is a social theory that holds a particular political or economic system as a fair system, and that social change should take place within the social institutions provided by it .Consensus theory contrasts sharply with conflict theory, which holds that social change is only achieved through conflict.. They construct their individual employability in a relative and subjective manner. Conflict theory in sociology. The consensus theory is based o n the propositions that technological innovation is the driving force of so cial change. Hassard, J., McCann, L. and Morris, J.L. Employability skills are sometimes called foundational skills or job-readiness skills. 2.2.2 Consensus Theory of Employability The consensus view of employability is rooted in a particular world-view which resonates with many of the core tenets of neo-liberalism. For such students, future careers were potentially a significant source of personal meaning, providing a platform from which they could find fulfilment, self-expression and a credible adult identity. Employment in Academia: To What Extent Are Recent Doctoral Graduates of Various Fields of Study Obtaining Permanent Versus Temporary Academic Jobs in Canada? The consensus theory of employment argues that technological innovation is the driving force of social change (Drucker, 1993, Kerr, 1973). This has illustrated the strong labour market contingency to graduates employability and overall labour market outcomes, based largely on how national labour markets coordinate the qualifications and skills of highly qualified labour. Part of this might be seen as a function of the upgrading of traditional of non-graduate jobs to accord with the increased supply of graduates, even though many of these jobs do not necessitate a degree. Purpose. (2010) Overqualifcation, job satisfaction, and increasing dispersion in the returns to graduate education, Oxford Economic Papers 62 (4): 740763. Policy responses have tended to be supply-side focused, emphasising the role of HEIs for better equipping graduates for the challenges of the labour market. Various analysis of graduate returns (Brown and Hesketh, 2004; Green and Zhu, 2010) have highlighted the significant disparities that exist among graduates; in particular, some marked differences between the highest graduate earners and the rest. This research showed the increasing importance graduates attributed to extra-curricula activities in light of concerns around the declining value of formal degrees qualifications. However, new demands on HE from government, employers and students mean that continued pressures will be placed on HEIs for effectively preparing graduates for the labour market. Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative, Over 10 million scientific documents at your fingertips, Not logged in As Brown et al. Consensus Theory. Graduates are perceived as potential key players in the drive towards enhancing value-added products and services in an economy demanding stronger skill-sets and advanced technical knowledge. This insight, combined with a growing consensus that government should try to stabilize employment, has led to much This is perhaps further reflected in the degree of qualification-based and skills mismatches, often referred to as vertical mismatches. A more specific set of issues have arisen concerning the types of individuals organisations want to recruit, and the extent to which HEIs can serve to produce them. Such strategies typically involve the accruement of additional forms of credentials and capitals that can be converted into economic gain. Employability skills include the soft skills that allow you to work well with others, apply knowledge to solve problems, and to fit into any work environment. Kupfer, A. Problematising the notion of graduate skill is beyond the scope of this paper, and has been discussed extensively elsewhere (Holmes, 2001; Hinchliffe and Jolly, 2011). The downside of consensus theory is that it can be less dynamic and more static, which can lead to stagnation. Barrie, S. (2006) Understanding what we mean by generic attributes of graduates, Higher Education 51 (2): 215241. Brooks, R. and Everett, G. (2009) Post-graduate reflections on the value of a degree, British Educational Research Journal 35 (3): 333349. The consensus theory of employment and the conflict theory of employment present contradictory implications about highly skilled workers' opportunity cost for pursuing entrepreneurial activities in the knowledge economy. Keynesian economics was developed by the British economist John Maynard Keynes . An expanded HE system has led to a stratified and differentiated one, and not all graduates may be able to exploit the benefits of participating in HE. Employment relations is the study of the regulation of the employment relationship between employer and employee, both collectively and individually, and the determination . Further research has also pointed to experiences of graduate underemployment (Mason, 2002; Chevalier and Lindley, 2009).This research has revealed that a growing proportion of graduates are undertaking forms of employment that are not commensurate to their level of education and skills. This is likely to be carried through into the labour market and further mediated by graduates ongoing experiences and interactions post-university. Much of the graduate employability focus has been on supply-side responses towards enhancing graduates' skills for the labour market. Research into university graduates perceptions of the labour market illustrates that they are increasingly adopting individualised discourses (Moreau and Leathwood, 2006; Tomlinson, 2007; Taylor and Pick, 2008) around their future employment. They also include the professional skills that enable you to be successful in the workplace. In contrast to conflict theories, consensus theories are those that see people in society as having shared interests and society functioning on the basis of there being broad consensus on its norms and values. This is further reflected in pay difference and breadth of career opportunities open to different genders. While mass HE potentially opens up opportunities for non-traditional graduates, new forms of cultural reproduction and social closure continue to empower some graduates more readily than others (Scott, 2005). Individual employability is defined as alumnus being able . These concerns may further feed into students approaches to HE more generally, increasingly characterised by more instrumental, consumer-driven and acquisitive learning approaches (Naidoo and Jamieson, 2005). Problematising the notion of graduate skill is beyond the scope of this paper, and has been discussed extensively elsewhere (Holmes, 2001; Hinchliffe and Jolly, 2011).Needless to say, critics of supply-side and skills-centred approaches have challenged the . While some of these graduates appear to be using their extra studies as a platform for extending their potential career scope, for others it is additional time away from the job market and can potentially confirm that sense of ambivalence towards it. Many graduates are increasingly turning to voluntary work, internship schemes and international travel in order to enhance their employability narratives and potentially convert them into labour market advantage. This paper reviews some of the key empirical and conceptual themes in the area of graduate employability over the past decade in order to make sense of graduate employability as a policy issue. Yet research has raised questions over employers overall effectiveness in marshalling graduates skills in the labour market (Brown and Hesketh, 2004; Morley and Aynsley, 2007). Elias and Purcell's (2004) research has reported positive overall labour market outcomes in graduates early career trajectories 7 years on from graduation: in the main graduates manage to secure paid employment and enjoy comparatively higher earning than non-graduates. research investigating employability from the employers' perspective has been qualitative in nature. Research by both Furlong and Cartmel (2005) and Power and Whitty (2006) shows strong evidence of socio-economic influences on graduate returns, with graduates relative HE experiences often mediating the link between their origins and their destinations. Collins, R. (2000) Comparative and Historical Patterns of Education, in M. Hallinan (ed.) Consensus theories include functionalism, strain theory and subcultural theory. The extent to which future work forms a significant part of their future life goals is likely to determine how they approach the labour market, as well as their own future employability. Hesketh, A.J. The concerns that have been well documented within the non-graduate youth labour market (Roberts, 2009) are also clearly resonating with the highly qualified. What has perhaps been characteristic of more recent policy discourses has been the strong emphasis on harnessing HE's activities to meet changing economic demands. Needless to say, critics of supply-side and skills-centred approaches have challenged the somewhat simplistic, descriptive and under-contextualised accounts of graduate skills. Purpose. Using Bourdieusian concepts of capital and field to outline the changing dynamic between HE and the labour market, Kupfer (2011) highlights the continued preponderance of structural and cultural inequalities through the existence of layered HE and labour market structures, operating in differentiated fields of power and resources. The problem has been largely attributable to universities focusing too rigidly on academically orientated provision and pedagogy, and not enough on applied learning and functional skills. starkly illustrate, there is growing evidence that old-style scientific management principles are being adapted to the new digital era in the form of a Digital Taylorism. (1999) Higher education policy and the world of work: Changing conditions and challenges, Higher Education Policy 12 (4): 285312. Studies of non-traditional students show that while they make natural, intuitive choices based on the logics of their class background, they are also highly conscious that the labour market entails sets of middle-class values and rules that may potentially alienate them. 2.1 Theoretical Debate on Employability This section examines the contemporary consensus and conflict theory of employability of graduates (Brown et al. While in the main graduates command higher wages and are able to access wider labour market opportunities, the picture is a complex and variable one and reflects marked differences among graduates in their labour market returns and experiences. The differentiated and heterogeneous labour market that graduates enter means that there is likely to be little uniformity in the way students constructs employability, notionally and personally. The changing HEeconomy dynamic feeds into a range of further significant issues, not least those relating to equity and access in the labour market. Consensus v. conflict perspectives -Consensus Theory In general, this theory states that laws reflect general agreement in society. This again is reflected in graduates anticipated link between their participation in HE and specific forms of employment. French sociologist and criminologist Emile . The relationship between HE and the labour market has traditionally been a closely corresponding one, although in sometimes loose and intangible ways (Brennan et al., 1996; Johnston, 2003). Ideally, graduates would be able to possess both the hard currencies in the form of traditional academic qualifications together with soft currencies in the form of cultural and interpersonal qualities. The construction of personal employability does not stop at graduation: graduates appear aware of the need for continued lifelong learning and professional development throughout the different phases of their career progression. and David, M. (2006) Degree of Choice: Class, Gender and Race in Higher Education, Stoke: Trentham Books. Smart, S., Hutchings, M., Maylor, U., Mendick, H. and Menter, I. For Beck and Beck-Germsheim (2002), processes of institutionalised individualisation mean that the labour market effectively becomes a motor for individualisation, in that responsibility for economic outcomes is transferred away from work organisations and onto individuals. Purists, believing that their employability is largely constitutive of their meritocratic achievements, still largely equate their employability with traditional hard currencies, and are therefore not so adept at responding to signals from employers. This should be ultimately responsive to the different ways in which students themselves personally construct such attributes and their integration within, rather than separation from, disciplinary knowledge and practices. The purpose of this paper is to adopt the perspective of personal construct theory to conceptualise employability. 's (2005) research showed similar patterns among UK Masters students who, as delayed entrants to the labour market and investors in further human capital, possess a range of different approaches to their future career progression. The Wall Street Journal reported Sunday that the department had reached a "low confidence" conclusion supporting the so-called lab leak theory in a classified finding shared with the White . Even those students with strong intrinsic orientations around extra-curricula activities are aware of the need to translate these into marketable, value-added skills. Individuals therefore need to proactively manage these risks (Beck and Beck-Gernsheim, 2002). Perhaps more positively, there is evidence that employers place value on a wider range of softer skills, including graduates values, social awareness and generic intellectuality dispositions that can be nurtured within HE and further developed in the workplace (Hinchliffe and Jolly, 2011). Thus, a significant feature of research over the past decade has been the ways in which these changes have entered the collective and personal consciousnesses of students and graduates leaving HE. (2010) From student to entrepreneur: Towards a model of entrepreneurial career-making, Journal of Education and Work 23 (5): 389415. By reductio ad absurdum, Keynes demonstrates that the predictions of Classical theory do not accord with the observed response of workers to changes in real wages. Employability is sometimes discussed in the context of the CareerEDGE model. For graduates, the inflation of HE qualifications has resulted in a gradual downturn in their value: UK graduates are aware of competing in relative terms for sought-after jobs, and with increasing employer demands. Over time, however, this traditional link between HE and the labour market has been ruptured. The purpose of this article is to show that the way employability is typically defined in official statements is seriously flawed because it ignores what will be called the 'duality of employability'. Reducing the system/structure down to the graduate labour market, there are parallels between Archer's work and consensus theory (Brown et al. Functionalism is a structural theory and posits that the social institutions and organization of society . Non-traditional graduates or new recruits to the middle classes may be less skilled at reading the changing demands of employers (Savage, 2003; Reay et al., 2006). Questions continued to be posed over the specific role of HE in regulating skilled labour, and the overall matching of the supply of graduates leaving HE to their actual economic demand and utility (Bowers-Brown and Harvey, 2004). Hammer, Peter McIlveen, Soo Jeung Lee, Seungjung Kim & Jisun Jung, Higher Education Policy Smart et al. Yet at a time when stakes within the labour market have risen, graduates are likely to demand that this link becomes a more tangible one. This will largely shape how graduates perceive the linkage between their higher educational qualification and their future returns. The expansion of HE and changing economic demands is seen to engender new forms of social conflict and class-related tensions in the pursuit for rewarding and well-paid employment. The study explores differences in the implicit employability theories of those involved in developing employability (educators) and those selecting and recruiting higher education (HE) students and graduates (employers). In such labour market contexts, HE regulates more clearly graduates access to particular occupations. The neo-Weberian theorising of Collins (2000) has been influential here, particularly in examining the ways in which dominant social groups attempt to monopolise access to desired economic goods, including the best jobs. Employability. A consensus theory approach sees sport as a source of collective harmony, a way of binding people together in a shared experience. Accordingly, there has been considerable government faith in the role of HE in meeting new economic imperatives. Little, B. Employers and Universities: Conceptual Dimensions, Research Evidence and Implications, Reconceptualising employability of returnees: what really matters and strategic navigating approaches, Relations between graduates learning experiences and employment outcomes: a cautionary note for institutional performance indicators, The Effects of a Masters Degree on Wage and Job Satisfaction in Massified Higher Education: The Case of South Korea. (eds.) 'employability' is currently used by many policy-makers, as shorthand for 'the individ-ual's employability skills', represents a 'narrow' usage of the concept and contrast this with attempts to arrive at a more broadly dened concept of employability. Maria Eliophotou Menon, Eleftheria Argyropoulou & Andreas Stylianou, Ly Thi Tran, Nga Thi Hang Ngo, Tien Thi Hanh Ho, David Walters, David Zarifa & Brittany Etmanski, Jason L. Brown, Sara J. Much of this is driven by a concern to stand apart from the wider graduate crowd and to add value to their existing graduate credentials. Increasingly, graduates employability needs to be embodied through their so-called personal capital, entailing the integration of academic abilities with personal, interpersonal and behavioural attributes. Players are adept at responding to such competition, embarking upon strategies that will enable them to acquire and present the types of employability narratives that employers demand. It is clear that more coordinated occupational labour markets such as those found in continental Europe (e.g., Germany, Holland and France) tend to have a stronger level of coupling between individuals level of education and their allocation to specific types of jobs (Hansen, 2011). 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