Asia- Pacific Journal of Cooperative Education Ranking Workplace Competencies: Student and Graduate Perceptions

Students and graduates from a variety of business studies programs at a New Zealand tertiary institution completed a questionnaire in which they ranked the relative importance of a list of 24 competencies for graduates entering the workforce using a 7-point Likert scale. These competencies were identified from literature reports of the characteristics of superior performers in the workplace. The results show a close similarity between students and graduates ’ ranking of competencies with computer literacy, customer service orientation, teamwork and co-operation, self-confidence, and willingness to learn ranked most important. There was little difference between the two groups in their rankings of cognitive or ‘hard ’ skills and behavioral or ‘soft ’ skills. However, the graduates placed greater importance on most of the competencies, resulting in a statistically significant difference between the graduates and students ’ ranking of both hard and soft skills. The findings from this study suggest that cooperative education programs may help develop business students ’ awareness of th