Competencies gap between education and employability stakes

This paper sets out to report on the study that assessed the gap between the competencies perceived to have learnt through hospitality graduate studies against what the graduates really possess when they begin their career in the industry. This study adopted one of the employability skill models proposed by the Australian Training Authority (2003) with nine generic competency groups and 52 descriptions of skills. The data was collected through a sample survey of 125 fresh hospitality undergraduates both from private institutions and public universities and 50 Malaysian hospitality managers. The findings show a lower ranking by managers for 3 skill clusters out of 9 and 25 skill descriptors out of 52 than that of the graduates. These findings are good indicators of the gap between education and employability stakes. This study was limited by the poor response rate from the industry. The study also did not evaluate the level of the relevance of the skill descriptors rated low by the industrialists. Further study can be carried out in evaluating the level of relevance of the descriptors for entry level managers in the hospitality industry. Most of the previous studies emphasized on the comparison between expectations and perceptions regarding the competencies and many of these studies were carried out in the United States of America, United Kingdom and a few in Australia. However, this study was carried out in Malaysia where graduate studies in Hospitality and Tourism are gaining popularity. This study also rated and compared the competency levels of the graduates through their self evaluation and from the point of view of the industry