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The purpose of this paper is to examine the employability of international branch campus (IBC) students and graduates in Malaysia, including their possession of transnational skills and knowledge, and the role of IBC educational characteristics in improving such employability.

A combination of employer interviews (n=21) and a survey of Malaysian students (n=246) enrolled at four IBCs are used in this study. Thematic and matrix analyses were applied to the interviews and multivariate analysis to the survey responses.

IBC graduates are well-equipped with the skills and attributes that employers find most important, in particular, soft skills and personal attributes. The development of these employability attributes is related to IBC educational characteristics and international exposure on campus – with important heterogeneity among IBCs and curricula. However, IBC education does not strongly improve the transnational human capital of Malaysian students and is only a partial substitute for education abroad in this respect.

This paper is one of the few studies that examine the employability of students that graduate from IBC universities, a type of education that has received only limited scholarly attention. It also broadens the scope of the debate on the relation between international experience and employability by examining whether receiving an IBC education in one’s home country can lead to the development of transnational human capital. Finally, it provides new insights on the returns to (higher) education by directly measuring students’ acquisition of skills and examining the role educational characteristics play in this.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationships of service marketing mix (SMM) as service input and service output in terms of students’ performance, satisfaction and referral act in context to higher and technical education (HTE) through the application of structural equation modeling.

A quantitative research, conducted through a self-administered survey composed by a closed-ended structured questionnaire, was incorporated for the students who were enrolled in the technical educational institutions situated in the Khandesh region of India.

The findings of this study revealed that traditional SMM is statistically linked with the performance of students in terms of skill and knowledge enhancement, satisfaction and referral act of students, which are perceptible new emerging SMM; performance, pleasure and pointing out in terms of service output.

Integrating SMM as service input and service output are productive for HTE in enhancing growth (quantitatively) by the inclusivity of diversified students and development (qualitatively) by enhancing their performance for global standing, making them satisfied and motivating them for recommending their institution to others. This integration can be utilized as a yardstick by the institutions for staying ahead in students’ market with a distinctive competitive advantage.

Growth and development of HTE will raise a society’s quality of life and thereby increase a country’s socio-economic status.

The study has exhibited SMM as input and output of a service system that is useful for the growth and development of HTE. The measurement tool presented is effective in (re)framing policies on SMM as service input based on desired service output.

A central aim of higher education is employability, in order to enable graduates to act in dynamic working environments. Internships as the prevalent work-based learning (WBL) settings offer such an opportunity during the studies; they are commonly used and broadly researched as interventions to improve students’ skills and competences. The purpose of this paper is to examine the influencing factors on students’ skills and competences that lead to employability in WBL settings.

The paper provides a synthesis of relevant international empirical research on beneficial effects of the very common WBL setting, internship, to create a research framework across disciplines.

The current research is characterized by a search for “best practices,” rather than a holistic and systematic view, acknowledging and taking into account different perspectives and their influence. It cannot sufficiently explain why employability in some WBL settings is enhanced more than in others. Therefore, it is necessary to expand the current understanding and evaluation of WBL as an experiential and situated learning experience. It is essential to take promotive factors from the university, the practical partner and the student perspective into account to understand employability enhancement. Based on these findings, a research framework for a holistic perspective on influencing factors of students’ employability is designed.

There is no empirical proof for the findings yet. Future empirical research may, therefore, be directed toward empirical testing of the impact of WBL settings.

It is possible to infer recommendations for improving WBL settings from the three parties involved by interlinking situated and experiential theory.

To meet the needs of the professional environment sector, environmental science graduates need to be suitably equipped in terms of their knowledge, understanding, and skills. At the University of Southampton, the first-year module Environmental Science: Concepts and Communication aids students in their journey into Environmental Science by preparing them to face the challenges of university study and beyond. This module thus engages students in independent learning and provides them with opportunities to develop and enhance the skills necessary to do so. Formative and student-led activities and tasks are considered important tools to achieve this aim. This review provides an overview of selected formative and student-led activities with focus on methods and approaches, values and benefits, and the practicalities of delivery. Three assessments are reviewed: a practice essay, a communication exercise, and a practice presentation. The intended benefits and value of these assessments are (1) engagement with environmental issues and topics and (2) development and enhancement of study skills. The value of such work is only realized, however, with student engagement. Delivering this module has demonstrated that formative elements are most effective when orientated to tutor group activities. Motivation for engagement appears most effective when the visibility – or absence – of students’ work is brought to the foreground through working in small groups. There is added value in that the collation and sharing of feedback within a small group permits students to learn not only from their own work but also from their peers.

The study explores the perceptions of graduates on their employability and future of work, in light of the challenges thrown upon by new vicissitudes in the work environment. The study intends to assess the preparedness of management graduates in facing the challenges and uncertainties of the actual job market.

Semi-structured and informal interviews with 65 management graduates from UK, Canada, Italy and India. The thematic analysis uncovered the concerns and areas to develop for management graduates regarding their future employability perceptions.

The authors benefited from a unique opportunity to capture the views and experience of graduates who are undergoing management education during this ambiguous period. Three major themes were developed on how to develop oneself for an ambiguous future of work which includes Psychological strengths, Skill enhancement and Future mindset. The study also unearthed the major focus areas for better employability from a graduate perspective.

Practical contribution comes from strategies to prepare university graduates for sustainable careers. Study hints at the importance of work experience, adaptability and skill enhancement in meeting the challenges of the future.

From a global approach this is one among the first studies to look into the graduate perspective of their preparedness for future work.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the concept of service learning and the use of volunteer organizations as a means for members to learn and hone leadership skills that can be transferred to their full-time corporate positions.

A qualitative study incorporating a phenomenological design was utilized to interview 30 past presidents of two volunteer organizations in Florida, Junior League and the Masonic Fraternity. The goal was to explore the participants’ thoughts and experiences related to transferable leadership skill development.

Emerging themes confirmed that accepting leadership roles within volunteer organizations is conducive to learning, testing, and evaluating new methods of leadership and skill enhancement. These skill sets can then be transferred and applied to different corporate settings.

Organizational leaders should consider the value-added benefits of encouraging employees to become involved in volunteer organizations and accepting leadership roles. This not only promotes good corporate social responsibility, but provides the employee with leadership skill development, which may ultimately benefit the firm.

Participants belonging to two separate volunteer organizations presented viewpoints regarding the value of volunteer organizations in developing and honing transferable leadership skills. Previous research has not addressed direct skill transference from leadership experiences in volunteer organizations and therefore, this research is unique in its contribution to the literature.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the experiences of individuals in transition between education and work during international volunteering expeditions. While it was expected that outcomes might include employability enhancement and skill development, the authors aimed to clarify what the main factors were, examine employability related factors in relation to other groups of variables, investigate development needs perceived by individuals, and evaluate the extent to which factors explored were influenced by participant attributes. Finally, the authors aim to integrate these findings into a series of recommendations for future research.

The study involved 406 respondents in three countries, where data were collected in the field. Survey design was based on previous related studies in volunteering and employability. Principal components analyses revealed a four‐component structure relating to leadership and teamwork, the environment and empathy, values and volunteering, and personal skills.

Employability enhancement was not a primary motive for engaging in the expeditions. Data suggest that respondents had much more altruistic motivations, with perceived benefits more associated with emotional capital development and authentic leadership, although respondents also acknowledged an enhanced ability to deal with selection processes due to their enriched experiences.

In undertaking this work using quantitative methods, the authors acknowledge that they have limited access to the richness of data that might emerge from more in depth narrative analysis. Further research could engage respondents in focus group studies.

The implications of this research are for individuals, that engagement with international volunteering for disingenuous reasons such as CV enhancement is likely to lead to failure, and for employers that individuals who have engaged are likely to have benefited from significant development in leadership skills. For international volunteering organisations, promotion of the employability‐enhancing attributes of the expedition may be less relevant to potential participants than the richness of the experience itself.

Engagement with international volunteering is personally transformative as well as delivering benefits in the context of the communities where the volunteering took place. While some respondents were drawn from a “widening participation” background there were no significant differences in their responses.

The authors believe this is the first study to attempt a detailed analysis of the range of attributes potentially held by individuals engaging in international volunteering expeditions.

This exploratory survey study investigated the alleged benefits associated with corporate volunteer programs. The results demonstrated that employees viewed volunteerism as an effective means of developing or enhancing several types of job‐related skills. This was particularly true for female employees and employees participating in a formal volunteer program. The results also demonstrated that organizational commitment was higher for volunteers from companies with a corporate volunteer program than for non‐volunteers with organizations without a corporate volunteer program. Finally, the results indicated that job satisfaction was related to volunteerism among female employees, but not for male employees.

The objective of this study is two‐fold. First, it provides guidance to educators and trainers on establishing a cooperative learning environment. Second, it examines final‐year undergraduate accounting students' opinions on the effectiveness of a cooperative learning environment in delivering generic skills for their future professional accountancy careers. In particular, the study examines relative perceptions of effectiveness between students of differing academic abilities.

A questionnaire was administered to elicit students' views on whether they believed cooperative learning had enhanced their generic skills development. The data collected were analysed using descriptive statistics and Mann‐Whitney U tests of differences.

Students found the cooperative learning approach beneficial in developing their generic skills. Further, no significant differences were found between the perceptions of the less and more able students.

The study addresses perceptions of the benefits derived from cooperative learning rather than measuring benefits using an objective measure of achievement. Therefore, an interesting extension of this work would be to chart changes in personal development as a consequence of implementing cooperative learning over a number of years.

The findings provide some level of assurance for educators in accounting and other vocational disciplines that students of different academic abilities believe they have enhanced their generic skills as a result of engaging in cooperative learning.

This paper provides guidance to educators on establishing a cooperative learning environment and provides empirical evidence on its contribution to the enhancement of generic skills.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the emergence of innovation in smart service systems to conceptualize how actor’s relationships through technology-enabled interactions can give birth to novel technologies, processes, strategies and value. The objectives of the study are: to detect the different enablers that activate innovation in smart service systems; and to explore how these can lead dynamically to the emergence of different innovation patterns.

The empirical research adopts an approach based on constructivist grounded theory, performed through observation and semi-structured interviews to investigate the development of innovation in the Italian CTNA (Italian acronym of National Cluster for Aerospace Technology).

The identification and re-elaboration of the novelties that emerged from the analysis of the Cluster allow the elaboration of a diagram that classifies five different shades of innovation, introduced through some related theoretical propositions: technological; process; business model and data-driven; social and eco-sustainable; and practice-based.

The paper embraces a synthesis view that detects the enabling structural and systems dimensions for innovation (the “what”) and the way in which these can be combined to create new technologies, resources, values and social rules (the “how” dimension). The classification of five different kinds of innovation can contribute to enrich extant research on value co-creation and innovation and can shed light on how given technologies and relational strategies can produce varied innovation outcomes according to the diverse stakeholders engaged.