Journal of Human Resource and Sustainability Studies, 2016, 4, 39-49
Published Online March 2016 in SciRes. http://www.scirp.org/journal/jhrss
http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/jhrss.2016.41005
How to cite this paper: El Mansour, B. and Dean, J.C. (2016) Employability Skills as Perceived by Employers and University
Faculty in the Fields of Human Resource Development (HRD) for Entry Level Graduate Jobs. Journal of Human Resource and
Sustainability Studies, 4, 39-49. http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/jhrss.2016.41005
Employability Skills as Perceived by
Employers and University Faculty in the
Fields of Human Resource Development
(HRD) for Entry Level Graduate Jobs
Bassou El Mansour, Jason C. Dean
College of Technology, Indiana State University, Terre Haute, IN, USA
Received 8 November 2015; accepted 27 March 2016; published 30 March 2016
Copyright © 2016 by authors and Scientific Research Publishing Inc.
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution International License (CC BY).
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Abstract
The world of employment has changed dramatically, technology is impacting practices and expe-
riences, and societies are becoming more global and multicultural. With the rise of globalization,
employability is becoming one of the main goals for education systems. Today’s employers require
employees to have soft or non-technical skills in addition to technical skills. The purpose of the
study was to explore employability skills as perceived by employers and university faculty of hu-
man resource development (HRD) and management for entry level graduate jobs. As a result of
this research, types of employability skills may be identified which are common among the faculty
of HRD programs and employers of HRD graduates both in the U.S. and internationally. To eva-
luate the interrelationships between the variables of interest among employees and faculty mem-
bers, both in the U.S. and internationally, one way analysis of variance (ANOVA) was utilized. The
overall results of this study indicate that with the exception of communication skills and the use of
technology, there is a significant relationship between 16 of the 18 variables investigated and the
type of respondents.
Keywords
Employability Skills, Human Resource Development, Soft Skills, Hard Skills
1. Introduction
The world of employment has changed dramatically, technology is impacting practices and experiences while