A BDO (Binder Dijker Otte) South Australia (SA) State Business Survey showed that over 50 percent of SA graduates have no skills in their field of study. They are unemployable and tough to manage. They are ending up costing businesses a lot of money in retraining.
BDO is Australia’s largest associations of independently owned accounting practices with offices in Adelaide, Brisbane, Cairns, Darwin, Hobart, Melbourne, Perth, Sydney and Sunshine Coast.
Businesses are spending close to $50,000 to train fresh from school graduates to do tasks that they should have been taught in school. This cost is becoming a huge liability to businesses.
The link between University graduates and SA business community is widening. Concerns about the unemployability of students coming out of university are genuine and the business community has complained about this problem. Questions are being raised on whether what is being studied in school is enough to handle job requirements in business markets.
SA graduates cost $50,000 to train
Joyce Ceravolo, an Ashton Valley Fresh business development manager, summarised the predicament by arguing that:
Businesses are spending $50,000 to train them for the position and we sit there and just think, ‘I didn’t really need a graduate – I could’ve just got Joe Blow off the street, paid him $20,000 less, still trained him for $50,000 and I’m on top, so yea, Sorry. Brutal honesty.
Her honest sentiment reflects the sad state of the level of talent being produced by this institution. She reveals that a lot of work needs to be done to address this problem where business cannot find appropriate workers for a job.
Universities take on the challenge for SA graduates
Universities, however, are also taking responsibilities and admitted that the problem might be bigger than they thought. On the forefront of those willing to tackle this problem head-on is the Adelaide University. Its Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Academic) Professor Pascale Quester in an interview with the InDaily, a publication based in SA, stated:
Our university is doing much with industry to co-create the workforce of the future, with students being given the skills to adapt to an uncertain future and the multiple careers they may have over their lifetimes. This involves the development of curriculum and new degrees specifically at the request of industry, as well as other direct connections between the university, our students, staff and industry, and industry placements as part of the study.
This is a problem that needs to be addressed by all the stakeholders involved in SA. Any progress, regardless of how small, will go a long way in ensuring that the numbers reflected by BDO SA report about the worrisome nature of the education system in this region will be very highly beneficial especially to students.
