The development of skills in the ict sector: analysis of engineering students’ perceptions about transversal skills

• Autores: Inês Direito, Anabela Maria Sousa Pereira, Manuel de Oliveira Duarte
• Localización: The International journal of engineering education, ISSN-e 0949-149X, Vol. 30, no. Extra 6 (Parte B), 2014, págs. 1556-1561
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • When starting a career, many engineering graduates possess the necessary technical knowledge but present serious behaviouralmismatches. The lack of transversal skills, such as working well in teams and successful time management, can represent animportant handicap in their careers and the resulting limitations can significantly impair their capability to undertake the roles thatcompanies expect from them. In the present study, 297 ICT engineering undergraduate and post-graduation students were surveyedabout their perceptions about their proficiency in and the importance of transversal skills. Findings showed that students ratedmore highly the importance of transversal skills than their own perceived proficiency in those same skills; post-graduation students(Bologna second cycle) perceived themselves as being more proficient in the vast majority of the transversal skills analysed, andrevealed less skills’ gaps in comparison with undergraduate students (Bologna first cycle). The results also showed that, incomparison with companies’ representatives, students tend to value the generality of transversal skills, suggesting that students areaware of the importance of transversal skills for their future professional roles, but lack a differentiated vision about these skills.These results emphasize the need to invest in initiatives to promote the development of transversal skills during the students’university studies and also alert to the importance of a regular interaction between education systems and companies.