Bahria University Karachi Campus

www.bimcs.edu.pk

Employability Skills – Your career ladder to Success.

1

Employability Skills Development CentreESDC

Mission Statement

ESDC will aim at producing a new generation of Bahria Students in all disciplines, included under the Banner of Bahria University, through continuous emphasis on Personal & Professional Development , leading to the highest levels of Employability skills , required by Employers in Pakistan and abroad.

2

Strategic Objectives

2. ESDC ( Employment Skills Development Centre) will aim at developing an ‘A’ Team of Bahria students equipped with Hard and Soft Skills, to represent BUKC as Brand Ambassadors to the Employers in Pakistan & Abroad.

1. To enhance the Brand Image of Bahria students with a view to positioning them as Employers’ first choice in Pakistan and Abroad and enable maximum employment in minimum time.

Why Employability Skills?

Our Graduates need to be:• Well equipped individuals with a positive “can do”

attitude.

• Achieve Strong Academic results combined with employability skills and competencies.

• Develop good team, communication skills, leadership skills, negotiating skills, Self confidence.

• Have a good understanding and awareness of the industry they hope to build successful careers.

Emerge distinct from the crowd as Bahria brand of graduates.

Three elements to PPD1.

1. Career Planning & Management • Pre employment – Bahria Responsibility.• Post employment-Organization’s & Employee

Responsibility.

2. Personal Development• Pre employment - Bahria Responsibility• Post employment - Personal Responsibility

3. Professional Development ( Hard Skills)• Pre Employment: Bahria University from 1st till Final semester.• Post Employment: Organization and Individual

Background

5

Career Planning and ManagementThe subject was initially being taught as a core course in Fall 2013 to BBA 8 students. It was made elective in Spring 2014 and replaced by PPD as core course for BBA 8. The course revolves around the four steps of career management.

Self-Assessment

Reality Check

Goal SettingAction

Planning

It was discovered during the course that students would have benefitted more had this course been introduced in BBA 5, before the majors were chosen. The course helps students in giving them focus and direction in the quest for a career and in choosing a major which is aligned to their Interests, Values, Job preferences.

Background

Background (contd.) Personal & Professional Development

1. PPD course outline for Spring 2013 and Fall 2014 was developed on the premise that a knowledge of Pre employment Career Planning & Management would be required to complete the PPD course. As such, PPD till midterms, was planned to cover CPM essentials including CV writing, Interviewing Skills etc.

2. Post midterm we will cover the essentials of Personal Development ie. enhancing and developing atleast 5 core employability skills.

3. Identifying & Developing employability Skills or competencies involves little of Passive learning and more of active learning. In other words Training & not Teaching.

4. At this moment we are severely handicapped in terms of Time & Training Facility Requirements in class rooms including the size, layout, Training fixtures , Training Material etc.

5. As such the course will simply create an awareness of Personal Development and provide guidance to meet selected Employability Requirements.

6. There is therefore a need to develop a full fledged , fully equipped “ Employment Skills Development Centre”, as a separate unit , eventually

evolving into a Profit Centre. 7

Employers are evaluating Competencies.

8

Employers look forEmployability skills

Commercial Awareness Teamwork Skills Communication Skills

Negotiation SkillsOrganizational Skills

Problem Solving

Leadership Skills Confidence Skill

9

Employability Skills Development Plan

Eligibility & Pre Requisites• The course is mandatory for pre selected students.• To encourage participation Bahria University Certificate will be

issued for attendance.

1. Final year students of MS/ CS/ SS/ Engineering/ Psychology.

2. Students who intend seeking jobs after graduation will be given priority.

3. Students securing GPA of 3 and above will be selected in batches not exceeding 25.

4. Course will be conducted with a minimum 10 students.

5. Assessments & Skill Gap analysis conducted on students will determine which Skills should students enroll for. 10

Workshop Venue

1. Computer labs will be used for online skill assessments atleast one week before the Workshop.

2. Ergonomic friendly classrooms complying to Training requirements will be used.

3. Facility of the Video Conference room and the Board room will be required for Mock Interviews, Mock management meeting sessions, focus groups and group discussions.

4. Common topics, Debates to be addressed by Guest Speakers will be held in the Auditorium.

11

Faculty & Training Material

Skill / Competency Faculty Skills

Commercial Awareness Faculty with all round General Management exposure to Corporate and Theoretical concepts on Entrepreneurship , Marketing, Finance etc.

Communication Skills Visiting faculty from corporate is recommended. Essence is effective business communications, verbal, written with a focus on emails, minutes of meetings, internal memos, external correspondence with suppliers, customers etc.

Leadership Skills Faculty for leadership is available at BU. Trainers approach is required in a heuristic style.

Above is an example to illustrate how faculty should be chosen. This is very critical from Employment Skills Development point of view. External Faculty always have the advantage of change and curiosity for the students.

12

Training Methodology1. Online Skills Assessments.Permission has been granted by The University of Kent for the use of their Careers & Employability online services which includes Online assessments of various employability skills and a host of material on PPD.

Online assessments will be used before and after the workshop for various skills & competencies.

2. A series of books by Dr. Stella Cottrel ( Director of life long learning at University of Leeds.UK) have been added to the library for ongoing courses on PPD. Book titled Skills for Success offers a series of exercises on Personal development and Employability. which will be used to develop long term career and personal development plans.

3. Group discussions, Group Task, public speaking, business games, focus groups will be used extensively in the class room sessions.

4. Guest speakers for specific Skill related topics will be sourced and invited.

5. We may requisition other Training material ( will be researched) including Videos ( which at the moment are downloaded from the net.

13

Timelines and Duration

14

•It is suggested that the workshop be planned between the end of final exams and results. •One week workshop to cover 5 sets of Skills & Competencies.•Each session to last half day covering one skill set.•Depending on Skill assessments one student may have to go through more than one session.•To estimate no. of students from each department we may have to average passing out students with 3 GPA.• Trained students passing out from ESDC will be exposed to employers through Job Fairs, Mock Interviews etc.