Skills Gaps and Overflows?

Abstract

This paper describes the kinds of skills that employers, especially from small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) expect from a graduate and the skills that university graduates think they have when they are looking for a job. The paper is based on a comparative analysis of (a) SMEs and graduates and (b) different countries within the European Union. The analysis refers to a conceptual model proposed by Reijo Väärälä and traces the differences within selected countries (Denmark, Finland, Germany, Ireland, and the UK) against a ‘European norm’. The analysis provides a comparison of possible differences between skills and expectations in selected European states and describes some interesting differences between countries. It suggests that there is a spectrum of skills which reflect different working patterns within the target countries, ranging from the modern use of ‘soft skills’ in the UK and Denmark to the more vocationally orientated skills in Finland, with Germany and Ireland somewhere between these alternatives.