BASED on the Graduates Statistics 2021 published by the Department of Statistics Malaysia, the graduate unemployment rate looks positive – settling at 4.1% as compared to 4.4% in 2020.
Yet within that reduction, graduates working in semi-skilled and low-skilled job categories in the labour market increased to 33.9% from 31.2% in the previous year.
They represent a group with a skills gap – having mismatched occupation or skills and they comprise a growing number that’s worrying employers, economists and government agencies.
Many of them find the careers they studied for are not in demand, have no available vacancies or that they require additional hands-on knowledge and skills that can only be gained from having some work experience.
A recent Hays survey finds that from a poll of over 17,600 respondents across the globe, only 31% believe young people have the necessary abilities to enter the workforce after finishing school.
TalentCorp’s annually collated Critical Occupations List reveals that certain employers have difficulties sourcing for talents with interpersonal and communication skills, problem-solving skills, analytical skills and the ability to work in a team.
These issues, if not addressed, can cause a wider rift for those in mismatched occupations – which will weaken the labour market and impact both wages and productivity negatively.
Talents assembled
TalentCorp’s mandate from the Government includes creating a dynamic talent ecosystem for economic growth.
It recognises the need to enhance the talent funnel and graduate employability through signature initiatives.
These include mynext, the National Structured Internship Programme (MySIP), and Young Employable Students (YES!) among others.
The creation of mynext was part of TalentCorp’s many initiatives, such as the industry-academia collaboration (IAC) efforts.
Through IAC, TalentCorp recognised the need for a collaborative model between key stakeholders to help bridge the gap between academic life and the “real working world”.
The current mynext programme is in its 3.0 iteration and made mandatory in 11 public universities, which includes Universiti Teknologi MARA, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Universiti Malaysia Sabah, Universiti Sains Islam Malaysia.
It was also introduced in eight private higher learning institutes, such as the Multimedia University, King’s College, INTI, Unitar, to name a few.
The initiative was also embedded in the Ministry of Higher Education’s Graduate Employability Strategic Plan 2021-2025 to develop graduates with better industry readiness.
Level up skills
TalentCorp’s mynext initiative offers an all-in-one talent solution and analytics platform to students, universities, companies and the workforce in order to help them align the skills and competencies with available job opportunities that need placements.
The tools in mynext help talents understand and improve their employability and career paths, for university administrators to add value to their offerings, and for employers to source the right talents for their companies.
There are three components for different segments:
> mynext Talent supports students and talents in their study-to-work transition with specially curated profiling tools, so that they can discover their strengths, interests, and employability traits.
It helps talents to discover potential career paths; career recommendations include listings beyond the status quo of their field of study, which opens doors to a journey of self-discovery and possibilities.
On mynext, students can be directly connected to internships with registered companies through an automatic matching service.
The programme also includes a free English proficiency test for talents to identify and improve problem areas and an industry-standard CV creator.
> mynext Company helps the national workforce by integrating talent solutions and analytics onto one platform, to bridge the gap between Malaysia’s talent supply to internships via MySIP.
Companies can access a wide range of qualified candidates, such as future talent pipeline, from all over the country via one digital platform.
Companies will gain access to insights from the candidates’ profiling assessment and language competency skills to ensure a higher level of compatibility for the organisation.
This platform provides a start-to-end internship management tool and enables employers to advertise positions across the mynext network.
Eligible companies can apply to join TalentCorp’s MySIP that comes with double tax deduction benefits.
> mynext University, which provides institutes of higher learning with data, enables them to develop training programmes and curricula in line with current industry demands, while addressing the needs of individual students.
These institutes can better understand their students’ ability to fit into any programmes, work readiness and potential career paths.
With the analytical dashboard, institutes of higher learning can develop evidence-based frameworks of action and intervention to increase graduate employability.
Institutes of higher learning can also get industry experts’ aid on curriculum development through mynext’s 360-degree feedback system.
Supporting proper placements
As of July this year, more than 170,000 talents across various education institutions have registered on mynext.
This will facilitate the channelling of talent in a structured, effective and sustainable manner.
Talent can be identified earlier and given the chance to hone their skills through structured industrial training.
With this collaboration, the Human Resources Ministry is also able to assist the Higher Education Ministry to increase the marketability of local graduates.
The Human Resources Ministry welcomes active participation from graduates, the workforce, companies.
It is also open to higher education and skill-training institutions, which are under the supervision of the Higher Education Ministry, to make this initiative a success.
For more information on TalentCorp’s mynext initiative, visit www.mynext.my
Already a subscriber? Log in
Get 20% OFF The Star Digital Access
Cancel anytime. Ad-free. Unlimited access with perks.
