MBA Employability Skills Programme builds confidence
Academic skills are highly regarded by employers, and demand for MBA-qualified graduates remains high across international markets.
But with competition for graduate jobs tougher than ever, MBA students at Edinburgh Napier have been delighted to have a dedicated employability skills programme running alongside their modules to help them prepare to stand out in the market – with 95% of those participating responding positively when asked ‘How would you rate your overall learning experience?”
Dr. Melina Seedoyal Doargajudhur, Programme Lead, MBA Strategic Project Management explains, “The MBA Employability Skills & Professional Development Programme is a fantastic collaboration between the Employability & Careers team, and the MBA Progamme Leaders at Edinburgh Napier. The programme features a series of 10 interactive webinars that focus on building awareness and understanding of key employability and career development skills.
“All our MBA students are invited to attend,” continues Melina. “The online webinars are interactive with discussion points and activities included to encourage engagement. There is also time allocated at the end of each session for a Q&A. One of the MBA Programme Leaders attends each workshop to provide context to students on how the session topic relates to their academic studies, and input into the Q&A.”
The webinars cover:
Professional development: to help students identify the skills they have and explore ways to develop the skills that employers need.
DISC & operation styles: provides valuable insight into students’ own personal operating style – the way they like to think, make decisions, communicate, and get things done. This knowledge helps individuals understand why some situations, environments, and tasks seem comfortable, but others are more challenging. One student remarked: “The model was really helpful. Now I can confidently say I understand my colleagues at work, their unique behaviours, how they love to work.”
Emotional Intelligence: explores what we mean by emotional intelligence and looks at how developing this will a benefit.
Performance, talent & motivation: looks at how students can build skills and improve performance and considers what motivates us as individuals and how each student can identify their deeper ‘why’.
Navigating change in our lives: explores our reactions to change, and how we might give ourselves different choices.
Career development: creates a career development plan to help achieve personal goals and explores some of the challenges that can arise along the way.
Self-awareness: covers how to build self-awareness and introduces some tools and resources that can help.
Exploring opportunities: covers ways to explore opportunities after graduation, including online research, speculative approaches, and through gaining work experience.
Applications & interviews: tackles job applications and interviews. “We look at different job search strategies and think about how to approach job applications,” explains Melina. “We also discuss effective preparation for job interviews.”
Networking & personal branding: provides top tips for creating an authentic personal brand.
The sessions, delivered once a month throughout the year, gave all Edinburgh Napier MBA students the opportunity to:
- Build self-awareness including gaining an understanding of skills, operating styles, and drivers.
- Learn about effective teamwork and the importance of professionalism in interactions with others.
- Understand how to create an effective career plan and navigate any changes that this will involve.
- Learn about job search skills including networking and making successful job applications.
These sessions are practical and engaging: students use tools like Mentimeter for live polls and activities, ensuring every session is as interactive and relevant as possible. Students are also encouraged to add their thoughts and opinions and feedback showed that students loved this chance to learn from each other. With such a positive response, we hope to continue and develop this programme for future MBA students at Edinburgh Napier University.