Institutional Strategies and Graduate Employability Development Skills of Business Students: The Mediating Role of Graduate Capital Forms

Abstract

This study aims to assess the effect of institutional strategies on the development of employability skills, mediated by graduate capital forms among business education students in some selected public and transnational universities in Ghana. Institutional theory underpinned this study. The institutional strategy constructs of curriculum design, extracurricular activities, work-integrated learning, internship and job placement, university engagement with industries, career centers, and student engagement with employability development opportunities predicted the dependent variable graduate employability with the mediating variables. On a sample of 1280 survey participants, structural equation modelling was used. The findings showed that all of the constructs included in institutional strategies had a favourable, significant impact on the growth of graduate employability abilities. The development of social, cultural, and psychological capital forms under the mediating variable was supported to have an indirect influence or partial mediation between institutional tactics and the development of graduate employability abilities. The findings recommend public universities should be more proactive in promoting the employability agenda by assisting students in building their employability skills in a digitalized world. Again, regulators and decision-makers like the Ministry of Education (MoE) and the Ghana Tertiary Education Commission (GTEC) should reconsider making the development of employability skills in the academic fields of undergraduate education that reflect and merit the rapidly changing skill requirements of contemporary and digitalised work environments, especially curriculum design.