Strategies Undertaken by International Graduates to Negotiate Employability

Abstract

This study aimed to explore how international graduates engaged with different employability approaches. Eighteen international students at several universities in Australia participated in this study. The findings revealed that the graduates engaged with different employability approaches and prioritised the development of different capitals at various stages of their career. They mainly engaged with the possessional approach to build human capital at university. However, after graduation, they were more engaged with the positional and processual approaches through which they had to interact with the labour market contexts and find ways to further enrich and mobilise their employability capitals. This study implies that there is a gap between the intentions and purposes of higher education and expectations in the labour market.