Measuring Employability Skills of Budding IT Professionals in India

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to identify employability skills among aspiring engineering graduates and develop measurement scale to assess their skill sets. This research has been conducted in two phases: Phase 1 covers the scale development process and Phase 2 covers exploratory factor analysis (EFA), confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and validation. The findings of EFA resulted in ten factors of employability. Subsequently, CFA identified nine different factors: leadership, critical thinking, numeracy, sociability, using technology, planning and organizing, problem-solving, teamwork, and emotional intelligence skills. The values of CFA met the acceptance level of different fit indices and thus, resulted in a good model fit. Further, the internal consistency of the total scale yielded Cronbach's alpha value (α = 0.82). The threshold values of CR, AVE, and MSV also met the required criteria. Thus, it received a valid and reliable 26-item measurement scale of employability which can prove to be useful for academia, students, and employers in computer science and information technology.