Research Article

Constructing Employability Indicators for Enhancing the Effectiveness of Engineering Education for the Solar Industry

Table 1

Related studies of students' employability in engineering education.

Experts/institutionEmployability indicators

Tsai et al. [28]Work attitude and job performance are closely related.

Kagaari [33]Application of skills, responsibilities, challenges, creativity, originality, safety, career development, adaptation to status quo, technical knowledge at work, and so forth.

MOE [34]The most needed to enhance employability: foreign language ability, job searching and self-promoting capacity, innovation capability, and leadership capacity.

NTNU [35]Core employability: working attitude and cooperation capacity favourable for employment, occupational career planning capacity and aggressive learning to advance, possession of professional knowledge, and ability to apply them at work.

Peng [18](i) Employability is constructed from three elements: capacity, attitude, and confidence.
(ii) Detailed indicators: presentation and communication skills, teamwork cooperation, mother tongue language capability, stability or stress resistance, professional knowledge and techniques, basic computer application skills, the ability to explore and solve problems confronted at work, good working attitudes, strong willingness to continue with studies, high degree of plasticity, professional ethics and morality, optimism in facing career development prospects, active dedication to current job, leadership capacity, innovation capacity, the capacity to apply theory to actual work, professional certificates or related capacities, knowledge of the relevant industrial environment and its development status, foreign language capacity, full understanding and planning for self-career development, and possession of job searching and self-promoting capacity.

NTNU [35]A 2005 follow-up survey of university graduates after one year of employment found insufficiencies in employability and concluded the causes to be lack of leadership capacity, innovation capacity, the capacity to apply theory to actual work, professional certificates or related capacities, knowledge of the relevant industrial environment and its development status, foreign language capacity, full understanding and planning for self-career development, and possession of job searching and self-promoting capacity.

Jaffer et al. [36]Efficiency and quality are the challenges of industry for advanced education.

Kuo et al. [37]Four common dynamic capabilities in response to external demands: “market-oriented sensitivity,” “the ability to absorb knowledge,” “social-networking capability,” and “the integrative ability to communicate and negotiate.” Three special dynamic capabilities required by business practices: “the capability to identify what drives market growth,” “the capability to develop a good sense of market-entry timing,” and “the capability to alter/create customers’ needs.”

Chang [30]Market-oriented sensitivity, the ability to absorb knowledge, social-networking capability, and the integrative ability to communicate and negotiate are the dynamic capabilities required of IT entrepreneurs.