Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
INTRODUCTION
How can information systems educators achieve a better fit between the workplace and
the university “studyplace”? Discerning and reconciling the aspirations of university
students preparing for careers in business information systems with the skills, competencies,
personal characteristics, and qualities desired by employers is, at best, the art of finding an
acceptable, if not optimal, balance between them.
Students are most concerned with future employability. They classically desire to
develop a sufficient base of knowledge and a skills repertoire to secure their first professional
position following graduation, to survive in that position, and to feel that their education will
also prepare them for advancement in the medium term of five or more years.
Employers, on the other hand, often indicate that they want new graduates who can be
immediately productive in their environment, who are teachable, loyal team players who work
to deadlines, who possess the ability to make an intelligible presentation, who can write
understandable business letters, memoranda, and reports.
Are the aspirations of students and employers fundamentally incompatible? How can
IS educators help to find a workable and satisfying balance?
Professional Preparation and Curriculum Design
It is a truism that the preparation of IS professionals must encompass a significant
portion of a body of technical skills laid down by various professional bodies (Cheney, Hale,
& Kasper, 1990; Gorgone & Gray, 1999; Underwood, 1997). It is also often held that employers
desire more well-rounded graduates who possess well-developed business skills in addition
to a sound technical repertoire (Trauth, Farwell, & Lee, 1993; Van Slyke, Kittner, & Cheney,
1997).
A persistent research finding that employers want graduates who possess better
business skills is often interpreted by academics who typically operate in a business or
commerce faculty to mean that more traditional, formal business subjects such as accounting,
economics, business finance, and marketing should be taught alongside traditional hard skill
subjects, such as systems analysis/design and programming in particular languages.
Somehow, the other “soft” areas, such as teamwork, communication skills, ability to accept
direction, and others, are “picked up” along the way through an unspecified, osmotic process.
Studies conducted in other practice-oriented business disciplines such as accounting
(Stewart, 1997) have indicated that students may not fully appreciate the importance of
nontechnical skills sought by prospective employers.
Several writers, including Ang (1992), Ang and Jiwahhasuchin (1998), and Young and
Keen (1997) noted the long-term shift from programming and other technical subjects to
business analysis and people-oriented skills in IS curricula and in employer requirements
expressed in recruiting advertisements over the past two decades. Ashley and Padgett (1997)
reported results of a 1996 study of the evaluation of the IS curriculum by IS graduates. The
study covered business and nonbusiness courses
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along with traditional IS courses and
compared results with a similar study in 1990 (Beise et al., 1991).
Some of the results appear to go against conventional wisdom. In the nonbusiness area,
foreign languages rated quite poorly in both periods. In their business courses, Introduction
to Information Systems and Business Communication rated highly, but core business
subjects such as Economics, Business Law, Statistics, Quantitative Methods, and even
Accounting rated below the average. Predictably, from the IS courses such as Systems
