Wittier, cleverer and more ambitious: Moving beyond a standardised approach to skills audit exercises

Abstract

This article focuses on understanding the challenges students face when identifying and articulating their skills. Situated within the context of Careers and Employability, it explores how students can identify and articulate their learning when accessing professional and creative opportunities beyond university. It describes activities that consisted of desk research and action research, with the former focusing on a literature review in the field of career development. The small-scale action research phase consisted of three activities (an online pre-workshop questionnaire, a two-hour seminar-style workshop and a paper-based, post-workshop questionnaire) resulting in several firm conclusions about the challenges students face when identifying their skills. This action research also provided an insight into how students can be supported to overcome these challenges. These findings feed into the delivery of a new skills audit exercise, designed to encourage students to author unique and discipline-specific skills profiles.