China: Making Graduates Employable
Universities in China are facing similar demands to improve the employability of their graduates as those in the UK, new research among employers has revealed.
But what are the skills employers want and how much do they differ between the two nations?
Generally, it includes family and friends and links with people working in other companies, voluntary organizations, or leisure activities. The Chinese also tend to take more time building up relationships with people before getting down to business. The University of Plymouth and its partner China Agricultural University in Beijing are working to determine the skills most likely to lead to employability and successful careers. Staff at both universities have conducted face-to-face and telephone interviews with local employers of graduates in three areas, marketing, human resources and finance-accounting.
“Students in China generally lose touch with society and they need help to understand how companies work and what is involved in the different jobs and professions. They know very little outside the campus and that is where I think they differ from students in the UK. We can share our experiences.”
| A．“However, there are some clear differences in the emphasis put on different attributes, such as the value placed by the Chinese on ‘guanxi’, the network of connections that a person has built up.” he said. |
| B．Employers in both countries valued the personal skills of graduates seeking work in human resources. |
| C．The Chinese employers said the person who could complete a job and get things done was highly prized |
| D．That is the question Dr. Troy Heffernan, a senior lecturer in marketing at the University of Plymouth, set out to answer through his involvement in one of 13 partnerships between institutions in the UK and China. |
| E．A draft of a report to be published later this year shows marketing executives in both countries put a high emphasis on good communication skills. |
| F．The Chinese government issued a circular earlier this year urging universities and colleges to strengthen their efforts in preparing students for the workplace. |
相似题推荐
【推荐1】Plato believed that men are divided into three classes: gold, silver and bronze. Vilfredo Pareto, an Italian economist, argued that “ the vital few” contributed to most progress. Such viewpoints are taboo (禁忌) today in public life. Politicians avoid talking of a “leadership class” or “the vital few”. School recruitment turns away from picking winners. Universities welcome the masses: more people now teach at British universities than attended them in the1950s.
In the private sector things could hardly be more different. The world’s best companies struggle tirelessly to find and keep the vital few. They offer them fat pay packets, extra training, powerful instruction and more challenging assignments. Private-equity (私人股权) firms rely heavily on a few stars. Firms in emerging markets are desperate to find high-flyers who can cope with rapid growth and fast-changing environments.
Few people know more about how companies manage talent than Bill Conaty and RamCharan. Mr. Conaty led the human-resources department at General Electric (GE) for 14years. Mr. Charan has spent the past few decades presenting proposals to some celebrated entrepreneurs (企业家). Their recent book, The Talent Masters, provides. a nice mix of portraits of well-known talent factories, such as GE and Procter & Gamble (P&G).
Successful companies make sure that senior managers are involved with “ talent development”. Jack Welch and A. G. Lafley, former bosses of GE and P&G, claimed that they spent 40% of their time on personnel. Andy Grove, who ra n Intel, a chipmaker, obliged all the senior people, including himself, to spend at least a week a year instructing high-flyers . Nitin Paranjpe, the boss of Hindustan Unilever, recruits people from campuses and regularly visits high-flyers in their offices.
Elitism (精英主义) has its drawbacks. In their rush to classify people, companies can miss potential stars. Those who are singled out for special treatment can become too full of themselves.
1. The change that occurred in British universities reflects that .| A．more students enroll for schools |
| B．people of today are much cleverer |
| C．UK attaches importance to education |
| D．elitism in public organizations declines |
| A．Potential clients. | B．Faithful employees. |
| C．Competent managers. | D．Celebrated politicians. |
| A．By listing examples. | B．By classification. |
| C．By analyzing causes. | D． By describing a process. |
| A．Discrimination in workplaces will get more serious. |
| B．Famous companies’ elitism management is worth trying. |
| C．The Talent Masters offers advice to some leading bosses. |
| D．Elitism may get some potential talented people excluded. |
【推荐2】Too much work, too little money and not enough opportunity for promotion, .or growth are stressing us out on the job, according to a new survey from the American Psychological Association.
We all know that stress reduces all of the things that help productivity— mental clarity (清晰), short-term memory, decision-making and moods. One-third of employees experience lasting stress related to work, the survey found. Fifty-four percent of the 1,501 employed adults surveyed say they feel they are paid too little for their contributions, and 61% said their jobs don’t offer adequate opportunities to advance. Only half of the adults surveyed said they feel valued at work.
Besides, women’s stress is rising as families rely more on women’s earnings. An employed wife’s contribution to family earnings has reached, on average, 47% since 2009, so women feel especially stuck and tense. Thirty-two percent of women said their employers don’t provide sufficient opportunities for internal advancement, compared with 30% of men. Women are more likely to feel tense during a typical workday, reporting more often that their employer doesn’t appreciate what they do.
Physically, the body responds to stress by secreting hormones into the bloodstream that stimulate accelerated (加速的) heart rate and breathing and tensing of muscles. People who experience stress as a positive often have increased blood flow to the brain, muscles and limbs, similar to the effects of aerobic exercise. Those who feel frightened or threatened, however, often have an unstable heart rate and constricting wood vessels (血管). Their blood pressure rises and hands and feet may grow cold. They may become agitated, speak more loudly or experience errors in judgment.
Emotional responses to stress often divide along gender lines, with men more likely to have a “fight or flight” reaction while women are more likely to have a tend and befriend” response, seeking comfort in relationships and care of loved ones, according to the research.
Women tend to “internalize”, which contributes to their stress. Many women hesitate to speak up for themselves or challenge behavior they see as unfair. Kay Keaney, interior designer, 40, rose fast at a California medical group, taking on responsibility for interior and facility planning. With her 60-hour workweeks, plus early-morning and late-night meetings and a 1.5-hour commute each way, she seldom had time with her two small children. Whether stuck in traffic on her way to a 6 p.m. pickup at day care, or tom between her children and urgent work emails, “I just wanted to crawl out of my skin,” she says. “I was overwhelmed.” Yet she hesitated to complain. “There was too much work to be done, and playing the Mommy card was bad form.” But the experts suggest that women should give themselves a voice.
1. The underlined word “agitated” in Paragraph 4 is closest in meaning to ________.| A．fearful | B．optimistic | C．anxious | D．ambitious |
| A．Everyone has a painful sense of being under-appreciated or under-paid. |
| B．An increasing number of people feel satisfied with work-life balance. |
| C．An improving job market is making some people’s work lives easier. |
| D．Most women have higher levels of work stress than the opposite sex. |
| A．relieving oneself from stress involves being frank as well as brave |
| B．experiencing symptoms of lasting stress causes communication barriers |
| C．seeking comfort from friends or relatives has little to do with office stress |
| D．being challenged or devalued by others leads to numerous health problems |
| A．Other aspects in life affected by stress in work. |
| B．Tips to help women handle their hard times properly. |
| C．Examples to show the different gender responses to stress. |
| D．Reasons why people are likely to feel tense when working. |
【推荐3】It’s time to reevaluate how women handle conflict at work. Being overworked or over-committed at home and on the job will not get you where you want to be in life. It will only slow you down and hinder(阻碍) your career goals.
Did you know women are more likely than men to feel exhausted? Nearly twice as many women than men ages 18-44 reported feeling drained of energy, according to a recent study.
This may not be surprising given that this is the age range when women have children. It’s also the age range when many women are trying to balance careers and home. One reason women may feel exhausted is that they have a hard time saying “no.” Women want to be able to do it all—volunteer for school parties or cook delicious meals—and so their answer to any request is often “Yes, I can.”
Women struggle to say “no” in the workplace for similar reasons, including the desire to be liked by their colleagues. Unfortunately, this inability to say “no” may be hurting women’s health as well as their career.
At the workplace, men use conflict as a way to position themselves, while women often avoid conflict or strive to be the peacemaker, because they don’t want to be viewed as aggressive at work. For example, there’s a problem that needs to be addressed immediately, resulting in a dispute over who should be the one to fix it. Men are more likely to face that dispute from the perspective of what benefits them most, whereas women may approach the same dispute from the perspective of what’s the easiest and quickest way to resolve the problem—even if that means doing the boring work themselves.
This difference in handling conflict could be the deciding factor on who gets promoted to a leadership position and who does not. Leaders have to be able to assign tasks and manage resources wisely. Shouldering more of the workload may not earn you that promotion. Instead, it may highlight you inability to effectively make use of what you have.
1. What does the author say is the problem with women?| A．They are often unclear about the career goals to reach. |
| B．They are usually more committed at home than on the job. |
| C．They tend to be over-optimistic about how far they could go. |
| D．They tend to push themselves beyond the limits of their ability. |
| A．weak | B．unhappy | C．stressful | D．tired |
| A．That women usually avoid conflict and strive to be the peacemaker is because their men colleagues are more aggressive. |
| B．When there is an urgent problem to address, women are more likely to do the task as they usually respond quicker than man. |
| C．Men and women differ in their approach to resolving workplace conflicts in that women are more ready to compromise. |
| D．Men have more chances to be leaders because they are able take advantage of others and shoulder less workload. |
| A．A training course teaching women to say “no”. |
| B．A campaign for more women rights. |
| C．A debate on whether woman is capable of working on the job. |
| D．A sharing on how woman can balance work and family. |
