Employability Jigsaw Project

The employability Jigsaw Project was established to enhance the University’s employability offer to its students and graduates, recognising that the nature of the graduate workplace is changing, that student expectations are evolving and that students are expressing dissatisfaction with the current position.

The metrics for graduate employability as measured by the Destination of Leavers in Higher Education (DLHE) annual survey shows the need to improve graduate employment in a number of disciplines (from 2020 the DLHE was replaced by the Graduate Outcomes survey).

The ethos behind the project stems from the recognition that there is no single approach to supporting career development learning in HE curriculum leading to the explicit enhancement of graduate employability skills, but there is an extensive body of exemplars of approaches and practice in place on campus, nationally and internationally. The Project aims to develop or collate materials, and identify strategic opportunities for significantly raising the attributes and skills which enable students to be successful in seeking graduate employment.

Between July and October 2016 the project interviewed 67 staff and student representatives, commissioned five external advisers to write reports on 'What employability should look like?', held two day workshops with 144 participants to enable staff and students to feed into the project and the recommendations.

In November 2016 the Employability Jigsaw report was produced with 14 recommended actions.

Staff can request a copy of the report from their School Employability Lead, AHTL or ADTL or request a copy by emailing ed@plymouth.ac.uk.