Bond University tops employer satisfaction ratings for graduates

This Queensland university is already one of a kind, now it has topped a national survey which will be welcome news for its graduates.

A QUEENSLAND university has produced the nation’s most wanted graduates, a new federal government survey shows.

Bond University scored the highest ranking in the Employer Satisfaction Survey of 4700 bosses, with 94.6 per cent happy with the quality of graduates they hired.

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Australian employers prize vocational degrees, reporting satisfaction rates of 90 per cent for engineering and health graduates.

But 20 per cent of bosses question the quality of workers with information technology, management and commerce degrees.

Creative arts graduates are the least attractive to employers, with a quarter of bosses unhappy with their performance on the job.

And 15 per cent of schools are not satisfied with the quality of graduate teachers.

Ten per cent of employers marked graduate teachers down on basic literacy and numeracy skills – the lowest satisfaction rating of any profession - and 15 per cent found teamwork lacking.

Employers rate the skills of migrant graduates more highly than Australian English-speakers, with a rating of 87 per cent for migrants and 83.6 per cent for Aussies.

Bosses said graduates who spoke a foreign language at home are more collaborative, have better technical and foundation skills, and are more “employable’’ than other Australian graduates.

Employers praised the teamwork of science, engineering and architecture graduates.

The survey shows that male graduates work better in teams, but female graduates are more adaptable to changes at work.

Barely half of graduates surveyed felt their degree was important for their current job - including 41 per cent of managers, 65 per cent of professionals, and a third of technicians and trade workers, community workers and clerical or administrative staff.

Bond — the nation’s only private university, based on the Gold Coast — trumped dozens of publicly funded universities, which receive taxpayer subsidies for students.

The survey shows that 96.3 per cent of bosses are happy with Bond graduates’ technical and collaborative skills.

The University of Queensland also scored highly, with 86.8 per cent of employers satisfied with their performance at work, compared to the national average of 84.3 per cent.

The Queensland University of Technology scored 84.2, trumping the Australian National University or the University of Sydney.

The University of Southern Queensland and Griffith University scored the lowest ratings of Queensland universities, with just 81 per cent of employers satisfied with their graduates’ job performance.

Federal Education Minister Dan Tehan said graduates must be “job-ready’’ when they leave university.

“A higher education system that produces high-quality graduates is good for students, good for the economy and ultimately good for the country,’’ he said.