Abstract:

There is a growing consensus of higher education authorities and industry alike to produce relevant and applied knowledge in third level education, which meets the labour-force requirements of todays’ global economy. An important aspect is the nature of competences and skills graduates require to secure employment. Recent research demonstrates that graduate employability requires the demonstration of both generic (i.e. across all subject areas) and subject specific competences (i.e. based in a particular discipline or sector), as well as critical thinking and reflective abilities. These abilities ideally have to be developed through a partnership between third level institutions and industry.

Due to domestic market limitations, most Irish businesses have a global orientation. Ireland’s economic performance is highly reliant on multinational corporations and strategic global partnerships and is mainly export-oriented. Hence, supply chain management is regarded as a critical business discipline in Ireland. In contrast, the Spanish transport and logistic sector shows important differences (with Ireland) in terms of both size and network structure, as well as the fact that is one of the most important terrestrial nodes of communications within the EU.

Logistics and SC (Supply Chain) skills in particular are critically important to many companies due to increased globalisation. Supply chain structural properties are and continue to change. Continued trends, such as increasing customer expectations, innovation and technology development, outsourcing of services and production, as well as disaggregation of the supply chain will have an impact on what skills are required. Thus, there is a greater need for new skills to manage supply chain systems efficiently and effectively.

This study sets out to recognise such skills in a range of different industries and sectors in Spain and Ireland. Relevant and necessary SC skills, their relative importance required by supply chain managers in different industries, as well as the current perceived performance of graduates are identified through two sets of surveys in Spain and Ireland. The respondent of both surveys are HR directors and HR managers of small, medium and large companies directly linked to personnel selection processes among graduate students. Skillset categories are developed through an extensive literature review identifying 58 different skill categories. Through systematic analysis of the data, the research examines which skillsets require improvement and where the current SCM skill development priorities lie. These skills are then contrasted with third level course offerings to identify competence gaps. Results reveal important gaps in the developed skills at third level programs and the actual demanded skills by firms, as well as differences between countries due to the specific features of each industry. This research contributes to designing relevant and current third level SC curricula.

Keywords:

Supply Chain Management, Logistics, Curriculum Design, Skills Requirements, Country Comparison.