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Stiffer Job Prospects
Await Fresh Graduates

“There is no doubt that the competition for jobs has increased. This year’s graduates will face significant competition. It is our twelfth commencement (graduation) this year and I don’t remember a time when competition was so stiff,” said Lance de Masi, president of the American University in Dubai (AUD), from where hundreds of Emirati and expatriate graduates pass out every year.

“Companies have declared they can’t recruit. So there are more people competing for fewer jobs. We are educating our students in terms of the market changes that are happening due to the recession and we are encouraging them to put their best foot forward,” 
de Masi said.

A college in Sharjah also agreed that recession has impacted conventional recruiters. “The number of job openings has drastically reduced. However, a few companies are still recruiting and our job is to find them, approach them and market our students,” said a career coordinator from the college, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

“We do not want the situation to affect the morale of our students and we are counselling them that this is only a temporary business cycle,” he added.

Experts also stress the need for graduates to be flexible. “Graduates have expectations of fairly high salaries and there needs to be a degree of flexibility. Otherwise, there could be a mismatch between expectations and the jobs available,” warned a professor at the government-funded Zayed University, who requested not to be named.

Some public colleges are also witnessing a rollback on private companies’ sponsorships and are hoping that government spending on colleges would not be affected by the downturn. “It is possible that the (education) budget could be influenced. The immediate impact is that private companies’ sponsorships for our international study tours have dried up,” said Dr Howard Reed, senior director at the Higher Colleges of Technology (HCT) and director of Dubai Women’s College (DWC).

The college’s plans to start a new academic programme, with a private organisation, has also been shelved due to the credit crunch.

Some institutions are convinced things would change for the better soon. “Companies may be firing employees drawing huge salaries. However, they would be open to hiring graduates at lower salaries. The freeze on recruitment is temporary as businesses have to continue,” said Omar Hefni, president of the University of Dubai.

preeti@khaleejtimes.com

• UAE