HPU Poll: What College Graduates Need to Succeed
The HPU Poll has compiled data on which skills North Carolinians think today’s college graduates need the most.
HIGH POINT, N.C., May 2, 2024 – As college graduation season begins, the High Point University Poll is releasing data from a survey of North Carolinians regarding which skills they believe college graduates need to succeed in today’s workplace.
Overall, those North Carolinians surveyed said recent college graduates are well versed in technical skills, which are important. However, respondents believe today’s college graduates may lack some life skills needed to achieve success in their careers, such as motivation, emotional intelligence and coachability. They also believe these skills are harder to develop than technical skills.
Those individuals surveyed (61 percent) also said that the COVID-19 pandemic may have caused or at least somewhat caused some of today’s college students to fall behind on developing certain skills in their formative years.
“In the dynamic job market, it is the skills like personal introspection, critical thinking and experiential application that are vital for the sustainability of college graduates, emphasizing the essential role of motivation and a positive attitude in achieving success,” said Dr. Doug Hall, HPU’s vice president for career and professional development.
The results are similar to and complement earlier HPU surveys of national C-Suite executives at large corporations reported in 2018 and 2022.
See HPU’s National 2018 C-Suite Poll Data
See HPU’s National 2022 C-Suite Poll Data
When asked which of these skills recent college graduates possess most strongly, respondents said:
45% – Technical abilities
18% – Motivation
16% – Positive attitude
12% – Emotional intelligence
10% – Coachability
At the same time, when asked which of these skills recent college graduates need to exhibit on the job to achieve success in their careers, they said:
27% – Motivation
25% – Positive attitude
20% – Technical abilities
15% – Emotional intelligence
13% – Coachability
In similar questions about their perceptions of the latest generation of college graduates, North Carolinians believe graduates have the technical abilities to succeed, but they may lack the work ethic to succeed or the ability to accept feedback and constructive criticism.
When asked which of the following statements do they believe to be most true about the new generation of college graduates entering the workforce, respondents said:
59% – They have the technical capabilities needed to succeed.
14% – They know how to solve complex problems.
14% – They have the work ethic needed to succeed.
13% – They accept feedback and constructive criticism well.
When asked which of the following statements do they believe to be most true about the new generation of college graduates entering the workforce, respondents said:
39% – They don’t have the work ethic needed to succeed.
37% – They don’t accept feedback and constructive criticism well.
14% – They don’t know how to solve complex problems.
10% – They don’t have the technical capabilities needed to succeed.
In a series of questions where respondents were asked which skills were more important to develop, majorities of North Carolinians chose life skills over technical abilities.
When asked which of these three areas is most important for today’s college students to develop, respondents said:
48% – Having a growth mindset and strong work ethic
38% – Having a positive attitude and working well with others
14% – Having industry-specific knowledge
Meanwhile, large majorities of North Carolinians also believe these life skills are the hardest skills to develop. In a series of questions where respondents were asked whether technical skills or a specific life skill are harder for a recent college graduate to develop, majorities of North Carolinians chose the life skill.
Which of these traits do you believe is harder for a new college graduate to develop?
77% – Motivation
23% – Technical skills
76% – Positive attitude
24% – Technical skills
75% – Personal initiative
25% – Technical skills
75% – Temperament
25% – Technical skills
74% – Emotional intelligence
26% – Technical skills
70% – Coachability
30% – Technical skills
In addition, nearly two-thirds (63%) of North Carolina residents say that professional etiquette courses are needed to help today’s college graduates transition to the workplace.
When asked if professional etiquette courses are needed to help today’s college graduates transition to the workplace, respondents said:
63% – Yes
19% – No
17% – Unsure
When asked if they believe today’s new college students are behind because they missed out on important development and educational opportunities during the COVID-19 pandemic, respondents said:
32% – Yes
30% – No
29% – Somewhat
10% – Unsure
HPU Poll 98 was fielded by the High Point University Survey Research Center on Oct. 19 through Oct. 29, 2023, as an online survey using a panel of respondents recruited and maintained by Dynata. Dynata sent invitations to its panel of N.C. respondents and the SRC collected 1,000 responses on its Qualtrics platform. The SRC did all data analysis. The online sample is from a panel of respondents, and their participation does not adhere to usual assumptions associated with random selection. Therefore, it is not appropriate to assign a classic margin of sampling error for the results. In this case, the SRC provides a credibility interval of plus or minus 3.3 percentage points to account for a traditional 95% confidence interval for the estimates (plus or minus 3.1 percentage points) and a design effect of 1.1 (based on the weighting). The data is weighted toward population estimates for age, gender, race/ethnicity and education based on U.S. Census numbers for North Carolina. Factors such as question wording and other methodological choices in conducting survey research can introduce additional errors into the findings of opinion polls.
Further results and methodological details from the most recent survey and past surveys can be found at the Survey Research Center website. Materials online include past press releases as well as memos summarizing the findings (including approval ratings) for each poll since 2010.
The High Point University Survey Research Center (SRC) reports methodological details in accordance with the standards set out by AAPOR’s Transparency Initiative, and the HPU Survey Research Center is a Charter Member of the Initiative.
Dr. Martin Kifer, chair and associate professor of political science, serves as the director of the HPU Survey Research Center, and Brian McDonald is the associate director of the HPU Survey Research Center.