Pongsaya Pumipatyothin

In the aim to explore employability in Thailand from both the demand and supply sides, this study analyzes employability gaps in Thailand through comparing the employers’ demand and the supply of 4th year social-science students, in the context of pandemic and technological disruption. The data were collected from online questionnaire surveys conducted upon 250 HR managers/recruiters for the demand side, and 350 senior social-science students for the supply side. The survey asks how the employers prioritize the qualifications of applicants, while the students were asked to self-evaluate their qualifications. The data were examined through the perspective of “employability components” based on an earlier-published work, which has derived employability qualifications from the interviews of 30 HR managers. The data were then analyzed by utilizing sample means and standard deviations. Among the three employability components, the results reveal that the employers prioritized attitudes, followed by adaptability and then career ability. On attitudes, ‘respectfulness to diversity’ is ranked highest, while ‘the ability to change quickly and perseverance’ is required most in adaptability. For career ability, the employers emphasized ‘the fit with firms’ corporate culture and value the most. By comparing HR demand to the students’ self-evaluation, the widest gap is found in the core component of adaptability followed by career ability, and then attitudes. The research is beneficial both conceptually and practically. It adds to the literature on employability, whereby the study on developing economies remains limited. Practically, the research findings could help preparing university graduates prior to entering the labor market.

This paper qualitatively reexamines the definitions, components, and sub-components of employability under the changing labor market contexts of the under-researched country of Thailand, an emerging market economy (EME). Semi-structured interviews among chief human resources (HR) officers, HR experts, HR academics, HR consultants, and top HR executives in various well-recognized private firms across industries in Thailand, virtual field visits to each company located in Bangkok and other provinces in Thailand, nonparticipant observation, and a review of archival documents and web-based resources were conducted. This paper proposes that Thailand’s institutional context, specifically the labor market context, plays an important role in shaping employability among workers needed by firms within that context. Several challenges, including the COVID-19 pandemic, aging societies, technological disruption, the growth of the cryptocurrency market, and the changing patterns of work, affect Thailand’s institutional context, specifically the labor market context, and worsen the problem regarding the shortage of job candidates or graduates who are readily employable. Here, employability among workers refers to the strong potential that helps job candidates obtain suitable jobs and readies them for work and to survive in the real word. It consists of three main components: (1) career ability, (2) resiliency, and (3) attitudes and personal attributes. Each component consists of several sub-components (25 sub-components in total). All of the components and sub-components of employability are necessary for job candidates or young graduates in the context of the Thai labor market. However, there are sub-components of employability that are necessary for job candidates who are working in EMEs with several abovementioned challenges that affect the labor market context.