There is a clear and persistent disconnect between how students and employers perceive students’ development of the competencies they need to be career ready as they enter the workforce, according to research by NACE.
Data from NACE’s 2024 Student Survey and Job Outlook 2025 survey reveal that although both groups are in alignment when it comes to the high importance of communication, critical thinking, teamwork, and professionalism, for other competencies—most notably leadership and career and self-development—there is a sizable gap in the perception of importance between new graduates and employers. (See Figure 1.)
JOB OUTLOOK 2025 SLIDES
The Job Outlook 2025 report is presented in slide format; slides can be downloaded and used as is, or adapted with permission.See the Report
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Similarly, the gap is quite large in the perception of new graduates’ proficiency in the career-readiness competencies; for leadership and professionalism the gap exceeds or approaches 30%, while for critical thinking and communication, it is approximately 25%. This means that students believe they are much more proficient in these area than do the employers that are recruiting them.
There are some instances where there is more agreement. For example, new graduates and employers are in line with the former’s level of proficiency in teamwork, and employers even feel that new grads are more proficient in technology than do the graduates themselves.
Still, the problem persists: What can be done to shrink this proficiency chasm? This general disconnect may occur because many students don’t fully understand the connection between the knowledge and experience they gain in college and the competencies employers seek, and, therefore, have difficulty effectively articulating this to employers on their resumes or during interviews.
To address this, career centers have implemented initiatives and programming and NACE offers resources—such as the NACE Competency Assessment Tool, sample behaviors, and more—to help students understand and effectively connect how their classroom work, internships, and other experiences have helped them develop their career readiness.
NACE’s 2024 Student Survey, sponsored by Indeed, was conducted March 13 through May 15, 2024; a total of 20,482 college students took part, including 2,281 graduating seniors earning bachelor’s degrees. Participants can access the report and dashboard through MyNACE. The report and dashboard are also available in the NACE Store.
Data for the Job Outlook 2025 survey were collected from August 5, 2024, through September 16, 2024. Of the 237 total respondents, 162 were NACE employer members, representing 19.2% of eligible member respondents. The Job Outlook 2025 survey was also distributed to nonmember companies, from which an additional 75 responses were received. The Job Outlook 2025 report is presented in slide format; slides can be downloaded and used as is, or adapted with permission.
Figure 1: Student and employer ratings of importance of and student proficiency in career readiness competencies, by percent of respondents.
| Competency | New Graduates | Employers | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Importance | Proficiency | Importance | Proficiency | |
| Communication | 96.3% | 78.1% | 96.1% | 53.5% |
| Critical Thinking | 94.0% | 80.8% | 96.1% | 55.9% |
| Teamwork | 90.5% | 83.5% | 93.9% | 81.5% |
| Career & Self-Development | 87.8% | 61.5% | 65.6% | 43.2% |
| Professionalism | 88.9% | 79.7% | 89.4% | 50.3% |
| Leadership | 84.6% | 66.0% | 45.0% | 31.0% |
| Technology | 77.9% | 60.5% | 71.7% | 72.0% |
| Equity & Inclusion | 78.3% | 79.5% | 70.0% | 63.3% |
Source: National Association of Colleges and Employers. Data are from NACE’s 2024 Student Survey and Job Outlook 2025 survey. Importance ratings are the percentages of responding students and employers that, on a five-point scale, rated the respective competency either “very important” (4) or “extremely important” (5). Proficiency ratings are the percentages of responding students and employers that, on a five-point scale, rated recent graduates either “very proficient” (4) or “extremely proficient” (5) in the respective competency.
Kevin Gray is an associate editor at NACE. He can be reached at 
