- Title
- Social media influence on graduateness skills and employability: the case of historically disadvantaged institutions.
- Creator
- Murire, Obrain T
- Subject
- Social media--Influence
- Date Issued
- 2021-09
- Date
- 2021-09
- Type
- Doctoral theses
- Type
- text
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/10353/20383
- Identifier
- vital:45660
- Description
- Orientation: The graduate labour force is increasing as more students are graduating from historically disadvantaged institutions (HDIs). The lack of graduateness attributes amongst final year students has in part contributed to the high rate of graduate unemployment in South Africa. Social media have been identified as a solution as more than 95percent of young adults enrolled at historically disadvantaged institutions in South Africa are using mobile technology. Research Purpose: The purpose of the study was to develop a model to enhance graduateness skills and employability through the use of social media amongst final year students at HDIs in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. Motivation for the study: The study is of utmost importance as it has developed an artefact that investigated the influence of social media use on graduateness skills and employability amongst students at HDIs in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. Additionally, students at HDIs are an interesting theoretical sample due to them being an under-researched sample. The HDIs context has received scant focus and attention. In theory, the link between psychological constructs (such as graduateness skills and employability) with a technology dimension especially within our South African context and internationally remains unexplored. Research approach/design and method: Social Media Integration and Career EDGE models were used as a theoretical foundation in this study. This study adopted design science as a research method, where a mixed-method technique was used to collect data from final year students and human resource practitioners. The sequential exploratory design was chosen as it offers an iterative process of developing an artefact that can be tested within a larger population. The questionnaire for interviews and the survey were developed after a thorough literature review and pilot study had been conducted. The questionnaire was distributed to all the participants, of which 411 responded, resulting in a response rate of 93percent; and 15 interviews were conducted. Descriptive statistics were used to analyse the data and correlations test were used to determine associations between variables. Main findings: The study found that there is a significant direct effect of social media use on graduateness skills; there is a significant direct effect of graduateness skills on perceived employability. Graduateness skills have a significant mediating effect on the relationship between social media use and perceived employability. The results also revealed that the direct effect of social media use on perceived employability does not exist. Practical/managerial implications: The study shows that there is a need for the government to devise policies that set guidelines for HR practitioners to follow when recruiting and selecting graduates. Contribution/value-add: The research study contributes to the growing body of research as it utilised a mixed-method approach to explore lived experiences. The Graduate Employability Social Media Model (GESM Model) is the main contribution made by this study to the body of knowledge in both the fields of Information Systems and Business Management.
- Description
- Thesis (PhD) (Information Systems) -- University of Fort Hare, 2021.
- Format
- computer
- Format
- online resource
- Format
- application/pdf
- Format
- 1 online resource (222 pages)
- Format
- Publisher
- University
- Publisher
- Faculty of Management and Commerce
- Language
- English
- Rights
- University of Fort Hare
- Rights
- All Rights Reserved
- Rights
- Open Access
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UFH Department of Information Systems
| Thumbnail | File | Description | Size | Format | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| View Details Download | SOURCE1 | Murire_201101379_Information Systems.pdf | 3 MB | Adobe Acrobat PDF | View Details Download |