Rodney Turner

Towards a structural model connecting hard skills, soft skills and job conditions and the IS professional: the student perspective

The IS professional is a person endowed with certain professional skills and attributes usually formally obtained through an education process. The IS professional may also have formal skills in peripheral, non technical areas that may too be obtained through a formal education process. This is typical now in the education of IS students who are aspiring IS professional. In addition they come with a range of soft skills that may be attitudinal and influenced by life and work experiences. This paper suggests that these skills, attributes and work environment do not sit in isolation from each other, but interact in an as yet unmeasured way. How this happens with students studying towards an IS qualification is discussed here and a structural model is developed to explain the interactions. The value of this research is that a picture is presented that shows the interactions between these important elements in a quantitative way.

Information Systems and Technology Education: From the University to the Workplace

Since its beginnings, the growth and development of the information systems and technology industry has been limited and shaped by the availability of sufficient numbers of skilled technical and professional workers. Information Systems and Technology Education: From the University to the Workplace presents a multifaceted, global view of the human dynamics of education, supply, demand, and career development in the information systems and technology industry. Information Systems and Technology Education: From the University to the Workplace exhibits a range of cultural and stakeholder perspectives, focusing on the profession, the professionals, the perspectives of students and new graduates, and common issues and challenges ahead. Information Systems and Technology Education: From the University to the Workplace provides an improved synopsis to understand and meet the challenges of providing improved integration between the stakeholders in planning, and improving their contribution to educating and employing an optimal supply of information systems and technology graduates in the decades to come.

IS Skills of Business Students in Transition from Secondary to Tertiary Studies

This paper reports an analysis of IT software skills of some Victorian students on entry to first year tertiary studies in Business along with an analysis of their performance in “Office” type application assignments. The assumption that youth of today are IT literate on exit from school is questioned. Despite survey results suggesting a high level of skill in word processing and, to a lesser extent in spreadsheets, results on assignments in these areas may suggest students perceive their skills as being better than their actual performance. In crowded curricula, where there is pressure to include ever more material at the expense of more traditional topics, word processing and spreadsheet applications are sometimes suggested for removal. The study reported here finds little evidence that these topics should be removed from the curriculum at this stage.

A Structural Model of the Information Systems Professional

This paper presents a two level factor model describing gender differences in perceptions of the relative contribution and importance of education and skills required of new information systems (IS) professionals. Model development took account of technical skills found in most IS programs, other business oriented academic studies, and soft skills sought by employers in new graduates. The model also includes features of the working environment which influence the career progress of IS graduates. The model suggests the presence of contrasting, genderbased quantitative views of the relative importance of the respective variables to the education and professional development of IS professionals.

The use of spreadsheet software in China

Spreadsheet software packages find ready applications in Western nations with a high proportion of PCs having a spreadsheet package installed. In Taiwan there is a high degree of acceptance of this class of software. In the People′s Republic of China, however, there is not the same degree of acceptance with only a very small proportion of end users utilizing this important class of software. Discusses the present situation with respect to the use of spreadsheet software in China and presents several reasons why the level is low.