The University expansion of the 1990's, and the questionable quality of some degree courses, is in danger of harming business confidence in graduates and creating legions of over-qualified bartenders.
Despite the number of graduate applicants having trebled over the past three years, a staggering four fifths of prospective employers report that the latest bumper crop of applicants lack the skills or knowledge for the role.
A third of prospective employers told The Association of Graduate Recruiters most recent survey that they were unable to meet their recruitment target this year, because of the poor quality of applicants.
And this is despite the fact that there are more 16-24-year olds out of work today, than at any time since records began.
The ongoing failure of employers to find suitable graduates is creating a vicious circle, with the number of applicants swelling year-on-year, generating a backlog of applications, which makes modern recruitment the equivalent of finding a needle in a haystack.
With one sixth of hiring firms receiving a dizzying 10,000 graduate applications in 2011, it is becoming prohibitively expensive for employers to review every graduate CV that lands in the inbox, and interview or assess every potentially suitable candidate.
As a result, many graduates are now forced to apply outside their skill-set and seek low-paid or temporary work, if they can find work at all.
It is little wonder many employers no longer regard University degrees as a litmus test of candidate suitability. Yet research shows 'previous experience' is an even worse predictor of future job success within a role.
Recent reports have confirmed the fear that employers are responding to this deluge of graduate applicants by simply rejecting any Uni-leavers who have not either worked for the company or within a related field in the past. We already know that the first place many recruiters choose to look in a CV is the 'career history' section.
This is a not only a travesty for the many excellent graduate job-seekers set to face rejection before they can even prove their suitability at an interview; we now know that this will harm employers ability to find suitable talent.
A series of studies have found that previous experience within similar roles merely reinforces ingrained habits and patterns of behavior, which means those recruited from similar past roles, scored the lowest on "adaptability" within a new role.
One of the key barriers to adaptability is 'cultural fit': the extent to which graduates can fit in with the cultural "DNA" of an organisation, something which differs massively among companies within the same sector.
Google and Apple may both make smart-phones, but they both have a radically different corporate 'identity', which may well prevent employees from one, making a smooth transition to the other.
Several studies have found that bad habits picked up from past jobs last far longer than any supposed benefits gained from previous experience, in terms of knowledge and skills.
Ironically, graduates who have already worked within a similar sector may need even more intensive training than inexperienced employees, who come without pre-conceived ideas or behavioral patterns, and are far easier to mould in the corporate image.
Individually-tailored assessments can illustrate the degree of synchrony between individual behaviors and company culture, allowing employers to measure candidate suitability, long before the interview. In other words, they tell you the things about a graduate that do not appear on their Career Experience.
Online internal-assessment tools can distil organisational culture from analysing brands, "mission statements" and rewards and promotions systems, before using social media metrics to mine the market for graduates with matching attributes or attitudes.
Sophisticated tools that measure practical skills and emotional intelligence can discover both a candidate's aptitude for a specific job and the likelihood that their behavioral styles will match that organisation's corporate culture.
Overall, the internet has increased the volume of unsuitable applications, by making it easier than ever to apply for a job and, in an economic downturn, the temptation to mass-mail CV's has never been stronger, and the resulting burden for recruiters will get even worse.
But the internet is also allowing companies to filter applicants earlier, with greater ease and greater sophistication than ever before.
Intelligent online software pre-empts failed applications by automatically analysing candidates and guiding them towards roles which match their profiles, freeing employers from the burden of sifting indiscriminately-emailed CV's.
OraRuth Rother, MD at HireMatch.me
