Responsibility of the University in Employability: Development and validation of a measurement scale across five studies

• Published date: 01 January 2021
• Author: Paula Álvarez‐González,María Jesús López‐Miguens,Gloria Caballero
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/beer.12319
• Date: 01 January 2021

Business Ethics, Env & Resp. 2021;30:143–156. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/beer  

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  143© 2020 John Wiley & Sons Ltd

1 | INTRODUCTION

Although employability is ultimately the individual responsibility

of the student, it also depends on other determinants such as the

university. Unive rsities are partially resp onsible for the impact that

their students generate in their social, local, and global environment

(Peric, 2012; Que zada, 2011; Vallaeys, de la C ruz, & Sasia, 20 09). They

also have the capa city and potent ial to prepare stu dents to enter

into society as responsible citizens contributing to sustainable devel-

opment, provi ding them with the necess ary qualities for th eir future

employment (Bo den & Nedeva, 2010; B ridgstock & Jac kson, 2019;

Cole & Tibby, 2013; Herbe rt, Rothwell, G lover, & Lambert , 2020;

Quezada, 2011) and, consequently, develop their employability (Sin

& Amaral, 2017). Pri oritising employabilit y has become a central ob-

jective of unive rsities (Sin & Amaral, 2017). B ased on research in the

field of organi sational responsibilit y (Hall & Berardino, 200 6; Haski-

Leventhal, Pour nader, & McKinnon, 2017; Kim, 2 019), we define

Responsibilit y of the University in Empl oyability (RUE) as the abilit y

of the universit y to transmit a set of gene ral and specific va lues, skills

and mindsets and to implement matching activities with employers,

insofar as they pr omote the employabilit y of future graduates.

Many stakehold ers are interested in RUE. So ciety wants univer-

sities to produce q ualified stu dents to promote s ustainable h uman

development (Br idgstock & Jack son, 2019; Herber t et al., 2020;

Trullas, Simo, Fusalba , Fito, & Sallan, 2018). G overnment entit ies

want to see the resu lts of their investments in uni versities, seeking

the integratio n of graduates into the l abour market and t he avoidance

of unemployment (C aballero, Vázquez, & Quintá s, 2015). Graduates

want to be employed to m eet their goals an d personal aspi rations

(Van der Heijden , Boon, Van der Kli nk, & Meijs, 20 09). Employers

demand gradu ates with domain-relevant k nowledge as well as qual-

ities such as flex ibility, adapta bility, teamwork, a nd empathy with

their environm ent (Dacre Pool, Qu alter, & Sewell, 2014; Nicolesc u

& Nicolescu, 2019). In shor t, although many stakehol ders are inter-

ested in RUE, for u niversities it r epresents on e of the main objec-

tives of the Bolog na Process within the frame work of the European

Higher Educati on Area (Paris Co mmuniqué, 2018). In th is way, uni-

versities have a grow ing social responsibilit y. This can be concei ved

as a change in the mana gement of universities whic h falls under the

remit of corpora te social respons ibility (Neave, 2 000; Scot t, 2003;

Shattock, 20 03). As orga nisations with a so cial orientat ion, uni-

versities have cor porate respons ibilities toward t heir internal an d

Received: 2 Augu st 2019 

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  Revised: 10 August 2 020 

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  Accepted: 19 August 20 20

DOI: 10 .1111/bee r.12319

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

Responsibility of the University in Employability: Development

and validation of a measurement scale across five studies

María Jesús López-Miguens1 | Gloria Caballero1 | Paula Álvarez-González2

1Department of Business Organization

and Marketing , School of Economic s and

Business, Un iversity of Vigo, V igo, Spain

2Department of Business Organization

and Marketing, Faculty of Economics

and Business Administration, University

of Santiago de Co mpostela, Santi ago de

Compostela, Spain

Correspondence

María Jesús López-Miguens, Department

of Business Or ganization and Mar keting,

School of Econo mics and Business , Rúa

Leonardo Da V inci, s/n, Universit y of Vigo,

Vigo, Spain.

Email: chusl@uvigo.es

Funding information

Social Counc il of the Universit y of Vigo

Abstract

This paper develops an d validates, at a confirm atory level, a second- order scale to

measure Responsibili ty of the Universit y in Employability (RU E). First, the li terature

on the component s of RUE is explored and a formative concept ual model is proposed

to underpin its me asurement using ext ant research in the f ield of organisation al re-

sponsibility and e mployability. At the empir ical level, the secon d-order RUE model

considers the reput ation of the universit y, the teaching staf f, and the matching ac-

tivities with emp loyers as components of RUE. This model is ba sed on five empirical

studies. The fi rst is a small-sampl e study based on the o pinions of expert s (n = 5)

and the rest are base d on representati ve samples of universit y students (n = 8 16,

n = 1,082, n = 1,08 8, and n = 1,203). A very good fit bet ween model and data were

revealed (CFI = 0.975; RMSEA = 0.039; standardised X2 = 2.676). The results indicate

that matching activ ities with employer s and teaching staf f generate more RUE than

university repu tation. Guideli nes are offered for ma naging the responsib ility of the

university in employability.