1. Roberto M. Macatuggal, Ph.D.
Project Leader

2.  Saint Paul University Philippines
 Cagayan State University
 University of Saint Louis Tuguegarao
 Isabela State University
 Saint Mary’s University

3.  Unemployment or underemployment of BS
Computer Science and BS Information
Technology graduates is attributed to a host of
factors, foremost of which is the mismatch
between the competencies acquired by the
Information and Communication Technology
(ICT) graduates from the academe and those
required by industries

4.  To determine the profile of industries employing ICT graduates in Region 2 in terms of
◦ location;
◦ classification;
◦ number of ICT graduates employed;
◦ number of years in operation;
◦ nature;
◦ recruitment;
◦ hiring practices.
 To determine the competencies acquired from the academic preparation of ICT graduates in
Region 2 as perceived by the industry as to:
◦ hard skills and
◦ soft skills.
 To identify the factors accounting for the absorption/non-absorption of the ICT graduates in
Region 2.
 To determine the employment conditions of the ICT graduates in the industries in terms of:
◦ rank
◦ employment status.
 To determine the implications of the results of the study: on existing CHED policies,
standards, and guidelines; on the ICT curricula; on the quality and supply of ICT graduates
from Higher Education Institutions in Region 2; and, on the industries that hired them.

5.  Research Method = Descriptive
 Data gathering instrument = questionnaire
 Other supplementary methods = FGD,
documentary analysis
 Total Population = 342
 Sample = 115

6.  Industry Profile of Respondent Business
Establishments/Institutions
◦ Location and Classification of Business Establishments/
Institutions Employing ICT Graduates
Of the 115 business establishments / institutions, 44 or
38.26 percent are computer services; 15 or 13.04 percent,
banking, finance, and insurance; 13 or 11.30 percent,
retail trade; and 12 or 10.43 percent, personal and other
services. The rest of the business establishments /
institutions are classified as wholesale trade; government
institutions; communication services; accommodations,
cafés, and restaurants; education, training institutions;
health, community services; electricity, gas, water supply;
and, agriculture, forestry, fishing.

7.  Number of ICT Graduates Employed
One hundred four (104) or 90.43 percent of the 115
respondent business establishments / institutions
employ at most 10 ICT graduates only, broken down as
follows: Cagayan, 56 or 90.32 percent; Isabela, 28 or
87.50 percent; and, Nueva Vizcaya, 20 or 95.24 percent.
The rest of the business establishments / institutions
employ more than 10 ICT graduates.

8.  Number of Years in Operation
Majority (81 or 70.44 percent) of the 115 business
establishments / institutions surveyed have been in
operation only for at most 10 years. In Cagayan, 40 or
64.52 percent of the business establishments /
institutions fall within this category. In Isabela and
Nueva Vizcaya, 29 or 90.63 percent and 15 or 71.43
percent, respectively, fall within this category. The rest
of the business establishments / institutions fall within
the remaining categories of 11 – 15 years and 21 years
and above.

9.  Nature of the Business Establishment /
Institution
As gleaned from the table, majority (73 or
63.48 percent) of the respondent business
establishments / institutions are ICT-related.
In Cagayan, 33 or 53.33 percent are ICT-
related, likewise with 23 or 71.88 percent of
the business establishments / institutions in
Isabela. Seventeen (17) or 80.95 percent of
the business establishments / institutions
surveyed in Nueva Vizcaya are also ICT-
related. The rest are non-ICT related
business establishments / institutions.

10.  Recruitment Practices
The respondent business establishments/institutions’
three most common ways of recruiting ICT graduates
are through walk-in applicants; referrals of employees;
and advertisement through print, broadcast, and online
media

11.  Hiring Practices
Ranked according to their prevalence, the most
common hiring practices by the respondent
business establishments/institutions include the
following: applicant submits application letter,
undergoes interview, submits clearances (NBI,
police, etc.), takes practical examination, written
examination, and submits a medical certificate.
The sequence of requiring the ICT applicants to
undergo these procedures may vary from
business establishment/institution to another.

12.  Hard Skills
Categorized by type of hard skills, all the respondent
business establishments / institutions in the three
provinces of Region 2 generally perceive the ICT
graduates employed by them to possess the
important hard skills except to customize packed
software applications for clients which they perceive as
moderately important only.

13. Soft Skills
 The respondent business establishments / institutions
perceive the ICT graduates employed by them to possess
three very important soft skills, namely: relate to clients
on a business level, providing advice to clients, and
demonstrate ability to understand how the organization
works.
 Categorized by location, all the respondent business
establishments/ institutions perceive the ICT graduates
employed by them to possess all the soft skills which they
consider as important in relation to the jobs for which they
are hired.

14. Factors Accounting For The Absorption/Non
Absorption Of The ICT Graduates In Region
2
* Preference of Business Establishments /
Institutions for Particular Higher Education
Institutions in Region 2 As Sources of Hired
ICT Employees
- On the whole, the respondent business
establishments / institutions prefer to hire ICT
graduates from the following three Higher Education
Institutions in the region: Saint Paul University,
University of Saint Louis Tuguegarao, and Cagayan
State University, all located in Cagayan.

15. Preference of Business Establishments /
Institutions for Particular Courses in Hiring
ICT Employees
Fifty seven (57) or 49.57 percent of the 115 total
respondents have no particular preference as to what
ICT course the graduates have finished. However,
forty five (45) or 39.13 percent of the employers prefer
graduates of Bachelor of Science in Information
Technology (BSIT), with graduates of Bachelor of
Science in Computer Science (BSCS) as the second
preference.

16. Preference of Business Establishments /
Institutions for Particular Gender in Hiring
ICT Employees
The respondent business establishments / institutions
in Cagayan and Nueva Vizcaya have no particular
preference with respect to the gender of the ICT
employees they hire, but those in Isabela prefer female
ICT graduates. On the whole however, the respondent
business establishments / institutions are not particular
about the gender of the ICT employees they hire as
expressed by 65 or 56.52 percent of them.

17. Preference of Business Establishments /
Institutions for Particular Religious Affiliation
in Hiring ICT Employees
The respondent business establishments / institutions who
are particular with the religious affiliation of their ICT
employees prefer to hire Roman Catholics. This
explains in part why they prefer graduates of Saint Paul
University, University of Saint Louis Tuguegarao, Saint
Mary’s University, and University of La Salette.
However, majority (70 or 60.87 percent) of them have
no particular preference for the religious affiliation of
the ICT graduates that they hire.

18. Preference of Business Establishments /
Institutions for Particular Ethnic Background
in Hiring ICT Employees
Majority of the respondent business establishments /
institutions are not particular with regard to the ethnic
background of the ICT graduates that they hire, as
indicated by 72 or 62.61 percent of them. However as
gleaned in the table above, the business
establishments/ institutions in Isabela are particular
with the ethnic background of the ICT graduates which
they recruit. Isabela is predominantly Ilocano and
Tagalog speaking, with some Ibanag speaking
communities.

19. Preference of Business Establishments /
Institutions for Particular Civil Status in
Hiring ICT Employees
 In general, the respondent business establishments /
institutions prefer to hire single ICT graduates as
indicated by 59 or 51.30 percent of them, but 5 or 4.35
percent prefer married applicants.
 As gleaned from the table, 51 or 44.35 percent of the
respondent business establishments / institutions have
no particular preference as to the civil status of the
ICT graduates which they hire.

20.  In terms of Rank:
Rank-and-file (1-2 ICT graduates) : Out of 72 Respondents:
Cagayan = 21; Isabela = 7; Nueva Vizcaya = 3
First-line Managers (1-2 ICT graduates): Out of 20 Respondents:
Cagayan = 7; Isabela = 1; Nueva Vizcaya = 6
Middle Managers (1-2 ICT graduates): Out of 15 Respondents:
Cagayan = 7; Isabela = 1; Nueva Vizcaya = 4
Top Managers (1-2 ICT graduates): Out of 8 Respondents:
Cagayan = 3; Isabela = 1; Nueva Vizcaya = 3

21.  In terms of Employment Status:
Contractual: (Out of 45 ICT graduates)
Cagayan = 24; Isabela = 4; Nueva Vizcaya = 9
Probationary: (Out of 19 ICT graduates)
Cagayan = 7; Isabela = 5; Nueva Vizcaya = 4
Regular/Permanent: (Out of 51 graduates)
Cagayan = 17; Isabela = 14; Nueva Vizcaya = 6

22. On CHED Policies, Standards, and Guidelines
 The Commission on Higher Education Memorandum Order
(CMO) in force which produced the ICT graduates who
participated in this survey was the CM0 #25, series of 2000.
Article I, Section 1 of the CMO envisions the ICT graduate to:
 have undergone training in abstract and analytical processes;
 have developed personal and social values;
 have acquired technical skills;
 be grounded in appropriate concepts and principles; and
 be adaptive to the work environment.

23. Results of this study point to some deficiencies in the
abovementioned competencies which a graduate should have
acquired from the ICT course. This may imply that the Higher
Education Institutions have not really given serious consideration of
the CMO#25 provisions to be able to raise the chances for
employment of their ICT graduates. This was verbalized by the
representatives of business establishments/institutions during the
round-table discussions held in Tuguegarao City, Echague
(Isabela), and Bayombong (Nueva Vizcaya) wherein they cited in
particular the weaknesses of the ICT graduates in hard and soft
skills, especially programming and application systems
development, human relations skills and communication skills.
The same weaknesses were cited by Gilleard, when he said, “…no
matter how technically brilliant you are, even in the IT industry you
need good interpersonal skills."

24.  As expressed in self-administered interview guides given
to the heads of the ICT programs of the top three Higher
Education Institutions from where the business
establishments prefer to hire their ICT employees, they
have adequate laboratory facilities and library resources
to support instruction, faculty that are educationally
qualified with a few having industry certification and
immersion.

25. On the ICT Curricula
 The curriculum is the blue-print of a plan on how to develop the
competencies of the ICT graduate to make him/her employable by
Industry, and to make him/her locally and globally competitive. If
there are some deficiencies in the curriculum, these would
invariably show in its graduates. The deficiencies of the ICT
graduates in terms of the hard and soft skills which they are
supposed to have acquired before graduation, reveals a weakness
in the curriculum that needs to be addressed.
 In an interview conducted with the Heads of the ICT programs of the
top three schools from which employers prefer to get the ICT that
they hire, they claim that at least half of their faculty are graduates
of Master of Science in Information Technology (MSIT) or Master in
Information Technology (MIT) in compliance with CHED-CMO #25.

26. The study team also reviewed the curricula of the ICT
programs of the said schools to verify whether there are
indeed subjects that develop the competencies of the
ICT students as envisioned in CMO #25, series of 2000.
The study team noted that the curricula differed among
the top three schools especially in terms of their free
electives, although the minimum mandatory subjects
were included. In particular the curricula of the top three
schools were able to satisfy the provisions of Article VI,
Section 16, in terms of basic non-ITE core topics, basic
ITE core topics, computer science and IT topics.

27.  The student On-the-Job Training (OJT) is one of the provisions
being implemented by tertiary schools to prepare the ICT graduate
for the world of work. In fact, if the OJT is well placed, it may serve
as an avenue for the ICT student to be eventually absorbed in
Industry. However, student On-the-Job Training (OJT) is not
explicit in the curricula of some of the top three schools identified as
sources of the ICT employees of Industry. For the schools that do
not have specific provisions for OJT, they have integrated this in the
subject Systems Analysis and Design where the students are
required to look for a business establishment / institution where they
can do research for the development of a proposed application
software which they would eventually turn over for its use as a
token of gratitude for allowing the ICT student to comply with the
requirements of the said subject.

28. Industry immersion is nil due to the absence of a real ICT Industry
in the region. However, some of the schools such as Saint Paul
University Philippines, University of Saint Louis Tuguegarao,
University of La Salette, and Saint Mary’s University have
succeeded in establishing linkages with ICT companies in the
United States, Singapore, Malaysia, Taiwan, India, and Korea
where these schools send their faculty for immersion and ICT
students for OJT. These ICT companies however conduct proper
screening of student applicants for OJT through local recruitment
agencies and only those who pass are accepted for 6 months
immersion. For the lucky ICT students who qualify, they shoulder
expenses for passport, visa and round-trip air fare, but they receive
monthly allowances from the foreign companies that accept them.

29.  Quality and Supply of ICT Graduates From
Higher Education Institutions in Region 2
The representatives from the academe claim that
they do train their ICT students to acquire the hard and
soft skills needed by the business
establishments/institutions. However, the results of
this study reveal that the ICT graduates are short of the
required competencies in terms of hard and soft skills,
which they are supposed to have acquired before
graduation. Producing ICT graduates without
establishing mechanisms/ procedures for assessing
their competence will certainly affect their quality as
well as their number. Or, even if such mechanisms /
procedures are available the extent of their
implementation will affect the quality and supply of ICT
graduates. This implies that there would be more ICT
graduates who may lack the confidence to get
employed immediately upon graduation due to
inadequate hard and soft skills.

30. On The Industries That Hired The ICT Graduates
 The study reveals that the business establishments/institutions
generally do not hire ICT graduates on the basis of the ICT course
they finished, their gender/sex, civil status, religion, and ethnic
background.
 Absorbing ICT graduates who are not adequately prepared with the
competencies required by the business establishments/institutions
would mean additional cost for retraining or retooling them. That
these business establishments/institutions have to spend to retool
the ICT graduate hired by them even with inadequate hard and soft
skills, was actually expressed during the industry-academe round-
table discussion by an employer who claims that he sends his ICT
employees to Manila for training or invites a trainor from Manila to
empower his ICT employees. This feedback affirms earlier findings
in the study conducted by Qayyum Parker (2003) who cited that
one of the obstacles to skills development include the high cost of
training learners, and the risk involved if learners fail to meet
training objectives or leave the country once training is completed.

31.  The Information and Communications Technology Industry has
been developing very rapidly to the point that, either the academe or
business establishments/institutions can hardly cope with these
developments, causing a possible mismatch between the
competencies and skills of ICT graduates as acquired through their
academic preparations and those needed by business
establishments/institutions that employed them. This study was
therefore undertaken in Region 2 to verify empirically whether this
mismatch between the acquired competencies of the ICT graduates
from Higher Education Institutions within the region and the
competencies needed by business establishments/institutions in the
region that employed them does exist.

32. The following conclusions are arrived at, drawn from the findings of this
study:
 No real ICT industry exists in Region 2. The bulk of employers of ICT
graduates are establishments/institutions located mainly in Cagayan,
Isabela, and Nueva Vizcaya that are engaged in IT-related business
activities, most especially computer services. These business
establishments/institutions that have been mostly in existence for 5 years
or less employ at most 10 ICT graduates recruited mostly as walk-in
applicants who submit application letters and hired after demonstrating
their hard skills.
 The business establishments/institutions consider important the following
hard skills which the ICT graduates must possess: programming, software
installation, hardware troubleshooting and maintenance, installing
computer networks, systems and database administration, and systems
integration.

33.  The following soft skills are important to the business
establishments/institutions, which ICT graduates must likewise
possess to complement their hard skills: communication skills,
human relations skills, understanding the nature and operation of
the organization where they are connected, and understanding
the needs of customers/clients.
 The ICT graduates have not adequately acquired through their
academic preparation the hard and soft skills desired by the
business establishments/institutions that hired them. This implies
that the Higher Education Institutions where these ICT graduates
came from have not exposed them extensively to in-school and
OJT experiences that would allow them to develop these hard
and soft skills, although these institutions have complied with the
minimum requirements of CHED-CMO #25 for which reason their
programs have been issued recognition. This would also reflect
on the curriculum that the ICT graduates have pursued in their
chosen careers, which may not really contain all the required hard
and soft skills to be developed and therefore need to be revisited.
Because of this problem, there is a need to retool the ICT
graduates to fit the demands of the jobs for which they have been
hired and this would entail additional cost on the part of the
business establishments/institutions.

34.  The business establishments/institutions do not have a particular
preference for certain ICT graduates, neither are they particular of
the sex, civil status, ethnic background, or religion of the ICT
graduates they hired. However, whether it is purely coincidental
or implied, the number one Higher Education Institution from
which the business establishments/institutions prefer to hire their
ICT employees is a Catholic school perhaps because of the
underlying presumption that they have desirable work values and
attitudes.
 The size and volume of business of the
establishments/institutions limit the number of ICT graduates that
they are capable of hiring, most of which number 10 or less,
contractual, and belonging to the rank-and-file.

35.  The faculty teaching ICT courses should continue to improve their
competencies, not only by earning the appropriate master’s
degrees, but by attending trainings and seminars to update
themselves on the latest trends in Information and
Communications Technology, obtaining industry certifications,
and immersing themselves in the ICT Industry.
 The heads of the ICT programs should revisit their curricula and
determine in which subject areas the hard and soft skills of their
graduates need strengthening based on the results of this study
in order to increase their chances for employment.

36.  The heads of the ICT programs should consider adding
enrichment courses or free electives that would further develop
the teamwork skills of the ICT graduates, such as Human
Relations, and provide them with managerial and entrepreneurial
skills through the inclusion of management and entrepreneurship
in the ICT curricula which would be useful if the graduate decides
to establish his/her own ICT – related business.
 The Higher Education Institutions should consider
institutionalizing and strengthening their On-the-Job Training for
their ICT students both locally and abroad through well defined
policies and procedures and industry linkages thereby providing
them with ample experiences that would hone their hard and soft
skills.

37.  The Higher Education Institutions should institute mechanisms
and procedures which would effectively ascertain that its ICT
graduates have acquired the hard and soft skills needed by
business establishments/institutions that would eventually hire
them, such as conducting both theoretical and practical
examinations to test their hard and soft skills, and requiring those
who do not pass to take remedial lessons.
 The Higher Education Institutions should establish strong linkages
with chambers of commerce, at least locally, and initiate periodic
dialogues with them in order to get feedback on what
competencies they require the ICT graduates to possess in order
to get hired by them.

38.  The Commission on Higher Education should consider making
Industry immersion of the faculty mandatory in future CMOs as a
requirement for the recognition of the ICT courses of the Higher
Education Institution.
 The Commission on Higher Education should consider supporting
financially or sponsoring pre-certification trainings of both ICT
faculty and students to prepare them for Industry certification.
The ICT faculty’s passing the Industry certifications such as those
given by Microsoft, CISCO, Philnits, and the like, will certainly
raise the quality of the graduates produced by the school. For the
students, passing the Industry certification would earn them a
valuable qualification which is recognized and required by
business establishments/institutions worldwide.

39. THANK YOU!