Introduction

Introduction

Students with good interaction skills can markedly increase their chances of finding jobs in the ICT field. Their future jobs are typically done in work groups internally and internationally, and often in projects with close co-operation with the customer.

There seems to be no doubt about the demand for interaction skills for future ICT specialists. The sample interviews of recruitment staff within the ICT sector are in line with Rouse's statement  (2014) that "IT organizations aim to employ individuals possessing both hard and soft skills. However, the demand for the latter is increasing, especially among those in IT leadership roles. This demand is due to a "soft skills gap" - - , as well as the increasing need to align IT with business goals."

A recent study conducted by the Finnish Union of professional business graduates (see Mikkonen 2012), which included 181 ICT BBA graduates, shows that interaction skills are, indeed, very much needed in their work (56 % of respondents claim that these skills are needed very much), but only 3 % of them stated that they had developed very much of these skills during their studies. A lot of interaction skills were needed from 38 % of the respondents while 33 % considered that they had developed these skills a lot during their studies. 

There seems to be a clear gap between the interaction skills' need at work and their development during studies: further 49 % claim that their education developed these skills moderately while alltogehter 89 % state that they need these skills a lot or  very much at their work (table 1).

The need for a high level of emotional intelligence and soft skills among IT professionals was also identified  by Lewis et al (2008). An Austrian study (Riedl and Zwettler, 2014) revealed the increasing significance attributed to soft skills among IT experts among which qualities such independence, motivation and readiness for action were rated to be most valuable.

Table 1: Veratile interaction skills (Mikkonen 2012)
Red: My education developed my skills
Blue: I need at my work

The purpose of this paper is to investigate closer what the interaction skills actually are. There seems to be wide understanding that employees need to have good interactional skils. However, there seems to be a wide variety of definitions and no international agreement on what these skills actually are (here some literature review needed). Could the gap between the required and actual skills lay in the fact that students and employers define them differently?

Main research questions:

1) What are current interaction skills required from ICT graduates?
(Answers found by staff interviews, job ads; literature review )
2) How do students define interaction skills?
(Student questionnaires)
3 Are they different from employers definions?
(Analysis of the answers, comparison of students replies, job ads, employee interviews)
4) Are there any differences in interaction skill definitions and demands between Austria and Finland?
(Analysis of the answers, comparison of students replies, job ads, employee interviews)