Are you overqualified for your job?

Izam Said Ya'akub BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN

THE Centre for Strategic and Policy Studies (CSPS) will be conducting its biggest employment study to date, with a view to understanding the job satisfaction levels of Brunei's degree holders.

To be carried out online, the "University Graduates and Employment" survey study is expected to complete the picture of the country's labour status.

The sample will be drawn from Universiti Brunei Darussalam students and those who graduated abroad, as well as holders of bachelor's, master's and doctorate degrees.

Dr Diana Cheong, CSPS senior researcher, speaking at a press conference yesterday said the findings of the study would be crucial to policymakers.

"There hasn't been any studies to find out how many graduates are employed or unemployed, this will be the first national study that can give us benchmark findings for policymakers," she said.

Dato Paduka Dr Hj Ismail Hj Duraman, executive director of CSPS, said that in previous years the centre had focused on the macro aspect in its studies but would now be looking at the unemployment issue in detail.

"We did touch upon this unemployment before but in a small scope," he said.

The groups of particular interest to CSPS are in three categories: graduates who are currently employed, unemployed graduates, and those graduates who are employed but not entirely satisfied with their job.

"For graduates that are employed CSPS will be looking at the reasons why they are employed along with employment issues," said Dr Cheong.

She added that the centre would look at the backgrounds and reasons behind graduates who are unemployed and how long they have been without jobs. Graduates who are employed but are not satisfied with their jobs are considered to be a unique category, said Dr Cheong.

"We are trying to find a mismatch with qualification and employment or it could be (that) graduates are employed but they feel their jobs are significantly lower than their qualifications," she said.

"We hope that graduates understand that this CSPS endeavour will help with better employment policies in the future, with relevant stakeholders to know more about the situation and discuss about it," added Dr Cheong.

"As mentioned before in 2009, CSPS did touch on employment and conducted a very big scale unemployment study," said the senior researcher, however, "this was confined to jobseekers, about six to seven thousand people who registered at the labour department that they were searching for jobs," she said.

"This was a good study, but it was limited in a sense that the research population was only limited to jobseekers, primarily school leavers," said Dr Cheong. She explained that as such, there are not many graduates in that list.

"So this (new) study will complete the picture, with employment and unemployment issues amongst graduates, the higher educated," she said. The Brunei Times