Involvement of graduates in information and communication technologies and quality of their employment

Abstract

Introduction. The urgent need to solve the employment issue for graduates of vocational educational institutions and for substantial insight into quality of employment, especially on the Russian unstable labor market, defines the aim of the study: to identify how using information and communication technologies in their work is related to the quality of graduates’ employment. The work scheme of the study includes both a complex of technological and psychological characteristics of information and communication technologies and characteristics of the quality of employment, including indicators of its instability, uncertainty and psychological well-being in the professional and work sphere. Materials and methods. The participants were 384 working young people (average age – 24 years, 49.5% male, 50.5% female); 216 had higher education, and 168 had secondary vocational education. At the time of the survey, all the participants had no more than three years of work experience after graduating. A special author's questionnaire was used which operationalized the components of the research design. Results. The study revealed that such components of employment quality as the opportunity to acquire new professional knowledge and skills and non-forced employment form an extensive set of connections with information and communication technologies. Among the aspects of these technologies, the greatest number of connections with the quality of employment is found in affective-motivational and operational components of involvement in technology (experiencing positive emotions, interest, pleasure from using them, activity and consistency in their use), absorption in technology, use of Internet search engines and platforms for video communication (Spearman's ρ in the range of 0.103–0.344, significance level from p = 0.05 to p = 0.001). Strengthening these characteristics may increase the quality of graduates’ employment and vice versa. Conclusion. The results allowed expanding ideas about the employment of Russian graduates. Indicators of employment quality were proposed; the correlating technological and psychological aspects of information and communication technologies were established, considered as components of human capital that help the graduates’ adaptation and professional development on the modern labor market.