Building student resilience for graduate work readiness

While resilience theory has its roots in studies of individual mental dysfunction, it has evolved to focus beyond the individual to recognise the impact of social and environmental influences. King et al. (J Organ Behav 37:782–786, 2016) described how there have been four waves of development in resilience theory. The first wave focused on the factors and characteristics that enable individuals to overcome adversity through self-esteem, self-efficacy, and optimism. This evolved into a second wave whereby the investigation turned to how certain factors contribute to resilience, with a third wave focusing on the development of interventions to build resilience. The final wave highlighted genetic, neurological, and developmental factors relevant to resilience capability. Studies to date have looked at at-risk youth, management of athletes and military personnel, with limited focus on resilience in the workplace or on how to develop resilience in new graduates to function effectively, not least within a complex workplace. While resilience is acknowledged as a complex construct (and difficult to assess), universities are recognising its importance and are beginning to invest in research and services aimed at building student resilience. In focusing on the question of developing student resilience as an employability capability, this chapter takes a systems approach to explore the various layers that contribute towards student resilience. The research provided identifies two pivotal transition points in a student’s life - entry into university life, and departure from university into the workplace (Turner et al. in High Educ Res Develop 36:386–400, 2017a). Whilst these pivotal points relate to two distinct time periods of a student experience, the interrelationship between the two requires attention by universities to graduate students as employable scholars.