Are Foreign Trained Accounting Graduates Better Than Local Universities’ Graduates?
Hoo et al. (2009) concentrated their study on all graduates of Malaysian origin and found that Malaysian graduates who studied in tertiary educational institutions in Australia, U.K and USA are more trained to suit the needs of the industry than their locally trained counterparts. The finding of the study shows that employers perceived foreign trained Malaysian graduates to be superior in terms of communication skills (verbal and written), confidence/self image, computer/IT skills, creative/innovative skills, analytical research skills and flexibility/adaptability compared to locally trained graduates and graduates from local twinning programs. This shows that foreign trained accounting graduates are more marketable, as they meet the industry needs, compared to local graduates. This is a big challenge to the Schools of Accountancy in the local Universities; they just have to change the trend in a few years to come. Ting et al. (2011), however, found that employers' perception towards business graduates, especially local graduates, is quite satisfactory even though the graduates are still unable to achieve excellent level of performance, especially in term of soft skills required by employers. The study shows that competency skills such as written skills,leadership skills and innovative skills were critical areas that need special attention from local graduates. Business graduates from local private universities and overseas universities possess better leadership quality, which is preferred by employers, than business graduates from the local public universities. However, another study shows that local graduates from private universities seem to have diversity awareness and global understanding that meet employers' expectation than graduates from public universities (Ting et al., 2011).