Surfacing skills… in a strengths-based card-sorting session 

Title of case study

Surfacing skills… in a strengths-based card-sorting session   

School/Subject:

 

Chemistry  

Lecturer(s):

Smita Odedra   

Course:

BSC Honours Chemistry   

Student Level:

Chemistry Level 4 

Class size:

30

Location:

Classroom

Brief summary

In response to the Graduate Outcomes survey in the School of Chemistry, as well as broader feedback from students and staff perspectives, a tailored 2-hour interactive session was developed and implemented by the Careers & Employability Manager (CEM) for the final-year class.  

Teaching Staff Perspective 

Initial challenges that we aimed to address in our Employability provision:  

  • Students struggled to identify their future skills and how they could evidence these.  
  • Some also lacked confidence to apply for roles, feeling they’d be up against more experienced candidates.  
  • Students were unsure about what career routes suited them, and whether to stay in a discipline-based career or search more broadly. In-school support systems lack the expertise to advise students about non-chemistry careers. 
  • Within the final year class, there is a wide variety of backgrounds: some students have completed an industrial placement year or academic summer project, while others lacked chemistry-specific external work experience. 

CEM  Perspective 

A decrease in positive responses to the Graduate Voice questions within the Graduate Outcomes survey suggests that recent Chemistry graduates lack confidence and direction in their career progression.  This interactive 2-hour session sought to address this by combining reflection and discussion of Strengths with an exploration of the job market for Chemistry Graduates. This allowed them to connect their newly recognised Strengths to a wide range of Career Options (some discipline-based and some wider), thus building their self-confidence and career readiness.  

Objectives

  • Building confidence in students to be able to recognise their authentic best self. 
  • Building confidence in students to be open to exploring a range of graduate options to assess which job sectors/roles play to their strengths. 
  • Allow students space to reflect honestly on what they enjoy and dislike in study and other activities to feel unfettered to choose what activities to retain and what to set aside. 

What is done? 

  • Use of a card sorting activity focussing on Strengths that stimulates both self-reflection and peer discussion.  
  • The use of self-reflection tools encourages students to measure their learning along the way, using a systematic approach to develop good reflective practice habits that will enable them to navigate their long-term career path in an ever-changing labour market. 

The Strengths Profile Cards are produced by Cappfinity who have led in the development of Strengths-based recruitment methods for many UK graduate employers.  

 The Strengths Profile comprises of 4 quadrants:  

  1. Strengths defined as what I can do well plus love to do/energised when using this 
  2. Unrealised Strengths defined as what I could be good at in future plus love to do/am energised when using this 
  3. Learned Behaviours defined as what I can do well but not do enjoy using/find mentally draining 
  4. Weaknesses – I can't yet do well at plus I don't enjoy using/find mentally draining 

What works well?

Teaching Staff Perspective 

  • Sessions tailored specifically for class and timetabled as part of the course experience tends to lead to higher uptake than general careers sessions. Students felt more supported with this tailored support for them and more likely to commit to sessions.  
  • Students appreciated having expert careers advice built into the curriculum and targeted to their needs. Class reps reported that the CEM’s expertise was highly appreciated and respected by the class, and that they found the sessions very useful. 

CEM Perspective 

Students appear to engage enthusiastically with the card-sort activity. The ensuing discussions flow with good natured feedback to their peers – perhaps at level 4 they know their peers well enough to be able to comfortably give constructive and honest feedback.  

Benefits (students & staff)

Teaching Staff Perspective 

Benefits for students: 

  • More targeted support for their discipline feels more relevant. 
  • In the pursuit of connecting Strengths to a wide range of career options, the CEM devotes in the session for interaction with individual students, allowing them to ask specific questions and receive personalised support and advice. This is particularly important since the students have such a broad range of backgrounds (including past work experience) and career plans.  As the CEM has strong expertise in the graduate job market, the students can ask questions about different roles and sectors that their lecturers may not have insight into. The CEM will also promote the opportunity for 1 to 1 follow-up guidance appointments with a university careers consultant.  

Benefits for staff: 

  • Academic staff (class head & advisers) felt relieved of the pressures of being asked to provide one-to-one career guidance from students, which can be challenging with limited knowledge of the current graduate careers landscape. Signposting to dedicated services is a godsend, especially knowing that students will get the individual help that they need.  
  • It is very reassuring to have expertise of Careers, Employability & Opportunity embedded into the official timetable to ensure all students have equal opportunities to receive support. 

Challenges (students & staff)          

Timetabling can be tricky – final year can be very busy for students, especially with their projects & scheduled assessments – but we have tried to be flexible as possible around this to maximise benefits for students. 

What did you learn? 

CEM Perspective 

After many years of use of the Strengths Profile cards (with updated cards), careers practitioners find that card-sorting activities continue to resonate with students as a ‘hands-on practical tool that allows for a structured approach to reflection and discussion’.  

What advice would you give to others?

CEM Perspective 

My experience in delivering the Strengths session to the level 4 Chemistry students was of a lively session with students enjoying and benefitting from the opportunity for peer discussion and feedback. 

However, this activity can be equally mentally energising for more introverted or less socially confident students who prefer a focus on inner reflection rather than discussion. The activities allow for each participant to choose their preferred proportion of personal reflection versus peer interaction.