Developing career management competencies among undergraduates and the role of work-integrated learning

ABSTRACT This paper explores undergraduate capabilities in career self-management and the influence of work-integrated learning (WIL). Career management competencies are an important aspect of individual employability and impact on wellbeing, graduate job attainment and long-term career success. Enhanced competencies among graduates can assist Faculty in achieving strong employment outcomes and support industry partners who wish to employ graduates able to self-manage their career pathways effectively amid flatter organisational structures and greater employee mobility. Our findings indicate that business undergraduates at one UK and one Australian university consider themselves reasonably proficient in career self-management yet variations exist across the different dimensions of self-awareness, opportunity awareness, decision-making learning and transition learning. Participation in work placements and study and employment characteristics influenced certain elements of career self-management. Our study highlights the importance of nurturing career management competencies in undergraduates and we discuss strategies, particularly in relation to WIL, which may promote effective career self-management.

to produce graduates who are both adequately skilled and adept at making informed career choices, navigating a range of job opportunities and articulating their strengths and abilities (Coetzee and Beukes 2010). University-wide efforts in fostering graduate employability must therefore extend to the development of career management competencies.
Career management competencies span the formulation of informed career goals, labour market understanding, job search skills, the identification of relevant learning opportunities (Bridgstock 2009;Eby, Butts, and Lockwood 2003;King 2004) and professional networking (see Gerard 2012;de Janasz and Forret 2007). For undergraduates, proficiency in career management enhances self-efficacy (Raelin et al. 2011), encouraging individuals to understand the expectations of their chosen profession and to identify employment pathways early in their career (Watts 2006). Such capabilities underpin lifelong learning to develop and maintain employability among graduates (see Berdrow and Evers 2011) and are likely to enhance graduate employment prospects (Purcell et al. 2013).
However, career management competencies remain under-explored among undergraduates in respect of their precise nature, extent of development and determinants (Watts 2006). Enhancing current understanding will assist in identifying areas where undergraduates are less proficient and inform strategies for their development, an imperative given the documented gaps in graduate mastery of such competencies (Bridgstock 2009;Laker and Laker 2007). Watts (2005) suggests that the development of career management competencies in HE is not adequately harnessed with concerns surrounding the extent to which existing approaches engage students (Stevenson and Clegg 2011). Work-integrated learning (WIL) has been considered as an alternative, or complementary, platform for the successful development of career management competencies (see e.g. Pegg et al. 2012;Watts 2006). WIL represents the intersection of theoretical and practice learning (Orrell 2011) and is a prominent aspect of the interface between university and industry. Also referred to as experiential learning, cooperative education and work-based learning, it exists in many forms, including practicums, fieldwork, placements, internships and client-based projects. Within HE, WIL provides students with an opportunity to integrate academic learning with 'real-world' experience and encourages both industry feedback on individual capability and self-reflection (see Smith 2012). It can, therefore, aid in developing student's awareness of the labour market and possible career pathways, as well as providing the necessary exposure to a relevant work setting to facilitate informed career choices (Usher 2012).
We sought to develop current understanding by addressing three research objectives: (i) to gauge the extent of career management competencies among undergraduates; (ii) to evaluate the role of WIL in the development of undergraduate career management competencies; and (iii) to assess the variation in career management competencies by individual characteristics. We addressed the research objectives using data collected from business undergraduates studying in two different universities, one based in the UK (N = 136) and the other Australia (N = 344). Participation in WIL, for the purpose of this study, is the completion of a work placement as part of a student's academic studies. We have structured the article to first provide a background review of relevant literature on career self-management, with a focus on undergraduates and new graduates. We follow this with an outline of the study's methodology, presentation of the results and then discuss implications of the findings for practitioners.

Background
What are career management competencies?
Career management encompasses career planningthe identification of career goals and pathways for achieving themand career developmentthe acquisition of skills and competencies to achieve one's aspirations (see Ayranci and Oge 2011). Smith et al. (2009) highlight the continuous nature of career management with individuals progressing through cyclical stages of self-awareness and resolution of career-related issues. Career management competencies are, therefore, inextricably linked with professional development planning (Watts 2006), with self-reflection being integral to the successful development of both (Pegg et al. 2012).
There are a range of conceptual frameworks summarising the competencies considered important for self-managing one's career. An established and widely used model (Watts 2006) is DOTS (Peterson, Sampson, and Reardon 1991) which underpins much of career management provision in HE providers (Evans 2008). The model comprises four dimensions: development of decision-making skills; opportunity awareness; transition learningsuch as job-search skillsand self-awareness. Later, King (2004) developed a framework of career management competencies that comprised positioning, influence and boundary management behaviours, the development of which ensures individuals have the necessary contacts, skills and experience for their chosen career. Hawkins and Winter's (1995) framework highlights self-awareness, self-promotion, access to opportunities, action planning, networking, decision-making, negotiation, political awareness, coping with uncertainty, development focus and transfer skills.
The more recent literature emphasises establishing informed career goals and understanding local labour market conditions (Eby, Butts, and Lockwood 2003). Bridgstock (2009), for example, presents a model of graduate employability which highlights the importance of developing career management in undergraduates, including capabilities in labour market analysis, identifying work and learning opportunities, negotiating recruitment processes and professional networking.  empirically validated six constructs of career competencies: reflection on motivation, self-profiling, work exploration, reflection on qualities, networking and career control. In Australia, the national Blueprint for Career Development framework was introduced to underpin career development programmes and comprises 11 competencies across personal management, learning and work exploration and career building (see Hooley et al. 2013).

The importance of career management competencies
On an individual level, career management helps to develop understanding of career options (Miller and Liciardi 2003) and encourages reflection on career choices and pathway (Greenbank 2011). Drawing on the work of Holmes (2001), career management capabilities also contribute to the development of one's identity, as ' … the type of work we do determines our social standing and status' (Evans 2008, 47). In the long term, there is evidence that career management competencies positively influence employee wellbeing, self-efficacy, goal achievement, resilience, personal growth and work-engagement (Akkermans, Schaufelia, et al. 2013). Adamson, Doherty, and Viney (1998) stressed the relationship between effective career self-management and 'the continuous construction and maintenance of a healthy self-concept, congruent with individuals' changing strengths and weaknesses, shifting beliefs and attitudes and future aspirations' (257).
There is broad acknowledgement and documented evidence that career management influences individual employability (Potgieter 2012;Raemdonck et al. 2012) and 'how the individual perceives his or her opportunities in the labour market' (Berntson and Marklund 2007, 281). There is evidence, although Bridgstock (2009) argues somewhat limited, that skills in accessing and using relevant information on career roles, job applications and labour markets will positively impact on employment outcomes (Krug and Rebien 2011;Pegg et al. 2012). Increasingly competitive graduate labour markets (AAGE 2013;Accenture 2013;AGR 2013;Purcell et al. 2013), and developing patterns of global student mobility (IEAA 2012) mean that effective career self-management has become ever more critical for graduate career success (Segers and Inceoglu 2012).
Career management competency is also important for long-term career progression. In the context of increasingly complex and fragmented career paths (see Akkermans, Schaufelia, et al. 2013) and a focus on career self-reliance (see Smith and Kruger 2008), career management skills are required to generate and maintain career momentum, reduce the likelihood of poor person-job fit (Heaton, McCracken, and Harrison 2008) and enable personal development (Whitelaw 2010). Furthermore, Bridgstock (2009) summarises a number of broader economic benefits associated with effective career management including improved productivity, lower unemployment and reduced healthcare costs and crime rates from higher earnings. This discussion highlights the importance of our first research objective, to gauge the extent of career management competencies among undergraduates.

Development of career management competencies
The development of career management competencies in HE, often referred to as 'career development learning', can be structured as university-wide generic modules, customised units for certain schools or faculties or more bespoke options for particular programmes or courses (Watts 2006). The need to infuse career management learning across the disciplinary curriculum, and early, is echoed by many (Bridgstock 2009;Pegg et al. 2012) and Greenbank (2011) argues provision should be student-centred and facilitative of effective decision-making rather than advising students what choices to make. Stand-alone, extracurricular initiatives, such as career fairs or seminars, can be delivered at key stages of study and target certain groups yet their irregularity and isolation from course curriculum limit their contribution to career readiness (Sultana 2012). Early intervention is particularly important as graduate recruiters shift talent acquisition strategies towards first and second year undergraduates, aiming to capture 'elite' students (Isherwood 2014) through internship and vacation programmes. Pegg et al. (2012), in their review of careers service provision in the UK, concluded that interaction among career experts and those responsible for the design and delivery of academic content is critical to enhancing graduate employability. Benson, Morgan, and Filippaios (2014) consider the role of social media in cultivating career management among students, while AGCAS (2005) provide a useful review of suitable teaching and learning methods such as 'buzz-group' discussions, personal skill audits, role play scenarios and peer reviews of resumes. Sultana's (2012) summary of career management learning in Europe indicated assessment was largely informal, formative and multi-modal. Interviews, self-assessment and competency assessmentincluding action planningwere popular, and there was extensive use of portfolios. The use of portfolios for self-reflection is strongly supported and is considered critical for self-awareness and the effective articulation of experience and capabilities to potential employers, particularly in non-technical skills (Berdrow and Evers 2011). Recent discussions of alternative approaches focus on the use of library services (Davey and Tucker 2010) case studies and lectures (Greenbank 2011) and embedded units or modules (see Evans 2008).
Unsurprisingly, employers are concerned with graduate career management competencies (Bridgstock 2009) amid evidence that undergraduates are failing to 'adopt a practical, proactive approach to their careers' (McKeown and Lindorff 2011, 311) and are not adequately engaging with career management activities (see Brown and Hesketh 2004;Greenbank and Hepworth 2008). Sagdic and Demirkaya (2009) cite a range of studies which suggest that many young people are not adequately planning their careers, particularly students from lower socio-economic backgrounds (Greenbank and Hepworth 2008), increasing the likelihood of poor employment outcomes upon graduation (Ayranci and Oge 2011).
Undergraduate failure to adequately engage in career development activities may partly be attributed to ignorance. McKeown and Lindorff (2011) highlight the disparity between graduates' labour market expectations and what they term 'job search realities', with many undergraduates expecting a 'good job' upon graduation and being unprepared for extensive job searches and the anxiety associated with ongoing career self-management (Perrone and Vickers 2003). However, this lack of preparedness cannot be solely attributed to a lack of student engagement. Many commentators believe existing career management provision in HE is not providing students with the necessary strategies or capabilities to meet employer expectations (McKeown and Lindorff 2011;Ng and Burke 2006;Pegg et al. 2012). Despite provision evolving from lengthy, individual guidance interviews to more bite-sized interventions that are wider in scope, such initiatives are criticised as continuing to focus on short-term employment outcomes (see Watts 2006). Further, these services most often assist those who least need guidance with lower levels of take up among widening participation, mature and part-time students (Stevenson and Clegg 2011). Watts (2006) argues problem-based, active and student-centred learning are essential to the effective development of career management competencies, in addition to an authentic context that facilitates the simulation of work-related activities. Hooley et al. (2013) notes that instead of being concerned with when career management is learned during undergraduate study, rather the focus should be on where and in what context. Smith et al. (2009) advocate WIL as a valuable tool for nurturing reflection and planning while Raelin et al. (2011) posits enhanced career self-efficacy from such opportunities. The importance of employers' input into the development and assessment of career management competencies, to add realism and credibility to content, is acknowledged by many (Bridgstock 2009;Gunn and Kafmann 2011;Jackson 2014).

Role of WIL
The focus of much WIL is the enhancement of work-readiness through developing non-technical attributes such as self-efficacy and effective teamworking (see McIlveen et al. 2011;Smith and Worsfold 2013), rather than disciplinary knowledge and skills (Usher 2012). WIL also acts to enhance students' understanding of the expected skills and task performance of specific job roles (see Jackson 2014), empowers effective career decision-making and facilitates successful networking in one's chosen field (Bourner and Millican 2011).
Barriers remain, however, to the effective use of WIL to develop career management competencies. For instance, there is confusion over the different terminology applied to WIL and the different forms it can take, inhibiting stakeholder understanding of its value (Maertz, Stoeberl, and Marks 2014). Cleary et al. (2013) also highlight the potential lack of managerial support in the workplace that may be problematic for career development. The potential influence of WIL prompts our second research objective, an evaluation of the role of WIL in developing undergraduate career management competencies.

Variations in career management competencies
Demographic influence on the development of career management competencies is under explored (Jain and Jain 2013), particularly for groups other than established professionals and managers (Zhang 2010). This prompts our third research objective, to assess variation in career management competencies by individual characteristics. Extant studies suggest contradictory evidence for the influence of age on career management competencies (see Creed, Prideaux, and Patton 2005;Gerber et al. 2009;Kuijpers and Meijers 2012;Zhang 2010) and those that explore the influence of gender are typically focused on career success and career orientation (see e.g. Ashby and Schoon 2010;Gerber et al. 2009). Kuijpers and Meijers (2012) found that men were more competent in career exploration and networking. Patton, Bartrum, and Creed (2004) suggest, however, that women are more adept at making career choices yet men are more certain of their decisions.
Alongside demography, we believe educational characteristics are likely to be significant in the development of career management competency, consistent with Kuijpers and Meijers (2012) who report the influence of both degree specialisation and stage of study. Elevated perceptions of capabilities in career management competencies are, therefore, expected among those more advanced in their studies, assuming exposure to opportunities to develop such capability. We also believe the influence of employment status is worthy of investigation.

Participants
The sample comprises business undergraduates from vocationally focused universities in the UK (N = 136) and Australia (N = 344). The countries were selected on the basis of their explicit attention to developing student employability and the similarities in their labour market contexts. These include a broad acceptance among educators, government and industry that individual employability contributes to economic wellbeing and that multiple stakeholders are responsible for preparing graduates for employment. Further, both countries, at the time of the survey, were experiencing similar labour market conditions with relatively high levels of graduate unemployment and underemployment (GCA 2014;UKCES 2015).
Participant characteristics are summarised in Table 1. An independent samples t-test reported a significant difference in the average age of Australian students (M = 26.5, SD = 8.1) and UK students (M = 21.8, SD = 3.3); t(478) = 6.55, p < .001. The higher proportion of mature-age students in the Australian university may be due to the choice of entry pathways into the university. There were relatively fewer women in the UK sample and a greater proportion of students in their final year of study. Variations exist in degree specialisation across the two samples and more Australian students were currently working although there were similar trends in the distribution of part-time and full-time status.
Relatively more UK students completed work placements as part of their studies under the 'thick' sandwich degree model whereby two years of study is followed by one year of full-time work in industry, before returning to university for their final year (in contrast to a 'thin' format where one year's work experience is structured into multiple placements). Students are ultimately responsible for securing their own one-year placements although support is provided by the university for advertising and guiding students to suitable opportunities. The Australian students complete shorter placements on a full or parttime basis over a 16-week period. Placements are organised by a dedicated WIL team within the Faculty.

Procedures
We gathered data on the career management competencies of business undergraduates at two universities through self-assessment in an online survey. We invited participation from students by email and/or via announcements on the universities' virtual learning management system, between April and June 2014.

Measures
Survey participants were asked to report on their age, gender, degree major, stage of study, current employment status and whether they participated in a work placement as part of their undergraduate programme. While we acknowledge that WIL is an umbrella term encompassing a range of on and off-campus activities that integrate theory with practice (Patrick et al. 2009), we chose to measure WILfor practical purposesas the completion of a work placement. We selected the DOTS career management framework for measuring career management competencies due to its concise nature, widespread use and suitability for the undergraduate cohort (Smith et al. 2009). The model is also considered valuable in assessing WIL experiences in regard to career management learning (Reddan and Rauchle 2012). McIlveen et al. (2011), who studied the perceived relationship between career development learning and WIL, argue the DOTS model 'clearly and simply captured student-related issues pertaining to the world-of-work, self-reflection, and transferability across learning and employment settings' (6). Twenty-one items were used to measure DOTS' four dimensions of self-awareness, opportunity awareness, decision-making learning and transition learning. These items have been used in previous empirical studies that assess career development learning among undergraduates (see e.g. Dacre Pool, Qualter, and Sewell 2014;McIlveen et al. 2011;Reddan and Rauchle 2012). We asked participants to rate their capabilities in each item on a five-point scale, ranging from 'very poor' to 'very good'. In addition, we asked respondents to indicate, on a scale of one ('no development') to five ('high level of development'), the extent to which each item was enhanced during their work placement. Finally, we asked respondents to consider which aspects of their work placement helped develop their career management competencies the most and to outline any barriers to their development. Both were optional, open-ended response questions.

Analysis
Items measuring the four dimensions of career management competency and the associated Cronbach alpha values are presented in Table 2. The values, each exceeding the widely accepted threshold value of 0.70, confirm internal consistency among the constituent items/elements and their reliability as an accurate measure of that particular dimension. Correlations between the different items were computed to assess construct validity for each of the four dimensions. Values ranged from .65 to .89, indicating the elements for a particular dimension are measuring the same facet of career management.
We then conducted a descriptive analysis of career management competencies among the undergraduate sample (N = 480), followed by an evaluation of the variations in the four career management dimensions for the combined sample using MANOVA. We analysed the ratings assigned to the development of career management competencies during placement using descriptive techniques at both item and dimension level. Analysis was conducted using SPSS 22.0. Finally, we completed a thematic analysis and coding at an individual response level of the open responses relating to aspects of work placements that assisted and hindered their development of career management competencies. This analysis was conducted using Excel. One hundred and four responses were gathered and analysed from the 110 students across the sample who had completed a work placement.

Career management competencies among undergraduates
The means and standard deviations of the four dimensions, and their constituent elements, are presented in Table 3 for the UK, Australian and combined samples. Average ratings were broadly similar among the UK and Australian students for selfawareness, opportunity awareness and transition learning. For the combined sample, self-awareness achieved the highest mean rating of 4.01, indicating that respondentson averageconsider themselves reasonably adept at identifying the knowledge and skills acquired during their degree and understanding their personal qualities, strengths and weaknesses in relation to employment. They also embrace reflection and, overall, appear to recognise the importance of self-awareness. In contrast, respondents reported capabilities only marginally above average for opportunity awareness with a mean rating of 3.54. This was the weakest element of career management competencies for both samples. Respondents report limited knowledge of general trends in graduate employment, opportunities in their own prospective field of employment and the requirements of graduate recruiters. They reported limited understanding of degree-related career options. Students performed marginally better in transition learning with a mean rating of 3.77. Analysing transition learning at an item level would suggest that students perform better during the actual selection processsuch as varying their self-presentation and conducting interviewsthan the stage of actually seeking vacancies and identifying suitable opportunities. Accordingly, student scores for using relevant vacancy information and understanding effective opportunity-search strategies were relatively weak with mean ratings of 3.47 and 3.64, respectively.
For decision-making learning, independent samples t-test indicated the Australian students rated themselves more highly than their UK counterparts (t(478) = 3.37, p = .001) for all six items. Across both samples, students rated themselves more highly on evaluating how their personal priorities may impact upon future career options and relating selfawareness to knowledge of different opportunities, consistent with the reasonably high levels of self-awareness previously reported. Respondents were, however, less equipped with tactics for managing the role of chance in career development.

Influence of individual characteristics
A series of MANOVAs was conducted for the combined sample to detect any variations in ratings for self-awareness, opportunity awareness and transition learning for individual characteristics. ANOVA was conducted for decision-making learning at an individual sample level, given the different competency ratings among Australian and UK students. A significant MANOVA (α = 0.05) variation in competency ratings was reported for degree specialisation, λ = 0.894, F(24, 1640.844) = 2.240, p = .001, partial η 2 = 0.028. Univariate ANOVA, with a Bonferroni correction (α = 0.013), indicated a significant effect for degree specialisation on transition learning, F(6, 473) = 3.549, p = .002, partial η 2 = 0.043. Tukey post-hoc analysis (α = 0.05) found HRM students reporting significantly higher levels than those in Marketing (p = .006), Finance/Accounting (p = .003), Management (p = .032) and those in the Other grouping (p = .005).
A significant MANOVA interaction was reported for stage of degree, λ=0.962, F(8, 948) =2.307, p = .019, partial η 2 = 0.019 although there was no evidence of significant ANOVA effects. A significant MANOVA was reported for employment status, λ=0.947, F(12, 1251.732) = 2.168, p = .011, partial η 2 = 0.018 with univariate analysis (α = 0.013) reporting a significant effect for opportunity awareness, F(2, 477) = 4.980, p = .007, partial η 2 = 0.020. Tukey post-hoc analysis suggested that those working part-time typically achieved higher ratings than both those not working (p = .035) and those working on a full-time basis (p = .050). Cohen (1988) provides benchmarks for effect sizes using partial eta squared whereby 0.0099 indicates a small effect, 0.0588 a medium effect and 0.1379 a large effect. The significant effects reported for the influence of certain individual characteristics on competency ratings are therefore small to medium.
We conducted further contingency analysis to investigate any mediating effect for employment status on ratings among placement/non-placement students. As suspected, filtering out those who were currently working in a full or part-time capacity produced a very different effect. The mean rating for all four dimensions of career self-management for those completing placements was higher than those who did not, although only significantly so (p = .012) for decision-making learning (those completing placements achieved a mean rating of 3.87 in comparison to 3.44). It appears, therefore, that current employment status seems to wash out any positive effect of the work placement on certain career management competencies.

Development of career management competencies
With regard to the extent to which the different career management competencies were developed during work placements, the mean ratings for each dimensionand their constituent elementsare presented in Table 2 for the UK, Australian and combined samples. The pattern of ratings is broadly similar across the UK and Australian samples with no significant variations in the mean ratings for the four dimensions. Completing a work placement appeared to offer a reasonable opportunity for developing the four dimensions of career self-management. More specifically, students typically felt work placements were extremely useful for developing their ability to identify strengths and weaknesses and areas for future development. In addition, the data show relatively high ratings for placements' role in helping the student identify their interests, values and personality in the context of vocational and life planning. In contrast, placements assisted them less in developing a self-reflective stance and synthesising their attributes. Reasonably high ratings were also achieved for opportunity awareness, decision-making learning and transition learning, suggesting work placements constituteoveralla useful tool for cultivating career selfmanagement capabilities. Inevitably, less evident was the capacity of placements to develop opportunity-search strategies among students, to improve understanding of general trends in graduate employment and career options and more efficient use of vacancy information.

Aspects of placements most benefiting learning
Using accepted approaches to narrative analysis (see Mishler 1990), inductive coding and thematic analysis of qualitative responses was undertaken to identify aspects of the work placement that respondents reported contributing to the development of career management competencies. Our analysis identified six common themes in individual responses. First, many identified the development of self-awareness and of a better understanding of the skills required in their intended profession, their capability 'gaps' and where their personal strengths lie. One stated, 'the ability to talk with people that employ others to find out what skills are required helped me greatly'. Another found by the end of the placement they were better able to 'synthesise one's key strengths, goals and motivations into a rounded personal profile'. Interestingly, several students noted that the recruitment process for their placement (whether employer-based or mediated via the university) helped to highlight what attributes employers desire in candidates. A number of respondents noted the quality and volume of constructive feedback, which often extended beyond that provided at university, was invaluable to deciphering their personal weaknesses and areas for improvement.
Second, many cited the mere exposure to working first-hand in their chosen profession as invaluable to their career planning skills and in providing insight into the realities of the industry. Third, working alongside established professionals allowed them to learn through listening and interaction, as well as the guidance and mentoring they received. Two students commented on what they learned from watching professionals promote themselves in their careers among their peers and colleagues. Fourth, many felt the placement experience had enhanced their confidence in their own capabilities to perform at the required level. One stated, '[the] placement has helped me push boundaries to make me more confident in my abilities and see where I can progress to'. Several believed they had progressed with career planning: 'it allowed me to gain a thorough understanding of what path I need to take'. Finally, many felt the placement helped them learn about networking and also provided them with opportunities to improve their own networks, gaining 'first-hand experience in meeting existing clients/partners and interacting with potential new partners/contacts for future employer prospects'.
Our thematic analysis also identified six main barriers to developing career management competencies during work placement. The first was a lack of exposure to their chosen profession through poor placement design. Some students reported work placements that were too short (for instance, a placement of 100 hours), were based in work areas unrelated to their degree specialisation or were spent working in isolation from the rest of the department. A second barrier was a lack of mentoring and guidance. Some students found managers unsupportive of the placement process or the assigned mentor lacked knowledge of their targeted profession. A small number commented on the lack of formal training given in the workplace and they felt there was a heavy reliance on learning by themselves and through their own mistakes.
Certain individual characteristics inhibited the development of career management competencies. Younger students noted the age gap with members of staff contributed to a lack of trust in their judgement and those with weaker English language skills reported likewise. One student noted that diversity, in general, acted to create misunderstanding that, in turn, inhibited learning. Several commented on the importance of communication and confidence in personal development during the placement. Finally, host organisation type appeared to influence the development of career management with larger organisations facilitating rotation across different areas, highly beneficial for broadening a student's understanding of their intended profession, and providing a wider range of opportunities for involvement. As an aside, many students spoke about their inability to 'shine' during the placement due to their lack of responsibility and control over the work undertaken, a situation aggravated on short placements.

Discussion/implications
Our data show that while business undergraduates differentially rate themselves on their possession of particular career management competencies, the pattern is broadly similar across the UK and Australian samples. On average, students perceive their competency in opportunity awareness relatively lower than decision-making and transition learning while self-awareness is relatively high among all students. The Australian students rate themselves as more competent in decision-making learningthe ability to develop and adapt career plans in the context of personal prioritiesmay be due to their more mature age profile rather than differences in the curriculum.
Work placements appear to offer a sound platform for developing self-awareness among students, consistent with previous studies exploring the value of WIL (Jackson 2013). WIL also appears to positively impact on the development of opportunity awareness, decision-making learning and transition learning. An area of weaker development among WIL students was nurturing opportunity-search strategies and a broader understanding of the graduate labour market. Overall, the data suggest that, particularly in the absence of concurrent part-time or full-time employment, students benefit from work placements in the development of career management competencies. This is consistent with the findings of Kuijpers and Meijers (2012) who report that a 'career-oriented learning environment' that stimulates the development and application of career competencies is one in which students have the opportunity to obtain real-life work experience. That work experience per se appears to contribute to greater possession of career management competencies, whether integrated into a programme of study or not, reinforces the value of all employment to student and graduate employability. Exploration of the precise influence of different types of work experienceincluding whether part or full time, related to academic study, and at varying levels of seniorityis an area for further consideration.
The implications of this data for HE institutions are twofold. First, they reinforce the imperative to expand opportunities for WIL across the student population. Within the sample, respondents experience a range of forms of WIL from yearlong industrial placements to shorter, less-intensive periods of work experience. That the data from both cohorts indicate the influence of WIL on the development of critical career management competencies suggests the value of diverse forms of WIL. This supports evidence (e.g. Jain and Jain 2013;Wilton 2012) for the positive impact of WIL for the development of critical employment-related capabilities and attributes. It also adds nuance to the issue of exactly how WIL contributes to employability. As such, HE providers need to be proactive in promoting and securing employment opportunities for students, particularly among those social groups that continue to experience disadvantage in the graduate labour market and in those subject areas where WIL has historically been less commonplace.
Second, the data indicate that WIL is not a panacea for the development of such competencies. The data shows that development is not uniform across competencies and, notably for the development of career-search strategies and labour market understanding, HE providers have a critical role in situating work experience within the broader environment in which such capabilities are enacted. WIL is reported by respondents to clearly have an impact on 'inward-focused' competencies, yet, not surprisingly, a lesser impact on 'outward-focused' contextualisation of experience. As such, universities have a critical role to play before, during and after WIL activities to place experience in its broader context through individual counselling, provision of relevant information and group briefings. This is likely not only to ensure students possess a better understanding of the graduate labour market, both in general and relating to specific sectors or occupations, but also to improve their preparedness for, and confidence during, selection processes. The development of contextual understanding should begin at the outset of study so that subsequent WIL can be used to prompt reflection upon career intentions and to shape the development of career development strategies.
This represents one way in which WIL programmes should be scaffolded and integrated into course curriculum with coordinators ensuring workplace learning and activities complement disciplinary-based offerings. This can further be achieved by paying close attention to the order in which units are taken to ensure students gain the most from their WIL experience, through applying relevant knowledge in that particular aspect of their discipline, and are able to translate their learning into academic units subsequent to their experience. Similarly, campus-based WIL models for enhancing career development among students can complement work experience. Here, students engage with industry and develop an insight into their intended profession through activities such as simulations, role modelling and client-based projects outside of the workplace.
For employers, the key message from the data is that, in order to best address their own criticisms of the graduate labour supply, recruiters should proactively provide opportunities for students to develop career management and related competencies through WIL. As employers seek to secure talent and engage in non-standard ways of doing so, such as curriculum co-design and early identification of potential recruits, then a critical means of positively shaping prospective employees, as well as a means of screening possible applicants for graduate posts, is to offer opportunities for work experience.
While the positive benefits of work experience during study are well rehearsed, take up among students, certainly in the UK, remains patchy (Bullock et al. 2009). These data add further weight to arguments concerning work experience as being central to the enhancement of individual employability. That current students often remain sceptical of the benefits of WIL represents a critical challenge for HE providers, further reinforcing the need to be able to clearly advise students of the specific benefits of work placements and the manner in which WIL positively impacts employability. This research contributes to this discourse by elucidating the specific areas in which WIL students are better prepared for the graduate labour market beyond the acquisition of work-related skills and experiences (Wilton 2012).
Interestingly, that the data provide no evidence for a gender or age effect on the development of career management competencies reinforces the perspective that work experience represents a prime determinant of the possession of employability-related attributes and, therefore, adds weight to the view that WIL has a role to play in overcoming traditional social disadvantage in the graduate labour market (Wilton 2011). Further exploration of any mediating effect of socio-economic status on the determining role of the different types of work experience on employment outcomes would be worthwhile. The absence of a 'stage of study' effect in the analysis is also worthy of note. It might be assumed that students who are further progressed in their studies would report higher levels of competency development. That this is not the case indicates again that work experience represents a key determinant of attainment of such competencies. It also suggests that HE providers have work to do to ensure the progressive development of competencies, particularly among those who do not choose or have the opportunity to undertake WIL.
Developing career management competencies in a campus-setting, for those who participate in WIL and those who do not, should emphasise fostering effective opportunity search strategies. This may include enhancing student understanding and following trends in graduate employment. One-way of achieving this is regular 'employment seminars' where external stakeholders, such as employer bodies, inform students of local and national economic trends and how these impact upon the labour market. Similarly, student understanding of the expectations of graduate employers and how to use vacancy information more efficiently could be facilitated through guest lectures and seminars with a range of graduate recruiters. Introducing students to industry requirements and the latest techniques for assessing graduate applicants against these selection criteria would be particularly useful. Finally, broadening student thinking in relation to degreerelated career options could be achieved by encouraging students to think more innovatively about where to seek work, beyond the traditional and highly sought after graduate programmes, by emphasising the importance of small and medium-sized businesses as graduate employers and the less 'popular' choices for graduate employment, such as the retail sector. Finally, assigning academic credit for career development learning, whether embedded in study units or through stand-alone delivery, could act to encourage student engagement with initiatives by which to develop career management competencies.

Conclusion
This study develops our understanding of how undergraduates perform in career management competencies and the impact of WIL on individual development of related knowledge, skills and abilities. Whilst respondents reported reasonably proficiency in career management competencies, particularly in the area of self-awareness, there is clear room for improvement, particularly in their reported ability to identify suitable opportunities, understand employer expectations and demonstrate awareness of graduate and career-specific employment trends. Notably, respondent's degree specialisation and employment status caused variations in competency ratings for certain aspects of career self-management. We found participation in work placements was also influential although this effect appeared to be washed out for those currently in employment. Those completing work placements broadly believed them to be useful to the development of career management competencies, particularly self-awareness.
Key areas in which WIL promoted career development learning included the ability to self-assess work-related capabilities, insight into the realities of a profession, exposure to guidance and mentoring by established professionals, enhanced confidence and career planning and networking. Impediments to the development process included a lack of exposure to their intended profession through poor placement design, poor mentoring and guidance, low self-esteem and poor communication.
We aimed to advance the understanding of how career management competencies are cultivated in undergraduates through WIL. There is limited empirical analysis gauging career management competencies among undergraduates and how best to develop them, particularly in relation to infrastructure, funding and collaborative partnerships among relevant stakeholders (Watts 2006). Our findings highlight the pivotal role of work placements for career development learning and suggest a set of strategies for practitioners to enhance career management provision and, ultimately, graduate employability. This will assist in producing graduates more aware of career aspirations and opportunities and better able to pursue their goals and to make informed choices, in order to more confidently transition to the graduate labour market. This is critical given the expectation that today's graduates will have relevant work experience, a repertoire of key skills and notable achievements and a clear understanding of their career ambition (GCA 2012).
As with all studies, ours has limitations. The study only explores individual-level influences on career management competencies and does not extend to social/cultural capital explanations. Many, for example, acknowledge the influence of social class (Greenbank 2011), ethnicity (Kuijpers and Meijers 2012) and media, social and political climate (Blackford 2010). We gathered self-report data, which is considered problematic by some (Douglass, Thomson, and Zhao 2012), using a single method that may raise concerns for common method variance (Taylor 2014). An alternative approach to gathering student perceptions could be the objective assessment of career management competencies by career management providers in the university setting. Also, we allow no comparative analysis of different strategies used to develop career management competencies in undergraduates as this study focuses on only one aspect of WIL, namely work placements. Future studies could also explore the influential role of personality (see Gerber et al. 2009).

Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.