Tracing and Problems of Professional Self-determination of Modern

Youth

Olga B. Istomina

and Elena S. Maypil

Department of Socio-Economic Disciplines, Irkutsk State University, Irkutsk, Russia

National Educational University, Irkutsk, Russia

Keywords: Professional Self-Determination, Career Choice, Labor Market, Tracing, Professional Trajectories, Staffing

Support.

Abstract: The article is devoted to the problems of professional self-determination of Russian youth. The relevance of

the topic is justified by the results of tracing, monitoring of professional trajectories of graduates of

educational institutions, as well as indicators of the modern labor market, unemployment and professional

migration. The object of this research is the criteria for choosing educational and professional trajectories in

the total volume of social strategies of young people. The article presents the results of sociological surveys

"Educational and professional orientations of young people of the Irkutsk region" conducted by the authors

in the period 2007-2020. The authors indicate the conditionality of the strategies of youth behavior in the

labor market on objective economic factors and the state of the regional labor market, as well as on subjective

socio-psychological factors, maturity / infantilism of the younger generation, on their readiness for

independent decisions, for professional self-determination. The authors substantiate the introduction of a

system for monitoring the involvement of young people in labor relations in order to solve the problems of

staffing support, preserving the economic, demographic, and socio-cultural health of the regions, which was

significantly actualized in the new post-pandemic reality that has changed the nature of social and labor

relations.

1 INTRODUCTION

The Institute of Education, like other social

structures, in the conditions of the rapid spread of a

new viral infection and significant changes in the

sanitary and epidemic situation in the world, has

significantly changed its social appearance, adjusted

the tasks, and of course, the forms of implementation.

The challenges of the new realities of the 2020-21

pandemic divided the educational process into

"before" and "after", traditional and the distance one,

which has received the metaphorical name "stress

test" in informational and analytical references. The

pandemic has demonstrated an inter-stratificational

gap in terms of social well-being, quality of life, and,

of course, the level of income, consumption of

material goods, availability of social services, and

receiving of educational services. A lot of practice-

oriented projects, including professional self-

https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4060-6106

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3402-1761

determination programs, have not found effective

application in the distance format. Moreover, changes

in the socio-economic situation have resulted in

modification of the structure of career guidance

activities in connection with the decomposition of

career choices and the transformation of professional

expectations and aspirations of the younger

generation.

The modern Russian educational environment,

according to the requirements of federal standards, is

still and even more focused on the practical skills of

the new educational generation. Due to this fact, a

potential employer is actively involved in the

educational process as a teacher, mentor in industrial

practice, expert in final certification, and forms a list

of qualification requirements for graduates. It is

obvious that these changes in the educational system

of the last decade have determined new guidelines for

strengthening social ties between the institute of

Istomina, O. and Maypil, E.

Tracing and Problems of Professional Self-determination of Modern Youth.

DOI: 10.5220/0010672000003223

In Proceedings of the 1st International Scientiﬁc Forum on Sustainable Development of Socio-economic Systems (WFSDS 2021), pages 569-574

ISBN: 978-989-758-597-5

569

education and the labor market. The transition to a

competence-based approach is determined by

modernization processes, the search for "the

effectiveness of regional educational management

systems, the creation of a strategic program for the

development of human resources". Measuring impact

is made on the basis of a proven system of tracing or

monitoring of professional socialization of graduates,

which has been a mandatory procedure in Russian

institutions of higher education for more than ten

years, and the level of demand for graduates in the

labor market is included in the list of accreditation

indicators of the university. In addition, along with

the indicators of the shortage of personnel in a

particular profession, the success of professional

socialization of graduates is assessed as a fairly

significant factor in the formation of control figures

for the admission of applicants for training on a

budget basis. Tracing extends to the secondary and

higher levels of education. The school graduate

demonstrates the subsequent educational trajectories,

as well as the university graduate demonstrates the

professional route, the compliance / non-compliance

of the employment sphere with the training profile.

Monitoring the educational and labor trajectories of

graduates reflects not only the strategy of

modernization of national education, but also the state

of the labor market.

The monitoring system allows all participants of

the educational process and, above all, the

educational organization to determine the

professional choice of the graduate, his life and

professional trajectories. The significance of these

measurements is due to the ability to identify the

dynamics of social and labor behavior of the younger

generation, to identify the most typical areas of work

for the youth audience, to record changes in the

professional and educational structure of both the

region and the state as a whole. In our opinion, tracing

reveals the nature of social changes and serves as a

basis for developing strategies for regulating labor

activity, reducing the risks of graduate unemployment

and countering the growth of employment in informal

sector, and therefore is necessary to ensure social

stability. The established monitoring system is a

regulator of future social and labor relations, provides

feedback to the employer, and allows building

effective models of strategic management of a

modern educational organization.

The tasks of tracing as monitoring of postgraduate

professional socialization of young specialists are

assigned, first of all, to the issuing educational

organization, which collects primary information.

The profiles are based on the information about the

results of employment from the respondents

themselves and their parents. Scoping studies are

conducted by the university in the first year of the

graduate's work after graduation. In addition,

educational institutions enter information about

issued diplomas of education in the Federal Register

of Educational Documents, which is the beginning of

accounting for the total employment of graduates.

These indicators are significant for the educational

organization (they determine the choice of the main

professional educational programs implemented by

the university) and for the labor market (they

determine strategic management, the choice of means

to solve the problems of staffing support). In this

regard, the results of employment monitoring are

selectively checked by the Federal Education and

Science Supervisory Service, then the social services

of the region are connected to objectify the data. For

example, the function of monitoring the information

submitted by the university is partly performed by the

territorial employment service, which records all

cases of graduates applying for employment

assistance and takes into account the number of

people receiving unemployment benefits.

In addition to these services, it should be

mentioned that it is necessary to clarify information

from other sources. Measurements of the demand for

graduates are conducted by the Pension Fund of

Russia. The analysis of this structure is based on

accounting for employers ' pension contributions. The

tax deductions of employees are also evidence of the

entry of young people into labor relations. In other

words, the determination of information on

employment can be carried out by a number of state

services and territorial bodies that provide social and

tax control in the region.

Measurements of the number of "arrivals to the

profession", primary employment and professional

migration are most often carried out during the first

calendar year after graduation. Although the staff

shortage in many areas of work (in particular, in

education, health care) reveals a high level of

burnout, disillusionment with the financial support of

the profession and, as a result, professional migration

after 3-5 years of work. More often, the change of

jobs during this period takes place due to the

complexity of adaptation and the active search for a

job that meets most of the economic and social needs

of young people.

It is obvious that the monitoring system should

include not only the fact of employment itself, but

also the conditions of self-employment,

entrepreneurship, and, of course, it is necessary to

take into account the payments to graduates and their

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correlation with the average indicators of the region's

economy.

2 PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

The purpose of the research is to investigate the

professional orientations of students, to identify the

most significant criteria for professional self-

determination. Achieving this goal involves solving

the following tasks:

- to organize and conduct sociological surveys of

students and working youth in order to determine

professional orientations and social expectations

from the post-work period of socialization;

- to identify the causes of difficulties in the initial

employment of graduates of higher educational

institutions;

- to reveal the factors of choosing a profession;

- to characterize the educational and professional

trajectories of graduates that determine the economic,

demographic, and socio-cultural health of the region.

3 METHODS

Dialectical, systematic, and comparative methods

were used as the theoretical and methodological basis

of this research. The authors also used a questionnaire

survey and methods of secondary analysis of

materials devoted to identifying the problems of the

modern labor market in the Irkutsk region.

Sociological survey "Educational and

professional orientations of young people", 2007,

2009, 2017, 2020. The total sample size is 546

respondents-applicants of higher educational

institutions of the Irkutsk region. The selection of

respondents was carried out on the principle of simple

sampling. The purpose of the survey is to determine

the educational and professional orientations of

applicants from the Irkutsk region.

Express survey "Criteria for choosing a job". 448

respondents aged 18-30 years, representing the urban

working youth of the Irkutsk region (Irkutsk,

Angarsk), were interviewed. The purpose of the

survey, namely, to determine the social expectations

of working youth from the post-work period of

socialization, led to the selection of such sample

criteria as age stratum and being in work.

Express survey "Readiness of students to undergo

professional retraining", 2018, 2020 The sample size

is 200 respondents studying at the Pedagogical

Institute of Irkutsk State University. The survey was

conducted on the basis of modern information

technologies, based on the Internet platform Google

Forms.

The materials of the sociological research were

processed using the SPSS Statistics 17.0 software for

Windows.

4 LITERATURE REVIEW

During periods of socio-economic instability, the

results of monitoring professional orientations are a

kind of evidence of the effectiveness of an

educational organization and during admission

campaigns work better than any of the best

advertisement.

At the present stage, there is an experience of

longitudinal research of professional orientations of

young people in all leading universities of the world

(Cocozza, 2014; Crew, 2015; Dusen et al, 2014; Ertelt

et al, 202; Gaio and Korhonen, 2016; Stiwne and

Alves, 2010; Vuorinen-Lampila, 2014). Russian

universities have already had such experience as well.

For example, the project "Monitoring the Educational

and Labor Trajectories of School and University

Graduates" was organized in 2009 by the Higher

School of Economics. The aim of the project is to

study the social processes that determine the

dynamics of educational and professional trajectories.

The professional orientations were based on life

trajectories of young people, taking into account the

financial situation of the family, social well-being,

health status, social status of parents and other

objective factors.

Such researches are necessary on an ongoing

basis, as they are part of comprehensive solutions

aimed at ensuring social stability. Monitoring of

involvement in labor relations is aimed at creating

conditions for interaction between all subjects of the

educational services market and the institute of

economics in the face of enterprises and organizations

in the region: "the practical significance of such

studies is supported by the possibility of making real

decisions and proposals in accordance with the social

order of the younger generation, and of course, with

the needs of enterprises and organizations of the city

and the region in the formation of labor collectives,

staff support" (Istomina, 2019).

Today, innovative technologies of informational

and methodological, social and pedagogical support

of professional self-determination are being actively

developed. The search is determined by the

transformation of the value orientations of the

younger generation in the context of changing

paradigms of the institute of education (Koch and

Orlov, 2020; Istomina et al, 2018). The significance

Tracing and Problems of Professional Self-determination of Modern Youth

571

of new effective forms is undeniable (Dusen et al,

2014; Radetskaya et al, 2020).

It is obvious that in the conditions of

transformation of social stratification, the life

orientations of all segments of the population are

changing. "The system of globalizing culture, new

paradigms of thinking, types of rationality are also

manifested in the educational structure of society...

the university at the present stage is not only an

educational organization, but also a regulator of

social and labor relations" (Istomina, 2019).

5 THE RESULTS OF THE

RESEARCH

The difficulties of employment are caused by a

number of reasons, the dominant of which is the

inability to adequately assess the level of demand for

specialists in the labor market, the applicant cannot

always predict changes in the situation after 4-6 years.

Thus, according to the author's research in 2007,

2009, 2017, and 2020, a weak level of awareness of

graduates about the peculiarities of the regional labor

market was revealed: 66% of the surveyed applicants

know about the work of the employment fund, and

51% of respondents have information about the

demand for professions in the region. The survey of

applicants showed that no more than 60% of

respondents are able to choose an educational

organization independently, 16.4% of them turn to the

help and recommendations of parents, and 14.8% of

respondents resort to the advice of acquaintances and

friends.

Modern realities have formed a clear belief among

young people: the availability of higher education is

a prerequisite for employment. Unfortunately, over

the past ten years, young people's perceptions of the

main factors of employment have not changed: the

most effective ones, from the point of view of

graduates of the region, are still personal connections

and contacts (65%), a diploma of higher education

(63%), professional qualities and the corresponding

level of training (34%), personal qualities (21.5%),

additional special knowledge (12.3%). According to

42% of respondents, finding a job for a graduate is

difficult.

The choice of labor trajectories is often

determined by economic factors, namely, the key

criterion for most graduates is the amount of

remuneration. According to the author's sociological

survey "Criteria for choosing a place of work", the

most significant criterion in modern social and labor

relations is the amount of remuneration, which

directly affects the amount of vital and cultural goods

consumed.

The following criteria are highlighted in the list of

significant criteria for respondents: the salary,

including in the shadow economy (the presence of

official employment is less important for young

people than the amount of income, which is quite

natural when assigning minimum payments that are

insufficient to meet the current needs of the

population) is extremely important for 67.8% of

respondents. Social guarantees are seen as significant

(42.8%). In the case of primary employment, the

possibility of obtaining experience (28.6%), the state

status of the enterprise (25.0%), and the availability

of contributions to the Pension Fund of Russia

(17.8%) are significant. Among the less significant

criteria are "territorial proximity to home" (10.7%)

and "compliance with the specialty" (7.1%). It is

important that 28.6% of respondents said that they

should like the work.

Unfortunately, the destructions taking place in

modern society, the decline in real incomes of the

population cause an increase in professional

migration and often put a young specialist towards the

choice of official and shadow employment. A young

specialist faces a lot of unsolved material tasks

(buying/renting housing; vital and cultural

requirements; increasing costs of a growing family;

unforeseen expenses due to the illness of children,

parents, etc.). Under restricted economic conditions,

it is difficult to think about solving future problems

when the current ones are not solved. Monitoring

allows timely implementation of programs to regulate

real and expected problems in the labor market.

Social forecasting and the resulting recommendations

in this case are focused on narrowing the gap of

informal sector of employment, fixation of socio-

economic factors that act as "barriers to the

individualization of personal trajectories or, on the

contrary, resources for their development".

6 DISCUSSION OF THE RESULTS

OBTAINED

Education, being a projection of the entire social

system, is characterized by the "death of traditional

stability", shows at this stage signs of deetatization of

education (the state loses control over the system, its

tasks include only ensuring the right of citizens to

their own educational trajectory), as well as

expanding the horizontal mobility of students

(education is not only "lifelong", but also "lifewide")

(Istomina et al, 2018). Innovative teaching methods

based on the individual routing of the student are able

to solve these problems.

Personal routing of education is the main

condition for innovative processes in the education

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system. During the period of study under the

bachelor's and master's programs and after it, a

student has an opportunity to master the program of

professional retraining and expand the list of

professional competencies. According to the results

of the express survey "Readiness of students to

undergo professional retraining", 98% of respondents

are ready and would like to master an additional

professional program in order to increase

competitiveness in the labor market.

To ensure the positive dynamics of the

educational and professional trajectories of graduates,

long-term meaningful programs of material and

moral incentives for young professionals are

necessary, especially in socially significant areas

experiencing a shortage of personnel. In the Irkutsk

region, the areas of work that require serious

"personnel injections" are education and health care.

Modern educational organizations develop

various strategies for building a dialogue between

graduates and employers, and the electronic

informational and educational environment is

recognized as one of them. Openness is a significant

condition in the system of implementing a competent

approach, it is associated with providing students

with free access to all information about the

educational process. The electronic informational and

educational environment allows you to use not only

educational and information resources through your

personal account, but it also works in the interests of

graduates, because it allows you to contact a potential

employer through the electronic portfolio system.

Personal achievements of students, which are

presented in the portfolio, are evidence of the

professional training of the graduate for labor

relations, they reflect compliance with the

requirements of professional standards.

In the current conditions of the new social reality,

not only the university educational programs are of

particular importance, but also the initiative, activity

of the recipients of educational services, their

involvement in the management of the educational

process, the construction of an individual educational

route, and meaningful professional self-

determination are becoming crucial.

The scientific novelty of the research is seen in the

following results:

 the methodological principles of the study of

professional and educational orientations of

young people as a factor of modern social and

labor relations are revealed;

 the authors’ programs of sociological research

of professional and educational orientations of

young people were tested;

 the effectiveness of the system for monitoring

the professional socialization of graduates is

confirmed, it is the basis for developing

strategies for regulating labor activity,

reducing the risks of unemployment of

graduates and countering the growth of work

in the informal sector;

 the most important criteria for professional

self-determination and job choice for graduate

students are identified and analyzed, among

which the amount of remuneration that

determines the lifestyle of a young person is of

particular importance;

 information about the views of young people

about the main factors of employment was

analyzed. The reasons for the difficulties of

employment, according to young people, is the

dominance of personal ties and contacts over

the professional qualities of the applicant;

 the difficulties of professional socialization of

graduates of the Irkutsk region due to the low

level of awareness about the peculiarities of

the regional labor market were revealed, and it

requires the creation of conditions for an

effective dialogue between the graduate, the

educational organization and the employer.

7 CONCLUSION

In order to propaedeutics of social problems caused

by unemployment, higher educational institutions

develop and apply technologies to increase the

competitiveness of graduates in the labor market.

Today, the strategic management of an educational

organization relies on a number of socially significant

procedures, including: tracing, monitoring of

educational orientations and professional trajectories

of graduates; availability of an electronic information

and educational environment; establishing a

productive dialogue in the system of relations

"graduate-educational organization – employer".

The research conducted by the author has

confirmed the importance of these procedures for

determining the dynamics of social and labor

behavior of young professionals, the level of

awareness about the state of the regional labor

market, the available vacancies and growing shortage

of personnel in certain professions.

In conditions of socio-economic instability, the

role of monitoring increases due to decreasing real

incomes of the population, which causes increasing

problem of professional self-determination, which

determines growing shortage of personnel in socially

important areas of work, due to professional

migration. In addition, the problems of staffing

support are caused by the difficulties of choosing a

profession and social forecasting of the state of the

labor market for the next decade. The

Tracing and Problems of Professional Self-determination of Modern Youth

573

epidemiological situation, which has changed the

social space, has made serious adjustments to the

forecasts of the labor market dynamics, and has

further complicated the socio-psychological

foundations of professional self-determination of

young people.

At the present stage, the most important criteria

for choosing a profession and place of work for the

younger generation are payments (regardless of the

presence / absence of an employment contract) and

social guarantees, which is explained by the desire of

young people for financial independence and material

security.

The difficulties of constructing promising

professional trajectories for graduates, their

professional migration and difficulties in primary

employment are explained by many economic and

socio-psychological factors. Among them, it should

be noted the infantile nature and lack of independence

in choosing a profession, the short-term nature of life

and professional plans, and the destruction of the

labor market itself. According to the respondents, the

risk-forming factor is the dominance of personal

connections and contacts over the professional

qualities of the applicant.

So, it is important to understand that the problems

of youth employment in modern conditions are

significant issues of social policy, affect the

economic, political, demographic, socio-cultural

health of society. Monitoring of labor trajectories is

an objective assessment of the state of the labor

market, and at the same time, a significant criterion

for the formation of the marketing environment of an

educational organization, which is especially

important in regions with a high migration loss of the

population. The system of monitoring social and

labor relations is necessary, since it allows us to

assess the level of demand for specialists in the labor

market based on the strategy of modernization of

domestic education, as well as formulate proposals

that can meet the social orders of the new generation

and the needs of enterprises and organizations in the

city and region.

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