Moscow metropolis labour market features: the requirements of employers and the quality of young specialists

Abstract

The subject-matter of the article is the study of the features of the youth labour market in such a specific region of Russia as the city of Moscow. The topic of the work is connected with the adaptation of training system for young specialists to the regional requirements of the employers of Moscow. The main hypothesis of the research suggests that the city of Moscow is an atypical region of Russia and it makes no sense to apply the standard criteria and methodological approaches, which are typical to our country, to its labour market. As the research method, the authors have used a sample survey of the key Moscow employers and the respondents aged from 14 to 30 years. On the basis of the data of the sociological survey conducted by the authors, it was succeeded to identify the following features of the region in question: a relatively low level of the youth unemployment for Russia; the employers’ focus on such target signs of personnel as good communication skills, learning ability, professional knowledge and competences. The Moscow employers pay insufficient attention to such characteristics of young specialists as foreign language and computer skills, and a diploma of a prestigious education institution. The principal barriers that cause dificulties to the employment of young specialists in Moscow are: their overestimated salary expectations, poor professional training level and disinclination for work in principle. As a result of the survey, some practical proposals were formulated. Their application area is differentiated in two ways: focused on the young people’s behavior at the learning stage and focused on the improvement of the practical component of the activity of the vocational education institutions. The authors have come to the conclusions on the expediency of a deep focus of education institutions on the applied nature of training specialists, a need for attracting practitioners to teaching special disciplines, a need for developing the future specialists’ ability to present themselves and their work results in the professional environment (self-presentation), and an objective assessment of their real employment opportunities.