Information and Communication Technology Literacy: What Do Businesses Expect and What Do Business Schools Teach?

Department

Information Systems

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

8-2010

Abstract

Today’s information and communications technology (ICT) provides unprecedented amounts ofinformation to organizations and their employees. This overabundance challenges workers,placing an increasing premium on skills of sifting through information of sometimes dubiousquality, integrating information critically, and producing well-reasoned conclusions. This paperexplores the hypothesis that employers want new hires skilled in ICT literacy, which includesnavigating information effectively and using technology efficiently. Based on an ICT literacyframework for higher education, two surveys were created to assess the opinions of humanresources (HR) consultants and business school faculty. HR consultants endorsed practically allelements of the framework as being important or essential for new hires. Especially valued wereskills associated with information security, confidentiality, and ethical behavior. However,business school faculty did not report a corresponding focus on ICT literacy generally, orethical/legal issues in particular, in their instruction. The results suggest that while ICT literacydoes indeed appear to be among the key skills for today’s workforce, much work must still bedone to integrate these skills throughout the business school undergraduate curriculum.

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