Sustainable Development of Soft Skills with the Purpose of Enhancing the Employability of Engineering Students

Abstract

Engineering students’ readiness for professional activity is not limited by their academic qualifications, technical skills, and further use of theoretical knowledge in practice. However, it is equally important for students to be able to defend opinions, substantiate their position, and possess career adaptability and employability resources in the course of their career. This mixed-method study utilizes the social cognitive theory and a metacognitive approach to reveal the possibilities of sustainable employability enhancement. The employability of students relies on various internal determinants within individuals. This paper describes the personal and social skills of the students and their needs in English and provides suggestions on simultaneously scaling up employability and English proficiency within English classes. The study methodology includes the English for specific purposes course instructional design (ESP) and measurement methods evaluating its effectiveness. An empirical study was conducted on a sample of 200 second-year engineering students learning ESP. The findings of the research indicated that engineering students enrolled in the optional ESP course succeeded in enhancing their soft skills along with their progress in English, compared to students who only had traditional lessons.

1. Introduction

In a society where job security is rare, the need for people to be more flexible, adaptable, and autonomous in their career management remains an important social quality. It has become vital that each staff member develops skills to support employability because work experience is no longer stable, predictable, or tied to organizational hierarchies due to the growing complexity of business and the pressure of ongoing changes in the economy. Employability, or one’s ability to identify and fulfill proper career opportunities, has become increasingly crucial for preserving and boosting an employee’s attractiveness in the labor market. Furthermore, considering that performance, happiness, and health are three indicators of a sustainable career, some initiatives investing in employability and preparing engineering graduates for an unpredictable, competitive, and precarious labor market should be implemented.

Because the primary goal of engineering education is to prepare engineers for professional practice, university engineering departments need to turn to industry to understand what soft skills employers want their entry-level engineers to possess and if employers are satisfied with the soft skills these new hires demonstrate [1].

Employers value a combination of technical understanding, interdisciplinary knowledge, and soft skills that enable employees to excel in their roles. Furthermore, the percentage of graduates employed in their specialty is a vital indicator of universities’ efficiency, which has led to demand for a learning environment that is conducive to the professional self-determination of students and their success and well-being in their professional lives [2,3,4]. Engineering education is becoming more interdisciplinary [5]. Soft skills and a good command of English are cross-cutting across jobs and serve globally as a career lift. English is viewed as an essential tool of international and scientific collaboration. East Asian countries have extensive experience adopting English as a professional development language. English is the official language of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) and Association of Southeast Asian Nations forums, as well as maritime agreements [6].

Equipping students for success in the workplace implies a comprehensive and multidimensional approach combining academic education with industry and academic practical experience and lifelong learning as an integral part of students’ future careers. Regarding this issue, one of the top challenges in today’s higher education is promoting equitable and responsive student employability, which is necessary for job seekers and highly valued by employers.

1.1. Theoretical Framework

Employability, being a complex phenomenon, has definitions that vary greatly. Some approaches prioritize students’ knowledge and skills, while others focus on their willingness to adapt to the demands of the labor market. Researchers state that employability skills, attitude, behavior, and a good command of English could allow graduates to better apply their academic skills [7,8,9].

Employability definitions are diverging because of the changing labor market landscape and government policies [10,11]. Some definitions of employability highlight the utilization of employability skills learned in one situation across various workplace scenarios [12]. Employability skills are personal qualities that help future specialists take initiative, bring innovation to their workplace, and succeed in the labor market [13]. Employability skills can be defined as the combination of skills and attributes necessary to secure and maintain meaningful employment over one’s professional journey [14]. Overall, 60% of employees strongly believe that soft skills are a significant factor while hiring [15].

This research views employability as ‘transferable skills’ or soft skills that are required for effective performance in any job sector and are not limited to a specific career. Soft skills can only be understood through wide perspectives. These skills include leadership and teamwork qualities, effective communication, self-management abilities, and problem-solving skills are essential for successful career development. They guarantee high productivity and efficiency in any industry, but they are not measurable and are not typically covered in job descriptions. The goal of soft skills, also known as universal competencies, is to find balanced solutions for a variety of everyday occupational tasks.

Some researchers argue that the curriculum should prioritize soft skills and develop creative, confident, and articulate graduates [16,17]. When it comes to the competencies of engineering students, technical aspects come to mind, while foreign language skills and soft skills also increase employability.

The ESP course often only focuses on technical vocabulary and aims to develop reading and writing skills without giving enough attention to soft skills. However, soft skills and command of English are important employability factors [18,19]. Most engineering programs fail to explicitly teach students transferable skills, including the best practices of group work [20]. We see soft skills as being as crucial as hard skills. Soft skills serve as a construct and the foundation of teaching and learning. Soft skills cross-cut across jobs and sectors and relate to personal competency (confidence, discipline, and self-management) and social competencies (teamwork, communication, and emotional intelligence).

Social cognitive career theory, being the extension of career theory, emphasizes feedback and feed-forward mechanisms and explains how motivation, self-efficacy, and interest influence career development and decision-making. Syrkov A. states that when students believe their goals are important, they will experience higher motivation [21]. Developing employability skills relies on the pedagogical conditions [22,23].

Metacognition pedagogy implies that students actively participate in their studies and considers their cognitive styles [24,25,26]. Abilities and personal qualities that contribute to readiness for professional activity are to be given particular attention [27]. Zyberaj J. and other researchers focus on motivation in career development learning and students’ professional plans during a pandemic [28,29,30].

In the scientific literature, two ways of perceiving employability are described: an individual-centered approach focusing on the self-assessment of one’s potential for employment and a situational approach aimed at considering situational factors such as the socio-economic situation, industry–academic partnerships, and the particularities of the labor market [31,32]. Situational factors are what sets perceived employability apart from self-efficacy [33,34].

Although the problem of students’ readiness for professional activity and their employability is of high importance, the ways of developing the employability skills of engineering students are not yet well-explored. In addition, quite surprisingly, there is a lack of literature on factors enhancing the employability of engineering students.

1.2. Research Questions

In this context, the results from the present research contribute to the professionalization of would-be engineers. This project developed an ESP course allowing the development of the employability of engineering students. Based on the data we collected, we identified the skills that graduates are lacking and the skills that are adequately addressed in the current curriculum. The identified soft skills, including social and personal skills, lay the foundation of the proposed framework of the ESP course.

This study aims to develop an ESP course that can scale up students’ employability, enhancing their strengths and developing soft skills.

This study addresses the following research questions:

-

What soft skills do students consider to be relevant in order to get a job in their field?

-

What can be done to improve the employability of engineering students within ESP classes?

The developed ESP course allows a better alignment between the soft skills that students need and the skills covered in the academic curriculum, thus enhancing graduates’ future employability.

2. Materials and Methods

Statistical data processing and data graphical presentation were performed by means of the computer program Statistica 12.0 (StatSoft). For the variables under study, sample averages, standard deviations (SD), midpoints, and first and third quarters are calculated. The nonparametric Mann–Whitney Z-criteria for independent samples and the Wilcoxon Z-criterion for dependent (correlated) samples were used to compare student groups. Statistically significant differences were considered at p < 0.05, where p is the Type I error probability when testing the null hypothesis.

2.1. Research Design

The theoretical foundations of our research are based on metacognition pedagogy and social cognitive theory. We consider metacognition pedagogy to support the purpose of learning and developing the students’ metacognitive understanding. Social cognitive theory examines learning’s cognitive aspects within social contexts, highlighting the interplay between individuals, surroundings, and actions. In their turn, personal outcome expectations, goals, and values are manifested in the students’ actions. We have formulated the following contextual factors of employability pedagogy based on the theories of Pintrich and Yorke and Knight [35,36] (

Table 1. Factors of employability (Source: compiled by the authors).

Students	Professors
Grasp of knowledge within and beyond the discipline	Integrating knowledge, skills, and competencies required in various disciplines
Employment of carefully selected evidence	A curriculum reflecting the newest international knowledge within the engineering discipline
Universal skills being applicable in multiple contexts	Conducting regular reviews of required labor market knowledge, skills, and competencies
Advanced strategies for learning	Selecting and employing advanced strategies for teaching
Examining individual learning styles, capabilities, and needs	Using cognitive strategies for differentiation in task difficulty

).

Experimental English language training for specific purposes was conducted within the second-year curricula of undergraduate students of Empress Catherine II Saint Petersburg Mining University during the 2023–2024 academic year (two academic semesters). The Mining University was chosen as an experimental base because its graduates traditionally excel in the engineering field. Additionally, the university ranked in the top 20 of the Quacquarelli Symonds rankings, with a score of 94.3 out of 100 based on employers’ opinions.

Our mission was the simultaneous development of engineering students’ English proficiency and employability skills through an integrative approach. The research process included identifying the needs of ESP engineering students, collecting data, planning the research, designing instructions, developing an interdisciplinary course for foreign language teaching, conducting pre- and post-experiment tests, and analyzing the test results.

An integrative model was used to teach engineering students in the ESP course, aimed at enhancing employability skills. Each group comprised 100 students, chosen based on their proficiency in English at the B1 level, in accordance with the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages. The control group included 100 students, consisting of 39 men and 61 women, all aged between 17 and 19. In contrast, the experimental group also comprised 100 participants, with 46 boys and 44 girls, within the same age range of 17 to 19. Students in the control group were taught via traditional teaching methods and resources during the educational experiment. We have used simple random sampling. It should be pointed out that in this study, we did not take into account the gender of students, either when dividing them into the control and experimental groups or when making calculations; their gender is mentioned for reference only. In order to determine the needs of the engineering students studying English at Empress Catherine II Saint Petersburg Mining University, a needs analysis test was administered, including diagnostic testing.

We ensured that every willing participant was informed about the research goals, and we guaranteed the confidentiality and anonymity of their data.

Engineering students are often the target group for soft skills development as, traditionally, their hard skills outweigh their soft skills [37,38].

Researchers and training practitioners focus on various aspects of soft skills and apply different technologies to develop them [39,40]. Soft skills are commonly defined as nontechnical skills enabling individuals to perform effectively when communicating with colleagues or partners. Soft skills are considered to be as important as hard skills for a professional in any field [41].

For the purpose of this research, we divided soft skills into two major groups, namely social skills and personal skills. Within the first group, we focus on effective communication, empathy, active listening, and conflict resolution. The second group contains motivation, self-regulation, critical thinking, and self-awareness (

Table 2. Soft skills (Source: compiled by the authors).

Soft Skills
Social Skills		Personal Skills
Effective communication	Empathy	Motivation	Self-regulation
Ability to find common ground with everyone, to attract others, to prevent and solve conflicts: interpersonal impact; relationship reinforcement; time administration; team building	Ability to empathize with the emotions of others, experience yourself through another person: accepting different points of view; understanding other people; high level of public awareness	Ability to overcome short-term difficulties in order to achieve a goal: initiative; positivity; commitment to the goal and its implementation	Ability to control emotions and behavior: reliability; conscientiousness; adaptability; creativity
Active listening	Conflict resolution	Critical thinking	Self-awareness
Readiness for listening; noticing the verbal and nonverbal cues being exchanged; giving accommodating input	Skill in finding solutions agreeable to all involved	Ability to question and test assumptions; adept at spotting ambiguity; explore; interpret in order to evaluate and reflect	Awareness and understanding of emotions, strengths, and weaknesses: emotional awareness; accurate self-assessment; self-confidence

).

Soft skills are difficult to measure as they are mostly revealed in practical activity. The performance or result of certain tasks where soft skills are deployed is often a criterion of their development.

However, the following assessment methods allow us to find correlations between soft skills and factors that can be measured.

2.1.1. Career Adapt-Abilities Scale

To assess the development of soft skills, two methods were used. We compared the results of the two methods to see whether they aligned. This ensured the reliability of the experimental results. The first method used is the Career Adapt-Abilities Scale (CAAS), which is a tool for assessing the adaptive resources that an employee has and uses to solve occupational tasks [42]. This form consists of four scales measuring concern, control, curiosity, and confidence as psychosocial resources indicating readiness for professional activities. Divided into four subscales, these 24 items evaluate adaptability traits, including concern, control, curiosity, and confidence, with equal distribution [43]. The concern subscale assesses the level of students’ focus and readiness for their professional future. The control subscale measures a student’s willingness to take responsibility for their professional growth. The curiosity subscale reflects a student’s capacity to explore and acquire relevant information about their professional field and career prospects. The confidence subscale represents students’ awareness of their competence in making professional decisions, reaching professional goals, and effectively handling stress. The CAAS can be completed in about 20 min. Participants rate their level of career adaptability on a 5-point Likert-type scale (1 = not strong, 5 = strongest) for each of the 24 items. The total score on each subscale ranges from 6 to 30 points, and the overall employability skill rating is between 24 and 120 points.

This method is favored for its simplicity and accuracy in evaluating career adaptability skills, including soft skills. Furthermore, it allows the investigation of relationships between career adaptability factors and soft skills. The four factors of CAAS reflect the targeted soft skills (

Table 3. CAAS factors and soft skills (Source: compiled by the authors).

Social Skills	CAAS Factors	Personal Skills	CAAS Factors
Effective communication	Confidence	Self-awareness	Confidence
Empathy	Concern	Motivation	Concern
Active listening	Curiosity	Critical thinking	Curiosity
Conflict resolution	Control	Self-regulation	Control

).

Table 4. Career Adapt-Abilities Scale Items (Source: [43] adapted by the authors).

Factors	Items
Concern	1. Wondering what my future will be like
	2. Knowing that today’s choices determine my future
	3. Preparing for the future
	4. Making wise choices of education and career
	5. Planning ways of achieving my goals
	6. Concerns about career advancing
Control	1. Encouraging spirit and feeding mind and body
	2. Making decisions independently
	3. Taking responsibility for the actions
	4. Being able to defend my beliefs
	5. Believe in myself
	6. Doing what’s suitable for me
Curiosity	1. Examining the professional field
	2. Looking for possibilities for personal growth
	3. Exploring options before making a choice
	4. Monitoring various ways of doing things
	5. Thinking deeply about the issues I have
	6. Increasing interest in opportunities
Confidence	1. Finding the most efficient way of performing tasks
	2. Being responsible for the choice
	3. Acquisition of new skills
	4. Working within my capabilities
	5. Overcoming obstacles
	6. Troubleshooting skills

shows the questions suggested by students to assess employability skills.

2.1.2. Johari Window Questionnaire

Students either are not aware of or do not realize their strengths and weaknesses or do not understand how other people perceive them. Johari’s window questionnaire enabled us to understand the interconnectedness and interdependence of personal qualities, seen from both personal perspectives and as assessed by others. The engineering students were asked to select five adjectives to describe themselves and then their peers chose five ones to describe their partner. Inserting these adjectives in a two-by-two grid of four cells is supposed to help students see themselves as others see them and be better able to use insight and introspection. This test provides a clear picture of the development of soft skills (

Table 5. Johari Window Perspectives [44].

Arena Known to self and others	Blind spot Unknown to self and known to others
Façade Known to self and unknown to others	Unconscious Unknown to self and others

).

2.2. Research Instruments

As the preliminary part of this study revealed the lack of English skills necessary to succeed in the workplace, we created an ESP course with an emphasis on the functional use of language in context. Communication skills in English are essential for engineering students since English is the dominant language of science and technology. Engineering students should be able to work with information in research periodicals and journals and take part in conferences, symposia, and seminars held in English. That is why technical vocabulary, such as special terms used for describing experiments and research results, as well as soft skills serve as a base and target for the designed ESP course.

We selected authentic professionally oriented materials related to students’ motivation and effective leadership, with a view to gaining a competitive edge for the ESP course. The unique aspect of our ESP course is the emphasis on applying a holistic approach to addressing soft skills along with technical vocabulary. The course consists of five modules, each corresponding to the career adapt-abilities scale factors (concern, control, curiosity, and confidence) and soft skills (social and personal) (Figure 1).

All the modules improved career adaptability and developed soft skills with a focus on a particular factor and skill. The factors and soft skills corresponding to the modules are shown in

Table 6. Course modules and corresponding factors and soft skills (Source: compiled by the authors).

ESP course	Module	Career adapt-abilities scale factors	Soft skills
	Debate	Control	conflict resolution, self-regulation
	Presentation	Confidence	communication
	Task-based (teamwork)	Concern	empathy, motivation
	Challenge	control, concern	self-regulation, motivation
	Journal	Curiosity	critical thinking

.

Research highlights that the close association between career adapt-abilities scale factors results in the development of soft skills as part of employability skills.

Table 7. ESP course description (Source: compiled by the authors).

Module	Features
Debate	- Buiding self-regulation - Improving public speaking skills - Promoting understanding in a collaborative and cooperative group setting - Honing an emotive language - Using techniques of persuasion
Presentation	- Studying of rhetoric in a foreign language - Mastering foreign language terminology - Developing abilities to treat a deficit of linguistic means - Enhancing speechwriting skills - Dealing with presentation nervousness
Task-based (teamwork)	- Cultivating deep-seated motivation - Engaging students’ empathy in STEM - Designing thinking tasks and trigger questions - Working in pairs and groups - Developing cognitive skills
Challenge	- Maintaining control in situations of uncertainty - Learning to anticipate changes - Responding pro-actively to the new in the outside world - Adapting to changes - Performing in a diversity of contexts centred on purpose
Journal	- Boosting critical thinking skills - Learning an academic word list - Using storytelling in a foreign language - Expressing ideas coherently - Mastering time-management techniques

provides a description of the ESP course.

The debate module covers key terminology (argument, rebuttal, and counterargument), debate structure (opening, rebuttals, and closing statements), and roles (proposition, opposition, and moderator). Having conflict resolution and self-regulation skills helps students navigate disagreements constructively and empathetically, which is a key to productive debates and brings mutually beneficial outcomes. As far as career-adapt abilities factors are concerned, control indicates the level of personal responsibility within debates. While fostering personal responsibility, students are taught to evaluate what they can control at each debate stage by completing a checklist, as well as a to-do list in English.

The presentation module teaches students to deliver a tremendously impactful presentation following preparation, delivery, and assessment instructions. Students’ confidence directly impacts their communication skills. Active listening, asking questions, and feedback activities allow students to become confident in public speaking, which is essential in their studies and future workplaces.

The task-based learning module focuses on empathy and motivation skill development. An innate empathic ability is known to be more pronounced in some people compared to others. Learning empathy requires reflective feelings practice based on integrating thinking tasks and trigger questions into English language teaching. Development of the control and concern career adapt-abilities factors requires active participation and interaction between students. In contrast to the traditional teaching approach, team-based learning aims to encourage self-managed learning and enables the instructor to provide content expertise while simultaneously monitoring the studies of the whole group.

The challenge module allows students to build the internal strength to cope with uncertainty through exercises such as sorting unforeseen events by risk level, reacting to changes, putting feelings into words, and developing personal motivation. Active listening, self-presentation, and asking open-ended questions to gather insights help students increase their self-regulation.

The journal module aims to improve ESP written communication. Students are taught how to read formulas, describe graphs and diagrams, use technical terminology and linking words, and write abstracts, introductions, conclusions, and references. Critical thinking skills determine the development of the curiosity career adapt-abilities factor through considering different perspectives and using storytelling in English lessons. In the ESP course, we give a ‘motivational text’. We compiled these texts in such a way that, after working with them, the students become ‘saturated’ with information on the topic; work with thematic vocabulary in the text; apply their knowledge in practice; and finally give effective presentations, delivering the results of their individual or group projects and drawing conclusions (

Table 8. Giving presentations (Source: compiled by the authors).

№	Module/Topic	Content	Hours
1	Stages of presentation preparation	four steps to a successful start; explaining the main points and using examples; how to end the presentation and lead the discussion	9
2	Writing a speech in English	how to put complex things into simple words; using synonyms; using correct and standardized terms	9
3	Pronunciation and intonation	‘false friends”; pronunciation of numerals and fractions; the importance of a correct accent	9
4	Examples of successful presentations	what makes a presentation successful; TED format; analyses of successful presentations	9
5	Psychological aspects	awareness of fears; positive attitude; breathing techniques	9
6	Preparation of visuals	title and title slide; use of verbs and prepositions; grammar and spelling; layout	9
7	Giving a paper	how to start a speech; engaging the audience; use of examples	9
8	Practical application of the studied material	speech preparation; presentation preparation; giving a presentation	9
Total		72

).

Ongoing assessment and a final assessment are used to evaluate what knowledge, abilities, and skills students have acquired.

The ongoing assessment is conducted through tests that contain questions on each module and are taken throughout the course. Upon completion of the experiment, the participants completed the ESP final test, indicating the results of English language acquisition in the experimental and control groups.

3. Results

We have identified the soft skills that improve engineering students’ overall engineering abilities, designed an ESP course enhancing both English language and soft skills, and validated pedagogical conditions created (the ESP course).

3.1. Outcome 1: Identification of the Soft Skills Maximizing the Career Success of Engineering Students

At the beginning of the experiment, the majority of engineering students considered technical skills and abilities more important than soft skills. However, after the experiment, 67 percent of the students answered that some soft skills are as vital as hard skills. The students highlighted soft skills related to communication, such as active listening skills, empathy, and accepting different points of view. In addition, the ability to overcome short-term difficulties in order to achieve a goal, self-confidence, and creative ways of problem-solving turned out to be the most significant and helpful skills in the students’ future jobs. In the feedback that the students provided, they stressed that they had become aware of the importance of soft skills. Before, they could not imagine that the role of soft skills could be as relevant as that of professional skills in terms of employability enhancement.

3.2. Outcome 2: Design and Validation of the ESP Course

Since soft skills are seen as the basis of engineering students’ employability, we have created an ESP course aimed at the simultaneous development of English proficiency and soft skills. The ESP course is designed based on the results of a needs analysis test. According to the results of the survey, the engineering students’ needs are focused on their professional field.

Students in the experimental group found the simultaneous development of soft and foreign language skills rather useful for their future work in the mineral resource sector. We received the following feedback: “You’ll become better adaptable and ready for changes after completing the ESP course”, “We have made ourselves more attractive to employers”, and “Technical skills alone are no longer sufficient for many employers”.

The diagnostic test, CAAS papers, and Johari Window Perspectives tests were administered before the ESP course and afterward. Differences between students’ results collected before and after studying the integrative course were examined.

The quantitative data collected through two sets of both CAAS papers and Johari Window Perspectives tests, as well as processed by the statistical analysis methods, have proved that we were able to simultaneously scale up the employability and English proficiency of engineering students through English lessons. The results showed a significant increase in soft skills development before and after ESP studies. Similarly, the results of the experiment demonstrated a significant increase in the development of English language skills.

The experiments showed that after training, the values of the attributes “Wondering what my future will be like” and “Making wise choices of education and career” statistically significantly decreased, with p being less than 0.05. The values of the attributes “Knowing that today’s choices determine my future” and “Concerns about career advancing” increased. The remaining data were unchanged with p > 0.05 (

Table 9. Factors in the Career Adapt-Abilities Scale (Source: compiled by the authors).

Groups	Variables	Wondering What My Future Will Be Like		Knowing That Today’s Choices Determine My Future		Preparing for the Future		Making Wise Choices of Education and Career		Planning Ways of Succeeding My Goals		Concerns About Career Advancing
		Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training
Control group	Mean	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	2.13	2.50
	±SD	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	0.85	0.81
	Median	3.0	2.5	2.5	3.0	3.0	3.0	3.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0
	Q1	3.0	2.0	2.0	3.0	3.0	3.0	3.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0
	Q3	3.0	3.0	3.0	3.0	4.0	4.0	3.0	3.0	3.0	3.0	3.0	3.0
	MannWhitney Z test	4.82		4.82		-		6.22		-		4.49
	P (before-after)	0.000		0.000		-		0.000		-		0.000
	Difference between groups, %	−16.7%		20.0%		0.0%		−33.3%		0.0%		17.4%
Experimental group	Median	3.0	4.0	2.5	3.5	3.0	4.5	3.0	4.0	2.0	3.0	3.0	4.0
	Q1	3.0	4.0	2.0	3.0	3.0	4.0	3.0	4.0	2.0	3.0	3.0	3.0
	Q3	3.0	5.0	3.0	4.0	4.0	5.0	3.0	4.0	3.0	4.0	3.0	4.0
	MannWhitney Z test	8.44		8.68		8.64		8.68		8.64		7.11
	p value (before-after)	0.000		0.000		0.000		0.000		0.000		0.000
	Difference between groups, %	33.3%		40.0%		50.0%		33.3%		50.0%		33.3%
Difference between groups	MannWhitney Z-test	0.15	−10.5	0.00	−2.93	0.00	−8.66	0.00	−11.7	−0.10	−7.59	−8.49	−8.87
	p value	0.879	0.000	0.999	0.003	0.999	0.000	0.999	0.000	0.924	0.000	0.000	0.000
	Difference between groups, %	0.0%	60.0%	0.0%	16.7%	0.0%	50.0%	0.0%	100%	0.0%	50.0%	50.0%	100%

The percentage differences between the mean values are highlighted in bold. Statistically significant differences are highlighted in red.

).

After the end of the experiment, the majority of students in the experimental group noted a statistically significant improvement in the values of all attributes by 33.3–50%. At the beginning of the experiment, the attributes were basically the same in the experimental and control groups (p > 0.05), apart from the value of the attribute “Concerns about career advancing”, which was higher in the experimental group.

In the control group, who were taught under the standard curriculum, the median of “Wondering what my future will be like” decreased statistically by 16.7% (p < 0.001).

In the control group, the median of the attribute “Knowing that today’s choices determine my future” increased statistically significantly by 20.0% (p < 0.001) after the standard training.

In the control group, after standard training, the median of the attribute “Making wise choices of education and career” decreased statistically by 33.3% (p < 0.001). The mean of “Concerns about career advancing” was statistically significant at 17.4% (p < 0.001) after undergoing the standard training.

The experimental group demonstrated an increase of 33.3% in the median of the attribute “Wondering what my future will be like” (p < 0.001). In the experimental group, at the end of the experiment, the median for “Knowing that today’s choices determine my future” increased by 40.0% statistically (p = 0.003). On the other hand, the median for “Preparing for the future” increased statistically by 50.0% (p < 0.001). At the end of the research period, the experimental group showed an increase of 33.3% in the median of “Making wise choices of education and career” (p < 0.001).

At the end of the research period, the control group demonstrated increases of 2.5–26.1% for all attributes (p < 0.05) except “Encouraging spirit and feeding mind and body”. After training, the experimental group showed an increase of 50% for all attributes (p < 0.05). Before the training, there were no differences between the groups (p > 0.05). After training, all indicators became higher in the experimental group by 50% (

Table 10. Factors in the Control Career Adapt-Abilities Scale (Source: compiled by the authors).

Groups	Variables	Encouraging Spirit and Feeding Mind and Body		Making Decisions Independently		Taking Responsibility for the Actions		Being Able to Defend My Beliefs		Believe in Myself		Doing What’s Suitable for Me
		Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training
Control group	Mean	-	-	2.00	2.05	2.11	2.18	1.79	1.98	1.57	1.98	1.70	2.00
	±SD	-	-	0.72	0.69	0.80	0.74	0.74	0.65	0.64	0.53	0.50	0.45
	Median	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0
	Q1	1.0	1.0	1.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	1.0	2.0	1.0	2.0	1.0	2.0
	Q3	3.0	3.0	3.0	3.0	3.0	3.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0
	MannWhitney Z test	0.53		2.02		2.37		3.72		4.91		4.29
	P (before-after)	0.593		0.043		0.018		0.000		0.000		0.000
	Difference between groups, %	0.0%		2.5%		3.3%		10.6%		26.1%		17.6%
Experimental group	Average	-	-	-	-	-	-	2.03	-	-	-	-	-
	±SD	-	-	-	-	-	-	0.85	-	-	-	-	-
	Median	2.0	3.0	2.0	3.0	2.0	3.0	2.0	3.0	2.0	3.0	2.0	3.0
	Q1	1.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	3.0	1.0	3.0	1.0	3.0	1.0	2.0
	Q3	3.0	4.0	3.0	3.3	3.0	4.0	3.0	4.0	2.0	4.0	2.0	3.0
	MannWhitney Z test	8.68		7.72		8.68		8.68		8.64		8.33
	P (before-after)	0.000		0.000		0.000		0.000		0.000		0.000
	Difference between groups, %	50.0%		50.0%		50.0%		50.0%		50.0%		50.0%
Difference between groups	MannWhitney Z-test	0.09	−6.85	−0.84	−6.84	0.00	−8.80	−1.88	−8.62	0.00	−10.46	−0.41	−7.46
	p value	0.925	0.000	0.399	0.000	1.000	0.000	0.060	0.000	0.999	0.000	0.682	0.000
	Difference between groups, %	0.0%	50.0%	0.0%	50.0%	0.0%	50.0%	13.4%	50.0%	0.0%	50.0%	0.0%	50.0%

The percentage differences between the mean values are highlighted in bold. Statistically significant differences are highlighted in red.

).

After training, the control group’s attribute “Looking for possibilities for personal growth” increased statistically significantly by 6.7–34.4% (p < 0.05). After the ESP course, all attributes of the experimental group improved statistically significantly by 33.3–100% (p < 0.05). Before training, there were no differences between the groups (p > 0.05) except for the attributes “Examining the professional field” and “Thinking deeply about the issues I have”. After ESP training, all attributes improved by 66.7–100% in the experimental group (

Table 11. Curiosity Factor in the Career Adapt-Abilities Scale (Source: compiled by the authors).

Groups	Variables	Examining the Professional Field		Looking for Possibilities for Personal Growth		Exploring Options Before Making a Choice		Monitoring Various Ways of Doing Things		Thinking Deeply About the Issues I Have		Increasing Interest in Opportunities
		Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training
Control group	Mean	2.20	2.48	-	-	1.80	2.42	1.69	2.17	1.63	2.07	2.23	2.38
	±SD	0.93	0.69	-	-	0.88	0.59	0.61	0.43	0.63	0.52	0.63	0.51
	Median	2.0	2.0	3.0	3.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0
	Q1	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	1.0	2.0	1.0	2.0	1.0	2.0	2.0	2.0
	Q3	3.0	3.0	3.0	3.0	2.0	3.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	3.0	3.0
	MannWhitney Z test	3.70		-		5.91		5.30		5.08		2.80
	P (before-after)	0.000		-		0.000		0.000		0.000		0.005
	Difference (before-after), %	12.7%		0.0%		34.4%		28.4%		27.0%		6.7%
Experimental group	Average	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	2.22	-	-	-
	±SD	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	0.63	-	-	-
	Median	3.0	4.0	3.0	5.0	2.0	4.0	2.0	3.0	2.0	4.0	2.0	3.0
	Q1	2.0	3.0	2.0	4.0	1.0	4.0	1.0	2.8	2.0	4.0	2.0	3.0
	Q3	3.0	4.0	3.0	5.0	2.0	4.0	2.0	3.0	3.0	4.0	3.0	4.0
	MannWhitney Z test	8.68		8.68		8.64		8.51		8.55		8.68
	P (before-after)	0.000		0.000		0.000		0.000		0.000		0.000
	Difference (before-after), %	33.3%		66.7%		100.0%		50.0%		100.0%		50.0%
Difference between groups	MannWhitney Z-test	−4.18	−9.48	0.00	−12.06	0.32	−11.63	0.00	−7.11	−5.49	−12.11	0.15	−8.95
	p value	0.000	0.000	0.999	0.000	0.748	0.000	0.999	0.000	0.000	0.000	0.883	0.000
	Difference between groups, %	50.0%	100%	0.0%	66.7%	0.0%	100%	0.0%	50.0%	36.2%	100%	0.0%	50.0%

The percentage differences between the mean values are highlighted in bold. Statistically significant differences are highlighted in red.

).

As can be seen from

Table 12. Confidence Factor in the Career Adapt-Abilities Scale (Source: compiled by the authors).

Groups	Variables	Finding the Most Efficient Way of Performing Tasks		Being Responsible for the Choice		Acquisition of New Skills		Working Within My Capabilities		Overcoming Obstacles		Troubleshooting Skills
		Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training
Control group	Mean	1.56	2.08	-	-	1.93	2.16	2.64	2.78	1.76	2.21	-	-
	±SD	0.57	0.31	-	-	0.64	0.37	0.98	0.79	0.74	0.41	-	-
	Median	2.0	2.0	1.0	2.5	2.0	2.0	3.0	3.0	2.0	2.0	1.5	2.0
	Q1	1.0	2.0	1.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	1.0	2.0	1.0	2.0
	Q3	2.0	2.0	2.0	3.0	2.0	2.0	3.0	3.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	2.0
	MannWhitney Z test	6.15		7.47		4.02		3.30		5.84		5.99
	P (before-after)	0.000		0.000		0.000		0.001		0.000		0.000
	Difference (before-after), %	33.3%		150.0%		11.9%		5.3%		25.6%		33.3%
Experimental group	Average	1.90	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
	±SD	0.61	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
	Median	2.0	3.0	1.0	3.0	2.0	3.0	3.0	4.0	3.0	4.0	2.0	5.0
	Q1	2.0	3.0	1.0	2.0	2.0	3.0	2.0	3.0	2.0	4.0	1.0	4.0
	Q3	2.0	3.0	2.0	3.0	2.0	4.0	3.0	5.0	3.0	5.0	2.0	5.0
	MannWhitney Z test	8.68		8.68		-		8.68		8.59		8.51
	P (before-after)	0.000		0.000		-		0.000		0.000		0.000
	Difference (before-after), %	50.0%		200.0%		-		50.0%		33.3%		33.3%
Difference between groups	MannWhitney Z test	−3.45	−8.51	0.00	−1.07	0.28	−9.15	0.00	−8.48	−6.01	−11.07	−1.86	−12.14
	p value	0.001	0.000	0.999	0.286	0.782	0.000	0.999	0.000	0.000	0.000	0.062	0.000
	Difference between groups, %	21.8%	50.0%	0.0%	20.0%	0.0%	50.0%	0.0%	33.3%	50.0%	100%	33.3%	150%

The percentage differences between the mean values are highlighted in bold. Statistically significant differences are highlighted in red.

, the values of all attributes increased statistically significantly by 11.9–150% (p < 0.05). After training, in the experimental group, all values increased by 33.3–200% (p < 0.05). Before training, there were no group differences indicated (p > 0.05) except for the attributes “Finding the most efficient way of performing tasks” and “Overcoming obstacles”. After the ESP course, values of all of the attributes, except “Being responsible for the choice”, became higher in the experimental group by 33.3–150% (Table 12).

The Johari Windows test administered after the experimental ESP course showed that the differences between how students see themselves and each other in terms of students’ attitudes, beliefs, skills, and experiences towards others decreased.

Thus, the open/free area (arena) expanded, the blind area shrank, the unknown area (unconscious) became more observable, and the hidden area (facade) was revealed. The interpretation of adjectives in the Johari Window quadrants showed that the internal and external self-awareness of the experimental group had increased. Thus, interpersonal communication has been improved in the experimental group.

After training, the control group’s indices improved. For example, the quadrants “arena” and “façade/hidden area” decreased by 33.3 and 3.6% (p < 0.05). The unknown area increased by 2.1%. The blind spot quadrant did not change (p > 0.05). After ESP training, the experimental group demonstrated an increase in the arena and blind spot quadrants by 33.3 and 50.0% (p < 0.05). Façade and unknown area decreased statistically significantly by 50.0 and 2.1% (p < 0.05). Before training, there were no differences between groups concerning the arena and façade quadrants (p > 0.05). Blind spot was higher by 12.6% in the experimental group (p < 0.05). There was a decrease of 0.5% in the unknown area. In the experimental group, the arena and blind spot quadrants widened by 100 and 50% in the experimental group. After training, the façade and unknown area quadrants were lower in the experimental group by 50 and 4.2% (

Table 13. Johari Window test results (Source: compiled by the authors).

Groups	Variables	Open Area		Blind Area		Hidden Area		Unknown Area
		Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training	Before ESP Training	After ESP Training
Control group	Mean	-	-	2.06	1.91	3.93	3.79	-	-
	±SD	-	-	0.57	0.65	0.61	0.71	-	-
	Median	3.0	2.0	2.0	2.0	4.0	4.0	47.0	48.0
	Q1	2.0	2.0	2.0	1.0	4.0	3.0	47.0	47.0
	Q3	3.0	3.0	2.0	2.0	4.0	4.0	48.0	49.0
	MannWhitney Z test	2.73		1.87		2.93		4.36
	P (before-after)	0.006		0.062		0.003		0.000
	Difference (before-after), %	−33.3%		−7.3%		−3.6%		2.1%
Experimental group	Average	-	-	2.32	-	-	-	47.08	-
	±SD	-	-	0.68	-	-	-	1.02	-
	Median	3.0	4.0	2.0	3.0	4.0	2.0	47.0	46.0
	Q1	2.0	4.0	2.0	3.0	4.0	2.0	46.0	46.0
	Q3	3.0	5.0	3.0	4.0	4.0	3.0	48.0	47.0
	MannWhitney Z test	8.10		6.97		8.23		5.24
	P (before-after)	0.000		0.000		0.000		0.000
	Difference (before-after), %	33.3%		50.0%		−50.0%		−2.1%
Difference between groups	MannWhitney Z test	0.04	−10.89	−2.75	−8.91	0.00	10.28	2.02	6.91
	p value	0.970	0.000	0.006	0.000	0.999	0.000	0.043	0.000
	Difference between groups, %	0.0%	100.0%	12.6%	50.0%	0.0%	−50.0%	−0.5%	−4.2%

The percentage differences between the mean values are highlighted in bold. Statistically significant differences are highlighted in red.

).

The interpretation of adjectives in the Johari quadrants showed that the performance of the experimental group improved. Thus, students in the experimental group improved their interpersonal communication skills.

Appendix A and Appendix B contain diagrams illustrating the changes in the soft skills of engineering students in the control and experimental groups before and after the experiment.

4. Discussion

The aim of this study was to find a way to develop English language skills and improve the employability of engineering students within English classes. This discussion centers around two main topics: the development of the foreign language competence of second-year engineering students and their soft skills, being part of their employability skills.

The results show that engineering students need an English language course focused on their professional field, as well as some soft skills with which to build a career and be in demand in the labor market. This research paper contributes to enhancing the employability of engineering students by creating pedagogical conditions within English classes. To achieve the set goals, the authors designed an ESP course offering practical insights and methodologies for the development of soft skills. The tutor–student interactions and the curriculum or subject matter were facilitated by the use of training strategies. As for a teaching and learning environment that would allow the future engineers to be effective, students were engaged in various activities throughout the English class that stimulated their minds and emotions and inspired them to work independently.

Our research highlights the role of the ESP in promoting the development of competencies for employability and agrees with the findings in [45]. However, the development of soft skills is not viewed as a goal in their research.

The diagnostic Test, CAAS papers, and Johari Window Perspectives tests indicated that students were satisfied with both the level of English and soft skills possessed. The students appeared content with the perceived level of their teamwork, public speaking, self-regulation, and personal management abilities at the ESP course graduation. Nonetheless, there may be some ways to elicit additional development in the areas of creativity and the capacity to resolve conflicts. This result seems to be in line with some past findings that suggest that capacities for conflict management and adapting to changes were lower than expected [46]. However, it must also be noted that none of the soft skills were scored ‘strongly agree’ on a 5-point Likert-type scale by students in the experimental group, which coincided with the results in [47,48]. Consequently, there is room for continuous improvement.

By revealing a connection between career adapt-abilities factors and soft skills, our study offers compelling insight into the nature of employability skills.

Our results are consistent with previously published data regarding fundamental academic competencies that were divided into cognitive abilities, such as reasoning, problem-solving, creativity, decision-making skills; conflict resolution, leadership, and negotiation (interpersonal and teamwork), and personal traits and mindsets, such as confidence and readiness for personal development [49,50]. However, in our present research, the role of an ESP course was emphasized.

Our findings on the development of employability skills have broadened the results of some other researchers in this field [51]. However, the level of communicative competence identified is not as high as that discovered in a previous study on L2 students’ and L2 [52]. This difference can be explained by the fact that students in engineering education typically have an inherently lower level of English compared to humanities students. The level of English proficiency can be increased based on the ESP course. This finding is not surprising in light of previous research results [53]. We agree with the results of [54], which suggested that students should be given an opportunity to develop complement skills associated with employability, such as personal ethics and social awareness; intellectual abilities to think critically, analytical skills; and performance—the application of skills and intellect in the workplace and engagement and the willingness to meet personal, employment, and social challenges. We enhanced the results gained by Ramisetty J. and employed two methods to evaluate employability skills development [55]. As the role of technology in any classroom is increasing, it is time to start using best practices in developing L2 competence [56].

Although the present study provided empirical evidence of the benefits of integrating the ESP course into a foreign language curriculum, it had a number of limitations. The students’ foreign language proficiency (B1) was assessed by the Saint Petersburg Mining University’s annual introductory test. Only the second-year undergraduate engineering students completed a survey concerning employability skill development.

Further research may be more extensive and cover such areas as peer-to-peer collaboration in class [57].

5. Conclusions

There is a critical need to create pedagogical conditions that develop the employability skills of engineering students, who should possess technical and interdisciplinary knowledge and have highly developed soft skills. The experiment was conducted to test the effectiveness of applying pedagogical conditions for developing students’ readiness for their future professional work.

This experimental ESP program instituted at Saint Petersburg Mining University in the curriculum of second-year specialists in the 2023–2024 academic year ensured the development of employability skills concurrently with English language skills. The calculated results of the control group compared with the experimental group lead us to the conclusion that the additional ESP course in experimental learning confirms its effectiveness. The results show that an ESP course at technical universities helps widen the arena quadrant, which proves the development of some soft (personal and social) skills in engineering students. Students and tutors have been provided with a tool to develop attributes that can enhance employability.

This study can be useful for future researchers in this field, as well as professors, students, and methodologists, as it proposes an English for a specific purpose course to develop students’ employability skills and validates it at the level of confirmation. Ultimately, it assists methodologists in pinpointing activities that cultivate essential student attributes.