Abstract
The study examined employability skills and level of performance of pre-service secretaries in Federal
College of Education (Technical), Akoka, Yaba, Lagos. In an attempt to achieve the objectives of this
study, three research questions were formulated for study. The study adopted descriptive survey
research design with the population which covered all the 120 pre-service secretaries (final year
students) in OTM department, Federal College of Education (Technical), Akoka, Yaba, Lagos from
which 50 participants were selected through simple random sampling technique. Structure
questionnaire was used to collect data for the study during working hours. All the data collected were
analyzed using frequency count, mean and standard deviation so as to answer the research
questions. The findings of the study revealed that most of the preservice secretaries lack some
important employability skills in OTM some of which include critical thinking to aid decisionmaking,
regularly changing of attitude to work due to pressure and writing of the minutes of the meeting which
of course lower their job performance. The study recommended that, workshop and seminar on
employability skills required by employers of labour should be provided to final year students. Also,
on-the-job training should be provided for practicing secretaries to upgrade their skills on the job so as
to meet the employers demand effectively and as such become relevant to the world work.
Keywords: Secretaries, Employability Skills, and Job Performance
Publication Date: 2018-06-09