Akademik Veri Yönetim Sistemi
EUROPEAN EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH JOURNAL, cilt.00, sa.0, ss.1-20, 2026 (SSCI, Scopus)
Competency in oral communication in English is a key factor in bridging the skills gap of graduates in the international job market, and higher education is attributed the role of accommodating this employability need. This sequential exploratory study aims to identify the speaking tasks and skills necessary for academic studies and professional life. Adopting a mixed-method design by utilizing interviews, observations, and a survey, this study was conducted in an EMI university in an EFL setting including participants from higher education and business sectors. Utilizing CEFR and the Cambridge Employability Skills Framework for ELT, the study adopted a novel approach to match the oral communication skills to the corresponding mode of communication and broader employability skills. Thematic content analysis and descriptive statistics revealed that students and employees perform tasks requiring information presentation and interaction skills. In survey results, tasks of small/social talk, meeting online, and discussion/meeting session, and skills of understanding field/topic-specific vocabulary, answering questions and expressing and supporting opinion are labeled prime ones. The study has valuable implications for stakeholders such as educators, curriculum designers, policy makers, and human resource specialists in prioritizing the tasks and skills for individuals to meet the demands of contemporary academic and professional landscapes.