A Strategic Approach for Making Higher Education Institutions Relevant and Viable through Engaged Learning and Teaching based upon Graduate Employability Profiles

HEI’s attempt to stay relevant and viable through engaging effectively with society, government and the private sector at all levels. These objectives are achieved via renovating their vision, approaches to learning and teaching and developing relevant graduate profiles for employment in both public and private sectors. It has been recognised that these interrelated challenges can successfully be accomplished through effective management practices and resourceful planning to handle ongoing market influences, competition and fluctuations in student enrolments. Therefore, enabling the institution to align its decisions with its mission and goals, while addressing risk assessment and risk management and considering the needs and expectations of its internal and external constituents. This paper presents a collaborative process for developing learning and teaching strategic plans, with a focus on graduate employability profiles, to fulfil an institution’s forethought for the future. The paper also proposes an implementation procedure to manage the successful delivery of declared learning and teaching priorities and objectives. In other words, enabling the organisation to remain relevant and competitive and on the path to realize this aspiration. Keywords: Higher Education, Learning and Teaching, Strategic Plans, Relevance, Graduate Employability.