Industrial Training Program During COVID-19 Pandemic: Perceptions and Challenges

An industrial training program provides working experience to the final-year students to prepare them for the real world. However, these industrial training students were affected in completing the program when the COVID-19 pandemic hit the world from 2020 until 2021. Therefore, this study was conducted to investigate the students’ perceptions of the skills required before joining an industrial training program and to find out the challenges industrial training students faced at the workplace during the COVID-19 pandemic. To achieve the research objectives of this study, a qualitative approach was employed among five industrial training students who had completed their industrial training program during the COVID-19 pandemic. They were interviewed and video-recorded. The data were then analyzed using thematic analysis. The study's findings show that the students valued five specific skills before joining an industrial training program: leadership, proactive, knowledge management, ICT, and communication skills. Meanwhile, there were two significant challenges faced by the students in completing the industrial training program during the COVID-19 pandemic which missed out on the opportunities to gain firsthand knowledge from their managers and coworkers, and also communication issues including in receiving tasks and guidance, as well as immediate feedback from the supervisors. Thus, universities need to offer courses or activities that help students develop relevant skills that are suitable for WFO and WFH working situations to prepare them for the industrial training program. The quantitative data method can be used to collect extensive data for further study to gain a deeper understanding of the problem.