Factors that contribute to graduates' satisfaction: does gender play a moderating role?

The purpose of this paper is to analyse the factors that contribute to graduates' satisfaction by focusing on gender and job experience (employment status and salary income). We considered two measures of graduates' satisfaction: the perception of the graduate regarding the quality of the formation given by the program of the university that they attended (subjective) and the average of graduates' score performance from all the career (objective). The data were collected through a telephone interview with graduates who had finished their studies between 2013 and 2018. We employ regression models on a final sample of 1,261 Colombian university graduates. The results show that there are significant differences between men's and women's graduate satisfaction and employment status. However, we could not find differences between gender related to the salary income. Finally, the finding provides valuable information on the factors that contribute to graduates' satisfaction as guides to Colombian regulators, universities, decision-makers, and policymakers. These people should consider our findings to promote a strategy that increases job market opportunities for graduates through either obligatory laws or suggestions.