Beyond the syllabus: Top books UK students are reading to get ahead

Applications for university internships rose 27% last year, but employers cut internship and placement hiring by 8%, according to the Institute of Student Employers’ (ISE) latest Student Recruitment Survey. Competition for experience is set to grow increasingly fierce - but data from digital learning platform Perlego suggests many students are not waiting for a placement to start building the skills employers want.

The personal development books UK students are seeking out on Perlego point to a generation actively building key life and workplace skills: emotional intelligence, resilience, communication, influence and motivation. These are skills employers are watching closely, with a separate ISE survey last year finding that almost half of graduate employers (46%) reported concerns about resilience in new graduates, up from 30% in 2023.

The most-read personal development books among UK students on Perlego:

1. The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck, Mark Manson

2. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, Stephen R. Covey

3. Grit, Angela Duckworth

4. How to Win Friends and Influence People, Dale Carnegie

5. Drive, Daniel H. Pink

6. Influence, New and Expanded: The Psychology of Persuasion, Robert B. Cialdini

7. Emotional Intelligence 2.0, Travis Bradberry and Jean Greaves

8. Everyday Emotional Intelligence, Harvard Business Review

9. The Intelligent Investor, Benjamin Graham

10. On Grief and Grieving, Elisabeth Kübler-Ross and David Kessler

The most-read title by far is about resilience and deciding what matters, read by almost three times as many students as the next book. Decades-old classics feature strongly too - including Dale Carnegie’s 1936 bestseller on communication and Benjamin Graham’s 1949 guide to investing - alongside a book on navigating grief, which also makes the top ten.

Gauthier Van Malderen, Founder and CEO of Perlego, said: “With internships harder to come by, students can’t rely on work experience alone to prepare them for the workplace. Our data shows many aren’t waiting. Given access to the right books, they’re choosing to build the skills employers value, from resilience to emotional intelligence - highlighting that employers should look at what young people are learning on their own terms, not just what’s on their CV.”

Some universities are already building self-directed learning into their programmes. At Ravensbourne University London, ranked among University Compare’s top 10 UK universities for employability, students use Perlego to build their own reading lists for projects, with skills employers value built into how they are assessed.

Dr Kellie Vincent, Executive Dean of the School of Business, Management and Commerce at Ravensbourne University London, said: “Employers tell us they want graduates who can think for themselves, and that starts with how students learn. We give students a starting point, then reward them for going further. Learning to find, judge and use information is the skill that carries into every workplace, and with first-time passes up 30% last semester, our students show they rise to it when they have the resources.”