Undertaken by mental health body ReachOut, the Ready Or Not report released this week found up to 43 per cent of the nation's new and near graduated university students did not believe their degrees adequately prepared them for life outside academia.

Additionally, up to 30 per cent of the respondents were disappointed with the amount of hands-on and work experience training available in their course load.

Director of Huntsman Recruitment in Wagga, Rhyley Hunter sees the results as a significant arena for growth in the nation's tertiary bodies.

"The more hands-on it can be throughout the degree, the better," Mr Hunter said.

"The more equipped they will be for what they experience outside uni."

In response to the report, a spokesperson for Charles Sturt University in Wagga confirmed the institution's commitment to student employment outcomes.

"Charles Sturt University is committed to training job-ready graduates and the University's results in the 2020 'Good Universities Guide' reflect this," the spokesperson said.

"The guide revealed 86 per cent of Charles Sturt graduates are in full-time employment within four months of completing their course - a superior rate to any other Australian university.

"The fact many of Charles Sturt graduates are finding employment so quickly after graduating reflects the University's successful integration of many practical and industry-based experiences into its degrees."

Many of Mr Hunter's clients have not attended university, but from those who have, he hears the same thing.

"Talking to graduates myself, the majority say they learn more in the two years out from uni than they did in the four-to-six years in their degree, that's the feedback I most often hear," he said.

"Universities need to offer a 50-50 approach to theory and practical learning, similar to how VET classes work."

Consistent and varied exposure to the changing workforce over the period of their degree, Mr Hunter argues, has a greater impact than simply preparing students for the work they will do post-study.

"Some finish their degrees, get out into the workplace and realise then that this is not what they expected or wanted to do," Mr Hunter said.

"They have to then go back and study again, or change it somehow. It's easier if they found that out before [completing] the degree."

The report also indicated that students feel under-equipped to face the rapidly changing workplace environment that is set to confront new graduates over the next decade.

In particular, increasing technological developments and the rise of automation in the workplace has the potential to upset quotas for many entry level positions.

Adapting to the job market in that sense, Mr Hunter said, hinges on a culture shift in both the student and the university.

"It comes down to mindset. You don't know what's coming in the workplace, only that there will be constant change and you have to be ready for that," he said.

"[Automation] will become more of an issue, and jobs will require more re-training as new technologies emerge.

"Workers will have to consistently re-train and re-skill to stay useful to employers.

"It's happening most in agricultural and manufactoring industries [right now], but all sorts of white collar positions, where there are repeated tasked, they are being automated."

The effects of automation in workplaces are already being seen through a comparison of Australian Bureau Statistics employment rates.

In 2007, up to 85 per cent of graduates with a Bachelors degree had full-time employment.

By 2016, less than a decade later, that figure had dropped to 71 per cent.

But Mr Hunter said this should not entirely be recognised as negative.

"Temporary and part-time employment is on the rise, but that is a cultural change," he said.

"People are increasingly looking to travel and experience multiple workplaces in their lifetime, they want variety in their work.

"Employers need to get ready for that, it's going to become more of a factor, so have strategies to assist with that."

Increasingly in Mr Hunter's recruitment work, he is coming across workers who seek short-term positions of up to six months that they can work as an interlude between long periods of travelling.

This, he said, is something workplaces can "turn into a positive with a bit of proper management".

"Employers need to educate themselves by speaking to their staff honestly about what they want for themselves in five to 10 years, and accommodating that," he said.

"It's how they frame those discussions, if they value full transparency, they could have an anonymous survey, with no repercussions for their staff, aimed at wanting to know what they want to make it a better, more flexible workplace.

"Progressive employers are looking at that now."