Employability is widely recognized as one of the most important indicators of higher education effectiveness, playing a critical role in preparing students for successful entry into the labor market. Given the increasing complexity and evolving demands of contemporary workplaces, identifying and prioritizing the skills that contribute to employability can provide valuable guidance for educational planners and higher education policymakers. Therefore, this study aimed to prioritize the employability skills required to enhance graduates’ job readiness and align their competencies with labor market needs, while also comparing the perspectives of male and female students at Shiraz University regarding the importance of these skills. Data were collected from a sample of 140 students at Shiraz University through pairwise comparisons and were analyzed using the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP). The findings revealed that business skills were identified as the most important employability dimension by both male and female students. However, notable gender-based differences emerged in the prioritization of other employability dimensions. Female students ranked soft skills as the second most important category after business skills, whereas male students assigned greater importance to hard skills. Among female students, communication and teamwork skills received the highest priority, while knowledge of start-up development and business plan preparation ranked highest among male students. The findings underscore the importance of strengthening business, entrepreneurial, and communication competencies as key components of graduate employability. The results also highlight the need for higher education institutions to adopt more comprehensive and gender-responsive approaches to employability development, ensuring that graduates are equipped with the diverse skill sets required in an increasingly competitive labor market.