The importance of bridging the skills gap
Recently, a food delivery company had to shut down its new food delivery initiative due to a lack of delivery partners. In another example, a city-based pick-and-drop company has expanded its services across India. Expansion and contraction across industries depends on the availability of human resources. Skills gaps can be a significant part of the business success cycle. In this article, we will see how to solve the skills gap.
What is a skills gap?
The difference between the required skill set and the available capabilities within an organization is referred to as the skills gap.
Skills gap = required skills minus available skill set
Let’s look at a recruiting scenario that is framed in duality. On the one hand there are layoffs and on the other hand it is difficult for companies to find qualified candidates. Some skills become obsolete while others gain strength. Most HR and L&D professionals feel the need for qualifications, but many employees express concern about the lack of support for skills development.
These oxymorons widen the skills gap. what is the result of this?
Implication of skills gaps
All life is about growth and movement. The constant development of technology created new opportunities and made some skills redundant. Digitization has changed the way people connect things around them.
The changing nature of life has an impact on the job market. Rapidly changing skill requirements and the aforementioned dualism have created skill shortages and deviations from expectations. This skills gap has a negative impact on the country’s economy and society’s income. The rising unemployment rate worries everyone.
Failure to upskill the population has huge consequences that are not so positive. These include:
- A rise in the percentage of young people who are unemployed or in training
- An increase in the demotivated job-seeking population
- Waste of funds due to incorrect or insufficient training
- Increase in unemployment insurance
- Loss of income, GDP and taxes
According to a study by Korn Ferry, more than 85 million people worldwide will be missing by 2030. This could lead to about $8.5 trillion in unrealized annual revenue. The US alone is expected to burn its pockets by $162 billion. Korn Ferry is a global organizational consulting firm.
One might wonder if the skills gap is affecting them. They need to find out.
Skills gap analysis
Organizations that identify a skills gap are better positioned to address it. Skills analysis helps with workforce planning, supports individual employee learning, and provides an organization with a competitive advantage.
Here are the main steps to perform a skills gap analysis.
Company goals
Improve company goals. In addition to the vision and mission, market, competitor, consumer and industry research would serve as great pointers for designing a business strategy.
Identify Roles
Once the business plan is created, companies must identify the roles of the defined target. For example, if a food delivery business is looking to venture into courier and food delivery, some of the required roles would be warehouse management, delivery partners, logistics support, etc. to name a few.
Skill inventory
Create a skills inventory for defined roles.
Skillset available
Identify the skills available in the organization. This can be achieved through continuous checks, observations, tests and data collected from CVs about their certificates and competencies. Assess each employee’s potential beyond their current role and skill set.
Skill is required
Derive the required skill sets after they match the required and available skills.
Addressing the skills gap
Once the analysis is done, the company needs to close or narrow the skills gap. There must be more jobs and qualified candidates, whether in manufacturing, media, finance, technology, etc. Organizations must look beyond career fairs, recruitment events and other traditional recruitment processes to survive skills shortages.
Talent Hunt
The question is whether the company has dug deep enough to identify talent. Here are some routes that may have escaped notice.
Employees with long careers may have a variety of skills that equip them to take on additional tasks. Employees can train to improve their skills. Veterans and former service members can be hired, hired and retained.
In addition, organizations should be open to the inclusion of people with diversity. Diversity refers to differences based on race, socioeconomic factors, gender, experience, disability, geographic location, and more. Diverse populations help fill the skills gap.
An unconventional source of candidates
Several government training centers and non-profit organizations train people in industry-related skills such as management, coding, website development, etc. Create synergies with these organizations.
Stay connected with educational institutions
Tell educational institutions what skill and expertise they need to teach as part of their curriculum to match industry demands. Partner with academic institutions, technical centers and certification programs to enable a steady flow of talent.
Accept policy changes
Create policies to support learning opportunities. These can be bootcamps, academies, internal training, digital education or employee education incentives.
Train the recruiting team
Train hiring teams to be adept at identifying candidate knowledge, skills and abilities (KSAs) so that every qualified skill set is captured. It is also essential that management and recruitment teams get rid of their biases in order to reach a wider population. This increases the chances of finding the required qualification.
“Governments and organizations must make talent strategy a key priority and take action now to educate, train and upskill their existing workforce.” – Yannick Binvel, president of Korn Ferry’s Global Industrial Markets Practice
Upskill And Reskill
Prioritize an effective and robust training program that empowers employees. The learning path could be a combination of face-to-face instruction, self-directed eLearning courses, webinars, and resources including textbooks, PDFs, videos, and more.
The digital learning component may vary depending on the skill set. Customized eLearning solutions and online Learning Management Systems help accelerate learning in the workflow without disrupting the work schedule.
Addressing skills shortages will help:
- Create effective training programs
- Improve employee productivity
- Retain the talent pool and reduce turnover
- Build strong and diverse teams
- Prepare the company for the future
Conclusion
An investment in the training of your employees is an investment in the future of the company. Make your training program engaging and effective with digital learning. We help you analyze the skills needed to make your organization competitive. This is consistent with the ADDIE design model.
Take advantage of Brandon Hall Group’s SmartChoice Preferred Solution Provider services. Give your company training an edge and achieve your L&D goals and objectives. Contact me or leave a comment below to learn more about our services and how we can help you.
Tesseract Learning Pvt Ltd
Tesseract Learning works with global organizations to improve employee performance through a spectrum of digital learning solutions. Solutions include eLearning, mobile learning, microlearning, game-based learning, AR/VR, adaptive learning, among others.
Originally published on tesseractlearning.com.
