Does America have a skills gap problem?
According to a sizable number of business leaders, people professionals and market analysts, the United States has a skills gap problem. Between a massive amount of retirees and chasms of knowledge in crucial fields from tech to skilled labor, the modern workforce is woefully behind on what is needed to fill the numerous open roles on today’s job market.
Currently, people professionals are helping remedy their company’s issues. By addressing internal and external obstacles, proactive leadership can right the ship, fill in the gaps and encourage employees at the same time. However, with little time to spare, companies have to correct their skills woes soon or face a future where they are no longer part of the marketplace. The same can be said for its employees.
We as people professionals need to be on the front lines of change. Here is how.
Acknowledging America’s Skills Gap Problem
Though far from unanimous, a significant portion of America’s business leaders do believe that we face a skills gap problem in the coming years. Some may ask, “but what about the low unemployment rate?” Sure, the United States has seen positive signs in people returning to work in some capacity. However, as people professionals are well aware of, the troubling signs exist beyond the glaring statistics.
2017 figures pulled by Education Week show that roughly 6 million job openings existed in the U.S., yet 6.9 million people remained unemployed. Furthermore, today’s workforce requires further education than past generations. Today, six in 10 workers need postsecondary education, where only one in three were required in the 1970s. Their findings also point to a third-party survey that found 95% reporting difficulty in finding skilled workers for their openings.
Education platform Udemy found similar results in its 2017 Skills Gap Report. Key takeaways included 80% of Americans agreeing there was a skills gap in the country, and that 40% of those polled reported changing skills would have the most significant impact on their job over the next five years. Additionally, Udemy’s report found that companies spent an average of $1,075 per employee for job training. However, the report made a compelling argument when comparing similar totals to what a company spends on office snacks per employee.
In 2018, news stories and opinion polls appear to show that the nation’s skills gap problem continues to be a burden for both businesses and employees alike. With the consequences including low staff productivity, losing edge over the competition and possible job loss, employers and workers have quite a bit at stake in the coming years.
As companies fight to close the gap, one has to wonder what can be done to reverse the trends.
How Human Resources Can Help Solve the Skills Gap Problem
With companies mainly in agreement that there is a skills gap problem, the next step is to determine how to close the problem. While numerous opinion articles and company profiles show us a variety of options, you must minimize these erroneous pathways to closing your company’s gap. In doing so, you save the company money while likely increasing employee satisfaction within the organization.
While there are sure to be a few blanketed maneuvers all companies can take, the key is to focus in on what your organization needs most. Always customize the approach to meet the needs of your team. For some, the best method is employee engagement. You can engage your employees by offering skills training that extends beyond their current role. If you aren’t already, consider doing so while embracing a bit more of the cross-departmental learning that a network of teams approach affords you. Additionally, ask the employees which skills they need for their roles. Consider the most viable options and watch job interest improve.
In some cases, people professionals and leadership used other strategies that focused on betterment, proactivity and encouragement. Middle market companies in particular benefit from the reemergence of apprenticeships and rigorous internships. In addition to the two roles, similar strategies, in-house training and other job education programs now provide employees with encouragement to learn as they develop.
While these strategies are excellent broad beginning steps, people professionals have to go much further to remedy the problem in their companies. Identifying the unique pain points in each company is key. For example, some jobs aren’t suitable for automation. However, these roles are often more laborious and hands-on tasks that usually don’t suit the modern workforce. This particular situation can affect organizations with a large Baby Boomer era staff. As these senior workers enter retirement, Human Resources leaders have to find ways to bring in younger talent for roles in plants, electrical and other essential jobs.
When it comes to recruiting, people professionals are finding new approaches to fill in their gaps with skilled labor. That includes widening the hiring pool to include veterans and ex-convicts, as Maine has recently done for its hospitality industry. Some companies are emphasizing culture fits more to keep teams cohesive and in good spirits. While this has been a common occurrence in several spaces like startups and creative agencies, other jobs are increasingly employing the approach as well. Today, people professionals in these fields seek applicants that are both skilled and culture fits for the existing team.
That’s all well and good, you may say. But what about highly skilled, evolving fields with job shortages already? STEM is a perfect example where an evolving tech space that makes job training essential and nearly constant. To overcome both obstacles, company leaders are now investing in employee training while remaining budget conscious whenever possible. That includes in-house job training for employees and inexpensive MOOCs like Udemy, Skillshare and Lynda to provide expert training when the team does not have an internal solution.
In the comings months, we should expect to find additional methods and techniques suggested as well. As people professionals and team leadership dive further into its team needs, customized solutions should come to the forefront.
With businesses and sectors at stake, the severity of America’s skills gap problem is not lost on many leaders. Today, an emphasis on skills, engagement and company culture, teams are beginning to be the norm. Team guidance and learning should only continue to gain in importance around the office in the coming years.
How has your team filled in its skills gap concerns? Thousands of people professional like you and I would love to know! Comment here and be on the lookout for the Peoplzz.com community where professionals will be able to learn from one another easier than ever before. Stay tuned!
