What’s Eating Talent?
If you stay still and remain absolutely quiet, you will begin to see a remarkable shortage taking place — a squeeze that will someday affect each and every one of us. It’s a shortage of talent. It’s become harder and harder to find the right talent, at the right time with the right skills. The rules of engagement to attract the talent needed have completely changed. Yup — you guessed it — the Gig Economy is disrupting the way we will need to engage a new workforce — and consulting firms better listen up!
In consulting, a talent shortage is particularly painful, as without the right people with the right skills it is impossible to have a successful client engagement. Plus, many of the skills necessary to add value today can’t be faked or quickly learned — development, design, and technical jobs are growing, and the skills needed to fill these jobs take time and education to develop. 92% of executives believe that there is a serious gap between workforce needs and workforce skills, and over half of those executives are struggling to fill jobs. Job openings are the highest in 13 years. Widening skill gaps, frustration with traditional models and new ways to digitally discover, communicate and collaborate all contribute to make the world of talent acquisition rife for disruption.
This is something that we’re contemplating at IBM — as the consulting model is disrupted, how do we stay on the cutting edge of talent and engagement? Our goal, to bring amazing service to our clients, is the same. But how we accomplish that goal will soon be wildly different.
So…how should we engage talent?
There are a few new models coming to the forefront of talent and engagement that companies can (and should) leverage as they grapple with a changing workforce.
Gig Economy
The workforce is generally moving towards embracing a gig economy. What does that mean? It means that instead of having a normal 9–5pm job, more and more workers are preferring to be freelancers or contractors. Instead of having one office job, they pick up work as necessary. This model works for individuals who want to have more flexibility in their schedule, as they can make their own hours, can work remotely from anywhere, and can pick and choose what jobs they take on the fly.
The cons? It can be hard to find enough gigs to compare to full-time work, but that may change in the not so distant future as more and more businesses embrace a freelance model. Other challenges include building a company culture without cohesive a work force, as well as ensure alignment to a company mission if workers are not full-time employees. As consultancies try different methods of engaging resources, their value props, culture, and brand must be more clear than ever to ensure that a discontinuity of workers doesn’t affect the outcome of work delivered.
Crowd-sourcing
Crowd-sourcing can be a great tool to find someone with the right skills within a large and diverse company, or the industry at large. Crowd-sourcing taps into the digital marketplace to solicit users for help with specific tasks, meaning you can get the work that you need done fast, don’t have to hire a resource full time, and can most likely pay less or nothing if you find the skills needed within your own company. According to a study from Ardent Partners, reliance on online labor marketplaces is expected to grow by 96% over the next two years.
Crowd-sourcing can be inexpensive and quick if you have a very specific task that you need help completing and can accurately communicate it to someone with little context or end to end view. Otherwise, it can be frustrating and time consuming, which means that to make it work, it is important to build a digital interface that is user friendly. Incentives for work are also important — Topcoder is a company that has used crowd-sourcing effectively by gamifying their system. They host contests in competitive programming as well as graphic design and development. What do you win? An improved Topcoder rating, which helps you get better jobs. A win-win for companies and coders!
P-Tech
Pathways in Technology Early College High Schools (P-TECH) is an exciting new model of education that prepares students for the future. The P-TECH Movement is a group of innovative public schools that span grades 9–14 (associates degree) and bring together high school, college, and career. At the end of 6 years, students have a no-cost Associates Degree in a STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) area and are prepared for a successful career in technology. Nina Kurth, an IBM Partner says, “IBM guarantees P-tech job interviews to qualified graduates. We couldn’t be more thrilled with the value P-tech graduates bring to our workforce community.”
P-tech offers a low-cost education that can lead either to further education or to a career path right away and is invaluable for many students. As the costs of higher education continue to rise, it is likely that more programs that help direct young people to great jobs that actively fill the skill gap without adding to student debt burdens. As our world changes, more communities, industries, and companies should embrace this career-focused educational model.
Veterans
There are approximately 21.8 veterans in the United States — a large segment of the population and potential workforce that is often overlooked. As we work to bridge the skill gap, no group should be ignored, especially not a group that is so highly skilled and instilled with a great work ethic. An initiative named VetsinTech was recently launched to support current and returning veterans with integration services, connecting them to jobs in technology. In the last 3 years, the initiative has grown to 12 veteran-led chapters, gained support from over 20 top tech companies who have hired veterans, and developed training programs to get more veterans into the field. Another great example of a Veteran program that’s working is at Prudential’s technology and call center in El Paso, Texas. Chosen because of its proximity to Fort Bliss, one of the largest army posts in the nation, Prudential El Paso has partnered with Workforce Opportunity Services to hire veterans and military spouses to work at the center. In addition, Prudential has a partnership with the University of Texas at El Paso that helps bring skill building opportunities to the local educational community.
A Non-Traditional Workforce is Emerging
New Collar Jobs
With disruption everywhere, many are taking steps to reimagine the workforce and make jobs available to more skilled people. CEO Ginni Rometty has made creation and support of “New Collar Jobs” — jobs that fall into IT, cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, and data science — a top initiative. Such jobs are increasingly necessary in a digital world, and IBM knows that vocational training is imperative for success in such careers. IBM has launched a “New Collar” initiative which has added 600 new hires to the ranks in 2017 alone. These are tech jobs that are smack dab in the middle of the skills gap, and so it is imperative that we find solutions to make them desirable for the workforce, and help train workers to take them on successfully.
The Workforce of the Future
It is undeniable that the workforce is in its own transformation — digital has changed everything from how individuals can work, when they should work, who they can work for, and the very work that is needed to move industries forward. All sized organizations are working to creatively solve some of the issues with legacy systems of HR, workplace schedules, training, and more. In the future, we hope that we can create and use systems that make it easy for everyone to work flexibly, on jobs that cater to their skills.
“We’ve acknowledged the talent gap and are being as productive as possible to move the needle to narrow it. While a gap can sound scary, we’re looking at it as an incredible opportunity to create jobs that will have a lasting impact on the future. We have a unique position to give young talent the tools to build meaningful careers in IT; it’s something to be very excited about!” concludes Krystal Pomerville, Managing Consultant GBS iX.
