Conquering the Skills Gap

87% of businesses experience skills gaps now or expect them within a few years. The most effective way to narrow the skills gap is to upskill/reskill your workforce

World businesses face a difficult dilemma, the demand for skilled workers is greater than ever, but availability is in short supply. 

Market and technology trends play a big part in the shifts between demand and supply in the labor market. More jobs have become more automated and digitised as a result of technology and innovations.

In addition to this, remote work has resulted in new ways of working, and employees now need the skills required to support these significant changes to how work gets done.

So what can businesses do to conquer the skills gap?

We need to be able to keep up with digitisation, adapt to new ways of working and streamline the skills supply with customers’ needs. Continuous on-the-job training is a must if you want to streamline your supply with the market demand and retain clients.

Upskilling means that you reduce the skills gap by developing your workforce’s existing skills, minimizing the gap between their current skill level and desired/needed skill level. Upskill your workforce through courses, certifications, participation in challenging projects, or by letting people take advantage of the collective knowledge and learn from each other.

Reskilling means that you train them for your future business needs by developing skills they currently do not have but need in the future.

If upskilling/reskilling isn’t enough to bridge the skill gap, you need to recruit new team members or structure your network of partners and freelancers in a digital platform.

What are the most important things to think about when creating a reskill/upskill strategy?

In a business context, reskilling, upskilling, and learning “stickiness”, rely on a set strategy. 

• To optimize your training investment  you need to tailor the development strategy to the organisations, as well as every individual, needs. Your strategy can take on many shapes depending on company size, purpose, timeline and end goal.
• The strategic development approach should be anchored in your business strategy. Influenced by your core values, your leadership style, your organisations main goals and vision.
• There are several digital tools that support reskilling and upskilling initiatives.

To keep track of your reskilling/upskilling initiatives, and the growth of your employees, you can use Cinodes growth plan and skills set functions. Read more about the growth plan function here, and skills sets here

• Build Your own Sets and Hierarchies, communicate which skills your employees need to self-assess and/or add to their Profile, and create a growth plan to map out all the coming development initiatives.