Despite the economy being in a strong position three quarters of UK businesses believe that a skills crisis is imminent.
Two-fifths expect it to hit the UK in the next 12 months, threatening to halt growth and the recovery.
A report based on interviews with 616 business leaders, commissioned by Prince’s Trust and HSBC, finds that the lack of skilled workers is a major challenge for UK businesses. It reveals that two-fifths of companies have experienced significant skills gaps in the past 12 months and over half are facing difficulties in filling vacancies.
In the construction sector, for example almost 1 in 3 vacancies are hard to fill due to a shortage of skilled employees with the right qualifications or experience. This situation is particularly worrying as construction accounts for 7% of GDP and has been a key driver of the UK’s economic recovery.
This has a big impact on the ability of businesses to attract and retain talent. A recent Open University study found that 66% of small to medium-sized enterprises are struggling to recruit adequately skilled staff, and 86% of larger firms feel this has a detrimental effect on their company.
Ability of businesses
There is no escaping the fact that the UK faces the biggest skills gap in decades, and it’s likely to continue to grow. This is a problem that will have a serious impact on business performance, staff wellbeing and the economy in general.
One way that organisations can tackle these issues is by focusing on the core skills that their employees already have, rather than trying to find new talent with additional qualifications or training. This is a strategy that is increasingly being adopted as the adoption of automation and AI creates a wide range of opportunities for companies to use existing talent and reskill them for future requirements.
In addition to assessing people for their core skills, employers can also invest in developing soft skills, which are crucial for enabling workers to adapt to the changing nature of their role and to thrive in a constantly shifting workforce. These include resilience, stress tolerance and flexibility, which have become widely recognised as desirable in the modern workplace.
Development programs
These skills are being acquired through a variety of different methods including on-the-job training, in-house development programmes and the use of digital platforms to help employees develop their skills.
However, the key is that these initiatives must be tailored to the needs of each individual organisation, so that they can effectively deliver the outcomes required by the business.
Another way to help combat the skills gap is to promote a culture of learning and development within the organisation. This means putting more emphasis on developing existing employees in a flexible manner, through the use of digital tools and online learning resources. It can also involve fostering an environment of collaboration across departments, so that staff are able to learn from each other and share ideas and best practice.
A third way to address the skills crisis is to work with the government and educational institutions to create new pathways to training. This could take the form of innovative schemes that encourage young people to study at a higher education level or to pursue careers in specific sectors, such as science or engineering. This can help to fill the skills gap and make sure that the next generation of graduates are fully equipped to take advantage of the booming technology sector.
