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Technology today has been so intricately automated into work that it is now difficult to keep up with its demand. The skill gap in tech is no news – tech workers can be confused on how to navigate certain tasks using optimized tools. Sometimes there are not enough trained professionals to fill in available automation management positions. This skills gap is a money pit that costs the U.S. economy about $1 trillion a year in lost productivity according to Entrepreneur. Worse, as technology continues to change everything so fast, this gap worsens.
A few companies are adjusting to this new way of working, but many are yet to fully understand it. Understanding the skill gap is the first step in resolving its effects. The skill gap has been an ongoing discussion and to understand a concept that continues to change over time, it is best to begin at the beginning.
What is this skill gap?
The skill gap is the difference between the skills needed to do a job and those that are available. Entrepreneur revealed in a recent survey that one in three U.S. workers were not proficient in tech tools they needed at work, and just one in ten mastered these tools. For instance, while just 13% of the workers covered in the survey were familiar with Dropbox and preferred it over flash drives and CDs for storage and file exchange, 21% would rather use the traditional file sharing method. And at least 29% felt using these tools was not helping automation at all.
The survey revealed that as much as three times the number of those that considered themselves experts in using tech tools, were workers who considered themselves novice and found the entire process complex.
These stats are alarming for tech companies trying to explore the skill gap with a view to closing it. There is a massive shortage of skilled workers, the industry is losing billions of dollars yearly due to lack of personnel and poor training.
According to Entrepreneur, if an average worker’s minimum wage is about $50,000 and 20% is lost in productivity, the company loses $10,000 per worker. Multiply that by over 160 million workers that makes up the tech industry in U.S.A and what we have is at least $1.3 trillion in productivity is lost every year. The skill gap is costly, and it would require extra and conscious efforts to close the gap. More training courses are needed. Herein lies the place of funded skill training.
What is funded skill training?
The only solution to resolve the skill gap in tech is increased training. Tech bootcamp and online classes are stepping up to the challenge and becoming more popular today within the tech training sphere. Expensive but effective, these training courses offer college alternatives to design and tech degrees, but they are not enough. Hence, the introduction of funded skill training. This is where non-profits and companies collaborate to empower, train, and inspire tech talents.
Non-profits are now emerging and offering better value for companies that will partner with them to change the skill gap narrative. These non-profits recruit tech talents and empower them with the skills needed to meet up with the demands of the technology industry today and in the future.
Non-profits, like Brave Achievers International, are bringing fresh perspectives into the tech space and closing the skill gap by offering UX design skill and product management skill training to underrepresented backgrounds in design and tech. We believe that tech talents are everywhere and we only need to give them the opportunity to shine. Donate towards our course to train the next tech talent and set them up for positions in design and tech today.
We may not close the entire gap entirely by ourselves, but together, we could build a long bridge to get us there.