Bridging the skills age gap
Embracing lifelong learning can help New Zealand attract and retain skilled workers young and old, writes
Fiona Kingsford.
At Competenz, we are getting feedback across our industries about three key labour force challenges. The first of these is attracting and retaining young people into the trades. Engineering for example, is perceived as grubby, dirty and hands on, but that landscape is changing..
Employers across our workplaces are increasingly looking for a higher skill level amongst workers.
And our employees are getting older. How do we retain their skills, stability and experience, but at the same time upskill them?
As a nation, we know we’re losing skills in our industries and it’s impacting on organisations and industry growth.
Retaining older staff is one way of bridging right.
We can’t afford age-bias. The benefits of employing older workers include; retention of jobrelated skills, expertise, knowledge and experience, intergenerational knowledge transfer and mentoring, client service and institutional knowledge (contacts and networks) the gap – if we do it that support it and workforce stability, diversity and flexibility.
Attracting youth is another essential part of the mix.
Employers are saying the government needs to do more and the schools need to do more. Firms are forced to recruit from a pool of offshore talent.
In general manufacturing, the demand for workers with level 5 qualifications has grown by over 40 per cent since 2000.
So, it’s imperative we see learning as something to be developed and enhanced over an employee’s lifetime.
Education is now extending beyond school and university to an ongoing, lifelong, learning journey.
And our education system needs to be flexible - ‘‘flexi-learning’’ may look like nationally recognised modules of learning that could build to a qualification, but that could also be valued alone.