Bridging skills gap to boost your business

WHAT is the skills gap?

Skills gap refers to the difference in the skills required for a job, and the actual skills possessed by the employees.

These gaps can vary widely depending on the job and skills required.

For example, an employee who comes into the workforce lacking the sales skills needed to perform at a high level can learn these skills through sales training and coaching programmes.

However, until the employee learns those particular skills, there will be a gap between the skills they possess and those required to perform well on the job.

Why is it important? A recent study by the Local Government Association (LGA) estimated that the potential cost of not dealing with the UK’s skills gap could lead to a loss of £120 billion in economic output by the end of the next decade.

In terms of your business, reducing the skills gap can drastically improve your own productivity and output, taking off the shackles and unleashing the catalyst for growth.

What can your business do to close the gap?

A skills gap analysis will need to be conducted by your business. This tool is used to assess the gap between the current skills and the future skills needed for an employee to perform in their role more effectively.

1. Identify skills needed. Look at each employee and assess what skills they need in order to carry out their job – how important is this skill in contributing to the success of the business?

2. Measure current skills. There are countless ways to understand what skills your businesses utilises, such as group discussions, surveys, interviews, performance reviews and skills spreadsheets. Plus there are a number of skills management software packages available which, although come at a cost, can be used to identify skills quickly and efficiently.

3. Create action plan. It’s now time to act on the data and implement change using one of the four methods:

Hiring a new employee with the desired skills

Mentoring or training an existing employee internally

Exploring professional training courses options

Outsourcing the work (this will depend on how long the skills are needed)

All in it together An important point to make is that although businesses must take responsibility for reviewing their own skills gap, it is also vital that the national as a whole collaborate resources and outline an action plan to tackle the issue – this includes the government, industries, trainers and learners.