Training To Address Skills Gaps In The Digital Age

Learn to identify technical skills gaps

In today’s digital economy, organizations across every industry are encountering a common challenge as they require a workforce able to adopt new technical skills, innovative thinking and agility to create and maintain a competitive advantage. While hiring talent equipped with these skill sets could be a solution, this approach is expensive, difficult to accomplish and excludes current employees. Instead, organizations can proactively identify technical skills gaps and provide employee training to overcome these gaps.

The Digital Learning Consortium (DLC) was created to strengthen the digital learning ecosystem and provide high quality training resources for professionals. Founded by organizations at the forefront of digital transformation including IBM, GE, PwC, Google, edX, Degreed, Watershed, SAP SuccessFactors, and Skillsoft, as well as multiple academic institutions and corporate partners, the partnership works to create a unified vision for corporate learning.
 
From the onset, DLC founding members agreed that a consistent protocol for learning credentials, a multi-platform learning ecosystem and a growing body of research to support learner skills was needed across industries and job functions. The end result is a more supportive environment for enterprise learners and a clearer, more defined path for developing digital job skills.

To be successful in supporting the digital transformation of today’s jobs, all organizations need access to public reports and data about the preferences and needs of learners. One of the first contributions the DLC made for public consumption was the Voice of the Learner, a report based on insights from more than 5,000 learners, spanning five generations, 114 countries and 15 professional fields. Findings unveil the typical learner experience and uncover what motivates learners to take their education into their own hands, including:
 

Of the report respondents, 78% noted that they are most motivated to pursue learning when they see how it connects to their future role. Organizations should offer context and set specific skills or merits that employees can strive for during regular reviews or in job descriptions.
 

The majority of respondents (about 60%) noted that they are very likely to utilize AI to identify skills, skill gaps and make recommendations on what they need to learn. The one drawback to this is that they are also worried that their online behaviors (such as taking a certain course) may unintentionally signal to their boss that they are considering a career change or falling behind. Organizations should encourage employees to come to their managers with topics they want to learn about to improve their skills.
 

A large number (73%) of respondents noted that having a transferrable record of the history of their learning or training would strongly improve their learning experience. Organizations should work to develop a portable record of credits that can be added to employees’ personal resumes for in-house promotions, industry organizations or possible career changes.
 

A majority of respondents (78%) reported that having their learning in one place would strongly improve their learning experience. They would also like to access learning from any device (67%), offline (65%) and with fast upload times (68%), indicating that convenience is key to ensuring that employees use learning tools.
 

Despite 70% of respondents acknowledging that interactions with peers during class improves learning, 58% of respondents said they prefer to learn alone. This is likely due to convenience of learning the skills that each individual wants to focus on and at their own pace.
 

Respondents that currently use multiple modalities for learning (such as digital reading, online courses, video, audio or webcasts) noted that they spend the most time reading digital content. However, when asked to rank modalities by importance, online courses ranked the highest. Organizations should be aware that each individual learns and consumes media differently, so it’s important that learning content is delivered via multiple modalities.
 

Interestingly, about 50% of respondents believe that learning sessions lasting from 20-45 minutes are most effective. 24% of respondents preferred longer sessions of one-to-two hours.

Once organizations understand their employees’ learning preferences and goals, they will be better equipped to provide access to specialized and targeted content for career development. This comes from understanding the skills gaps that exist and ensuring that training is offered to close these gaps.
 
The learning is on-demand enabling each learner to advance at their own pace and fit this into their busy schedule.

Today’s rapid digitalization across every industry means that organizations and jobs that once had no play in technology are now asked to adopt new techniques and skills to innovate. Every employee must make “learning” a core part of their job. By designing learning experiences to meet learner preferences and expectations, we can all make this a bit easier and more effective and provide that critical space for positive growth.