In a period of global high unemployment why have we got skills shortages around the world? A full answer would be a thesis supported with loads of verbiage and statistics but let’s cut to the chase:
- Lack of planning and foresight by the world at large but particularly the politicians, educators and big business.
- Politics by its very nature is opportunistic and short term – a please the voters today and to hell with the consequence.
- Educators have allowed themselves to churn out the people that commerce does not want. Education has been dumbed down so everybody gets a prize.
- Stock market pressures frequently lead to short term planning and maximising of profit to satisfy personal reward structures in big business.
- Societies failure to recognise/anticipate the impact of technology in getting rid of so many basic jobs. Canon fodder is no longer required.
- The internet has and will continue to revolutionise how we live and how we do business. It removes drudgery, it removes/melds jobs.
- A failure to invest into the long term future and recognise the impact of baby boomers retiring, contraction in higher skills with the withering of apprenticeships and the financial burden of an ageing and in most cases unfunded pension
- Lack of social mobility in many nations. The fact that it is easier to get an engineer to move from Warsaw to Wigan than to get a local engineer to move from Widnes to Wigan, a 30 minute drive!
- Failure by politicians/educators to identify skills shortages early enough and to create the demand for the positions when skills shortages exist.
- In many countries the soft underbelly of the welfare state cushioning people from the true impact of unemployment.
- The arrogance of big business in believing solutions to problems of their own creation should be solved by others. Big business communication is poor and shows no sign of improving so skills shortages will persist until they do something about it.
- The world facing up to the reality that we don’t have a problem with unemployment but with the unemployable. This will not go away.
Around the globe, as a recruitment agency we can usually find the talent but are continually frustrated by visa challenges and in particular big businesses failure to communicate properly.
Author: Chris Slay
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