Different uses of the word ‘Skill’ in the labor market
The Merriam Webster dictionary defines skill as: “the ability to do something that comes from training, experience, or practice.”
Skill is used by itself or in other forms like skill set, soft skill, hard skill, technical and digital skills or skill gap, skills shortages, skills mismatches, skill-set vacancies, unfilled skills demand, reskill, upskill and lastly transferable skills. Wow!
- A skill set is the combination of knowledge, personal qualities, and abilities that you’ve developed through your life and work. It typically combines two types of skills: soft skills and hard skills.Ideally your skill set matches the type of work that pays enough and interests you. Being aware of any skill gap you have and proactively managing will serve you well.
- Skills gap refers to the gap between the skills an employer expects their employees to have and the actual skills employees possess. A gap can be addressed by upskilling or reskilling and is described further on.
- Labour shortages refer to a shortage of suitable applicants for particular jobs
- Skills shortages refers to a scarcity of applicants with the skills required by an employer needing to hire..
According to the The Conference Board of Canada in partnership with Future Skills Centre in their publication; Lost Opportunities Measuring the Unrealized Value of Skill Vacancies in Canada.
“When an employer is hiring, they are looking for a set of skills to complete a series of tasks. Until the employer can recruit a new employee, the needed skills remain missing. Job vacancies can thus be thought of as skill-set vacancies, or as unfilled skills demand. In 2020 skill vacancies represented $25 billion of unrealized economic value in Canada.The skill group with the highest wage-and-job vacancies value is social and emotional skills, worth $8.5 billion in 2020—making up a third of the unrealized value of unfilled skills demand arising from job vacancies that year.”
A few more quotations follow that reinforce the fact that the social and emotional soft skills are at the top of the list for soft skill vacancies.
Over my career I can recall several managers who had social and emotional skill gaps.Soft skills have evolved with increased awareness and intolerance for abusive behaviour in the workplace.
Regarding soft skill gaps, Dr. Tricia Williams, director of research, evaluation, and knowledge mobilization at Future Skills Centre states:
“Employers are also reporting critical gaps in social and emotional skills such as collaboration, and problem-solving management. In fact, older Canadians, she said, have more valuable social and emotional skills that are being missed in the current labour market, and these include more experience, and stronger emotional and social skills developed over time.”
Good to hear older workers being missed in the current labor market.
Upskilling and Reskilling
According to Iberdola in their excellent article; Reskilling and upskilling: work training in the digital transformation era. “The difference between these two concepts lies in the objective of the training: whereas upskilling aims to teach employees new skills to optimize their performance; reskilling — also known as professional recycling — sets out to train employees to adapt to a different post within the company.”
So, with upskilling the individuals stays in his job and reskilling the worker moves to a new post.
Both are effective strategies for employers to manage what is expected to become an ongoing skills shortage.
It appears the labor market in Canada and other countries are at a crossroads regarding skill shortages and their development.
Further data for the cross roads effect is supported in the publication; Competency Frameworks and Canada’s Essential Skills through the Public Policy Forum in Canada, which advises;
- “It is estimated that half of working-aged adults are without the literacy skills required to perform well in the majority of jobs in the economy or to learn the skills required for new ones
- There is growing demand not only for technological skills, but also “soft skills.”
Moving on now with a review of hard skills, including digital and last but not least soft skills to complete the skill definitions.
Hard skills
“Hard skills are technical skills required for a job. They are learned abilities acquired and enhanced through education and experience.
You can acquire hard skills by taking online or in-person classes at a university or other training program, practicing these skills before applying them to a job, and gaining experience by using the hard skills in the workplace.”
Examples of hard skills are:
- Truck driving
- Video production
- Surgery
- Carpentry
- Search engine optimization
- Budgeting
- Auto mechanic
- Accounting
- Engineering
- Fire Fighting
- Data mining
Digital skills
The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the pace of digitalization in the workplace, resulting in a critical need for more workers with advanced digital skills.
Many industrial sectors across Canada are experiencing huge disruption (change)with the advent of new technologies and automation, and many are experiencing a shortage of skilled workers.
Tanzin Adams of High Speed Training writes the following on digital skills; “Whilst they range from entry-level tasks to advanced abilities, all digital skills are highly transferable and are now considered to be a critical component for employability. As the use of digital technology and automation is transforming the jobs market, transferable skills, particularly those in the digital sphere, are becoming more and more sought after.
The digital skills you need will depend on the type of career you’re pursuing, however there are some essential skills that are increasingly required in almost every job. These are skills that everyone should aim to develop.”
Essential Digital Skills:
- Email and instant messaging
- Word processing
- Social media for business
- Web-based research and problem solving
- Data entry and handling
- Behaving safely and legally online
The essential skills listed above should also include online transactions such as banking.
The list of 8 jobs below require advanced digital skills or literacy. It is important that you are interested in and possess the aptitude to pursue advanced digital training.
Best IT and tech jobs in Canada for 2023
- developer/programmer
- Business System analyst administrator
- data analyst /scientist
- quality assurance/ analyst
- security analyst/architect
- cloud architect
- IT project manager
- network engineer
The digital economy and its transformation are fascinating subjects which I write about in the next post; Industry 4.0 and Cyber-Physical systems in the 6-part Labor Market series.
Soft Skills
These are skills we use to manage ourselves and interact with others during work or non work activities. They are becoming highly valued by employers in recruitment and keeping a job.
LinkedIn lооked аt the five mоst in-demаnd sоft skills оf 2021 аnd саme uр with this list generated by recruiters and those in HR:
- Creativity- To be cliché, think outside the box, take a meta view to bring new bring a new perspective to problem areas, which can help companies develop and grow.
- Persuasion- is the ability to make intentional and successful efforts to persuade or influence someone either by speaking or writing to them.
- Соllаbоrаtiоn-Work in a team with respect and active listening for each person.
- Аdарtаbility- requires the ability to pivot during change and not get bogged down and keep moving forward.
- Emоtiоnаl Intelligence- is a core soft skill, involving self-awareness, self-management, and social skills or people management and empathy. This is an important soft skill and challenging to develop.
I supplied the definitions for each of the 5 skills listed above.
According to а Саrnegie Mellon Foundation study, 75 рerсent of long-term job suссess is determined by employees’ level of soft skills.
Аnоther LinkedIn study disсоvered that when it соmes tо new hires, 57 рerсent of employers рlасe а higher value on soft skills than hard skills.
The future of work lies in soft skills; these human characteristics can’t be replicated or replaced by automation or artificial intelligence (AI).
Last item on my list of skill definitions is next.
Transferable skills
The hard skills for a nurse and a chef are very different, but nurses and chefs could both apply the same transferable soft skills to be successful in their individual career
While it is easy for an employer to train a new employee in a particular hard skill such as how to use a certain computer program, it is much more difficult to train an employee in a soft skill such as collaboration.
Transferable or portable skills are those hard and soft skills that can be transferred between jobs and/or occupations.
The ability to understand and communicate your skill set concisely is key to an effective job search.
Soft and hard skills have been developed and accumulated to varying degrees, over the length of an individual’s career and experience.
Often individuals find they have more skills than they were aware of after completing a thorough self-assessment. Knowing what transferable skills, you own and can market is empowering.
When writing transferable skill statements, they need to be connected to measurable achievements to obtain maximum results, when marketing your skills to a prospective employer.
Job searchers can use their transferable skills to apply for jobs they have no direct experience in.I have not done this directly, but check out the sections for LinkedIn and Microsoft below for more information.
Organizations involved in skill building, job placement, training and education for all levels.
The Work Based Learning Consortium in their post, Rapid Upskilling & Reskilling For In-demand Industry Jobs advise that: “Since early 2014 over 60 advanced manufacturing employers in Ontario have partnered with WBLC to hire and train unskilled job seekers or upskill current workers or those in transition – a total of more than 650 employees – for skilled jobs at entry-level or mid-level, with a success rate of over 85%.”
Coursera (online) advises: “that individuals could start gaining the top 10 skills for each emerging profession in people and culture, content writing, sales and marketing in one to two months. Those wishing to expand their skills in product development and data and artificial intelligence could do so in two to three months, and those switching into cloud computing and engineering could make headway in the new skill set through a four to five-month learning program.”
Coursera partners with more than 275 leading universities and companies to bring flexible, affordable, job-relevant online learning to individuals and organizations worldwide. They also offer free courses and certificates online.
For marginalized Canadians: “The Digital Literacy Exchange Program (DLEP) will invest $17.6 million to support initiatives aimed at teaching digital literacy skills to Canadians who face barriers to participating in the digital economy. The program aims to equip Canadians with the necessary skills to use computers, mobile devices and the Internet safely, securely and effectively. Project funding for the second phase will be available from 2022–23 to 2024–25.”
Since 2020, LinkedIn and Microsoft are collaborating to provide free courses to help you find an in-demand tech role. The LinkedIn CEO, Mr. Ryan Roslansky writes in his article, Hiring For The Future, Not The Past, that: “Since last June, Microsoft and LinkedIn have helped more than 30 million people worldwide gain access to digital skills, and today we’re extending our commitment to skills by helping 250,000 companies make a skills-based hire in 2021.” WOW
Many implications for global digital literacy.
LinkedIn is also working with the World Economic Forum on their Reskilling Revolution Initiative which; “ aims to provide one billion people with better education, skills and jobs by 2030.”
For some of the services LinkedIn and Microsoft offer you will need to be a member of LinkedIn.This is not strictly for professionals and covers the service industry and more.
The Linkedin site also has software that; “uncovers career paths by matching your skills to thousands of job titles.” Plus you have a built in network.through LinkedIn.This is similar to job searching by transferable skills only.
Check out this interesting undertaking above and see if it meets your needs!
Brian
