Hiring challenges in digital age and what employers are doing to fill skill gaps

By Joel Paul

Today’s digital reality poses many challenges for organisations, including reskilling their workforce. In an attempt to fill the skills gap, employers tend to replace their resident workforce and recruit outside the organisation to find workers with the skill sets required to remain competitive. Many believe that hiring employees who are skilled in new-age technologies is the best way to fill the skills gaps. But hiring new people to fill ever-changing skills needs is not only financially unsustainable, it also leads to brand damage.

When layoffs are taking place in one area of the business, hiring is often happening in another. In such a scenario, reskilling is cost-effective. Here are some best practices that companies can follow to reskill and retrain their employees:

Assess current state of employees: Assessments can help gather meaningful data and apply it to individual career goals. Whether assessment measures strengths, personality type or interests, employees should be able to draw conclusions about their current needs and get insights into future prospects.

Online learning: Using AI, big data, deep learning, algorithms in career development platforms can help organisations map the learning journey of employees. Career development programmes based on individual needs and constructed around larger company goals are not only more engaging for employees, they are also likely to help corporates remain competitive by effectively filling the necessary skills gaps.

Establish mentorships: Career development among the rank-and-file must be supported by managers and team supervisors. Training managers to be mentors to their team members will ensure that individual contributors realise the value of the training offered and are given the time to pursue additional training.

Get career coaches on board: In addition to online learning, providing employees access to a career coach is a way to lift reskilling efforts to the next level. Career coaches can help employees devise the best strategic plan to integrate learnings into their roles, and set actionable goals for further career development activities.

By ensuring employees have access to digital tools they need to remain valuable, companies can remain competitive while forging long-term and mutually-beneficial associations with their employees.

(The author is general manager, India, RiseSmart, the provider of career transition services for organisations)