Technology success is about people

Karen Price OBE, CEO of e-skills UK

IT is a creative force, transforming business and society. In an increasingly competitive global economy, the effective use of technology is becoming vital for business success, prosperity and enhanced quality of life. Research indicates that half of Europe’s productivity gains in recent years can be attributed to investments in IT. So it is not surprising that everything from health care and banking to sport and entertainment depends increasingly on the ability of people to make the most of IT.

More than three quarters of the UK’s workforce needs IT skills. This includes four million business managers and leaders, and more than 21 million people who use IT in their everyday jobs.

In addition, there are around one million IT and Telecoms professionals – the experts who create, implement and operate the systems, services and communications backbone on which we all depend. Each of these communities has different skills needs, and these needs are changing all the time.

Outsourcing

The ability to outsource and offshore IT work, for example, has a significant impact on the skills required by the growing number of IT professionals in the UK. Employers need highly skilled, customer-focused IT professionals who understand the company and know how to deliver business benefit, often working within a complex team structure that spans the globe.

IT professionals

Currently, more than half (58 per cent) of IT professionals hold a degree-equivalent qualification or higher. Although companies recruiting into IT professional roles now take on as many graduates from other disciplines as they do from IT degrees, it is worrying that there has been a drop of 50 per cent in the number of people applying for IT-related degrees in the last six years. Alongside this, research just released by e-skills UK* reveals that around 140,000 new entrants to IT professional roles are required every year, and around half of these are expected to be filled by staff who are not currently in IT roles transferring in from other sectors.

With such a wide range of backgrounds, there are inevitably going to be gaps between the skills IT professionals hold and the skills they need to do their jobs. These gaps can, and must be, addressed. There are two main priorities. The first is to bring more employers and universities together to ensure IT-related education at school and university level meets the full spectrum of employer and individual needs. UK universities have a world-class record in computer science and there is new and exciting scope for complementary courses to meet the growing demand for business-focused IT professionals.

Professional development

The second is to ensure that IT professionals have access to effective professional development programmes. For example, e-skills UK is developing a new development programme through a partnership of employers of IT professionals and universities. This will offer an industry-backed, fast-track professional development programme for IT professionals that will help them to rapidly build their skills and competence in the early years of their technology careers.


As well as focusing on IT professionals, the importance of higher level skills in IT for business managers and leaders must not be underestimated. IT will continue its progress from the back room into the board room, and managers need to have the understanding of how technology can be exploited to deliver business benefit.

Advanced study

In many countries, the management of IT has become an integral component of advanced business study. This needs to become widely accepted practice in the UK. And as IT systems become more sophisticated and pervasive, everyday users of technology also require higher levels of skills. This is vitally important: according to e-skills UK research, around seven in ten employers consider the level of IT user skills held by their staff to have a ‘large’ or ‘defining’ impact on the company’s productivity. Many IT users are currently self-taught or rely on colleagues for assistance. Introducing structured IT user skills training can reap enormous benefits – particularly if the training is flexible and can be tailored to the needs of the company and the specific job requirements and skill levels of the individual.

Future growth

Technology provides the engine of future growth and the key to increasing productivity and competitiveness across all sectors of the economy. But investment in technology is wasted if it doesn’t meet business needs, its introduction isn’t managed properly, and if people don’t know how to use it. It is critical that employers proactively support relevant, ongoing technology-related training for all their staff – IT professionals, business leaders and IT users.