Crying out for IT skills

Added by The Editor, 6 months ago.

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It's no secret that UK plc is crying out for IT skills. But a recent survey by sector skills council e-Skills UK indicates that the numbers of new staff required is far higher than previous estimates.

Around 140,000 new staff will be needed every year, for the next five years, in order to fill high-level positions, says the study - and that's on top of the 1.5 million people already employed in IT.

"These professionals will be expected to drive business growth with a blend of technical, managerial and communications skills," said e-Skills head of strategy, Margaret Sambell.

Overall, more than 77 per cent of the total UK workforce already needs some technology skills, including four million high-level managers who need IT to make decisions and 21 million people who use IT in their day-to-day jobs.

Comments

There are currently 4 comments about this blog.

David Thomas, 4 months ago

Maybe companies should try hiring people who don't have experience and train them to the level they want!!

Jon Wright, 6 months ago

More pertinently, those in real demand are not just people with IT skills but those who understand what the business needs to prosper and can find an IT solution to meet that need. Too often, people are specialists in IT or a business field; those that bridge the gap are extremely hard to find.

Victoria, 6 months ago

The report findings don't surprise me in the slightest - technology has become more than a tool to help businesses work more efficiently; it's become part of the infrastructure they rely on to do their day-to-day job. So it's little wonder that we need more people with IT skills in organisations today.

Emily Drove, 6 months ago

Not good news, and it's not just confined to the UK. A report in Computing over a year ago suggested that 41% of companies in emerging markets were having problems finding appropriately qualified IT staff. More worrying though, I also read a few months ago that more than half of UK businesses lack the IT skills to create their own website!