Understand the current job market, then make it work to your advantage. With skills you’re always welcome. Find out how to fine-tune yours

The biggest headache facing British Industry today is an acute shortage of skilled workers. The UK currently has a million people unemployed, with a further 7.6 million people of working age inactive in the labour market, and yet, there remain over a million jobs unfilled. Many are asking, how did we get here?

Skills shortages are being experienced across the board, not just within the traditional problem areas of nursing and teaching. Accountancy, social work, medicine and, ironically, recruitment are all being severely affected. According to a recent survey by recruitment specialist, Reed, two-thirds of British firms are experiencing the crisis. The most desperate shortages of staff relate to specialist skills with 20 % of employers complaining that they had problems filling posts requiring technical and engineering skills, 19% with IT and 16% with accounting skills.

Employment minister Tessa Jowell said, ‘A particular challenge for the future will be in IT skills shortages. We already know that over 18 million UK workers now require basic IT competence to do their job. There are 1.2 million currently employed at technician level, expected to grow by 20-25% in the next three years.’ So bad is the lack of IT skills in Britain that a door knocking campaign has begun to recruit set targets onto the government’s Independent Learning Accounts, where online desktop computing skills are being offered at a bargain price of £25. ‘Some commentators have estimated that, if we do not do anything to address this skills gap, 12 per cent of vacancies for professional IT jobs could go unfilled in 2002,’ said Jowell.

Lloyds TSB periodic survey, Business in Britain, recently highlighted the skills shortage within companies using their banking services. Managing Director Michael Riding says, ‘The yawning skills gap is turning into a hazardous abyss across all sectors. In terms of recruiting unskilled staff, similar trends are also emerging.’ Production line workers, shelf packers and internal postal workers – jobs that almost anyone can do – continue to remain vacant.

But how has this acute problem arisen, and how did we fail to nip it in the bud?

Next page: the causes

The answers are not simple; there are several contributing factors. Kevin Hogarth of chartered accountants, Ernst and Young, believes that the problem has been brewing for over a decade. Companies neglected to invest in training and recruitment, once the British economy moved out of recession and, by the 1990s, into a period of full employment (as defined by the late economist J M Keynes). An Increase in young people continuing into higher education means that, jobs that were previously filled by school leavers remain vacant. And when it comes to IT, few could have ever predicted the huge growth in new media jobs.

So, as things stand, the skilled worker is supreme, which is great news if you happen to be one. ‘It’s definitely a workers market,’ says Sarah Parsons of Reed.

The rise in demand for workers and the growth of the Internet has increased the speed and ease in which jobs can be advertised and applied for. Workers are moving from one job to another, far quicker than ever before, which means they are staying in them for shorter periods.

Andy Westwood of the Industrial Society advises anyone who is currently re-entering the workplace, or looking to change careers, the following advice, ‘Make sure you visit your local employment services to get an overview of what jobs and opportunities are out there. What used to be a dead end visit to the job centre has now hugely improved. Personal advisers are able to help in all sorts of matters, from minimum wage issues to family credit. One third of all job vacancies are carried by the employment service, so ignore them at your own peril,’ he says.

Next page: what you can do

Get in on the action
So what exactly is currently out there? Learndirect on 0800 100 900 is staffed by qualified career advisors and is open 9am-9pm Monday to Friday and 9am to Mid-day on Saturdays. They can help with information on any educational course and course provider in the country. The country’s largest database, Learndirect has information on over 500,000 courses. Over 75% of courses are available through the Internet. This is currently the largest e-learning network in the UK, which means once you’ve registered, you can learn wherever there’s a computer.

Highlighting just how huge the information generation has become, 400 courses alone cover the subject of information at Learndirect, from communication technology to designing your own web pages. For those wanting to work in small businesses there are courses on dealing with angry customers, understanding accounts and team-building exercises. Learning is vital to the UK’s workforce, where over 7 million adults currently have difficulty with reading. ‘What a lot of us fail to realise is that, most of these people would struggle looking up a plumber in the Yellow Pages – they can’t do the simple things that we often take for granted,’ says a spokesperson for Learndirect.

There are 900 learning centres across the country, usually in accessible locations, such as shopping malls, schools and local community centres, which allow you to study en route to collecting the kids from school, or even after some shopping. Learning can now be adapted to your own personal timetable.

Underpinning this is the Independent Learning Account, a government initiative aimed at local skill shortages.

Next page: who can apply?

Eligibility is open to the self-employed, and those who wish to renew and refresh skills. Publicity for the scheme has been weak and the government is currently trying to meet large enrolment targets. Applicants to the scheme are being offered discounts of up to 80% on key courses. Childcare and travel costs are also on offer. Further information can be obtained by calling 0800 072 5678.

For mature women, the workplace has never been so good; an increase in recruitment agencies specialising in the older worker indicates that, employers are no longer shying away from the issue of age. Wrinklies Direct, a recruitment agency specialising in jobs for ‘men and women of advancing years’, now have 12 branches across the country. Candidates who are up on IT skills are almost guaranteed a position. Women over the age of 45 are particularly sought after, since they are unlikely to take maternity leave.

If choice was ever a misery for workers, it certainly isn’t now when it comes to reskilling the workforce for the 21st Century.