The skills gap is most acute in the health care and technology sectors, as well as in the trades, middle-skilled jobs and high-skilled STEM jobs. (Image: Shutterstock)
The country's long-term economic prosperity is being threatened by a skills gap that just keeps growing, according to the Society for Human Resource Management's 2019 State of the Workplace report.
It's not just record low unemployment that's causing the skills gap, it's also not having enough highly skilled workers to keep up with the ever-increasing emergence of new technologies—not to mention stiffer competition for the best-of-the-best talent across the globe, according to the report.
The skills gap is most acute in the health care and technology sectors, as well as in the trades, middle-skilled jobs and high-skilled STEM jobs. There are just not enough workers that have the required skills in data analysis, science, engineering and medical, as well as trade skills such as carpentry, plumbing, welding and machining.
Human resource professionals also report a growing gap in the “soft skills” needed regardless of industry or job type, including problem solving, critical thinking, innovation and creativity; the ability to deal with complexity and ambiguity; and communication skills.
To overcome the skills gap, the most effective remedies that employers are trying include providing onsite training to existing workers; expanding training for new hires; hiring gig workers and improving their efforts to retain their most talented workers.
However, even these highly effective strategies can't help employers find the right talent for the most difficult-to-fill positions, according to the report. Some employers are expanding their recruiting efforts to find candidates in foreign countries, as well as considering veterans, retirees and those who have been formerly incarcerated.
“Employers can't solve the skills gap issue alone — they need support from education systems to build talent pools with skills relevant to today's business needs,” the authors write. “While some organizations have worked directly with education partners to build talent pipelines, most are reliant upon education systems identifying and developing the needed skills of the future workforce on their own.”
However, just over half (51 percent) of HR professionals responding to SHRM's skills gap survey say that education systems have done little or nothing to help address the skills shortage issue.
“More work needs to be done by organizations and education systems to ensure that the U.S. workforce is prepared for the future of work,” the authors write.
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Katie Kuehner-Hebert
Katie Kuehner-Hebert is a freelance writer based in Running Springs, Calif. She has more than three decades of journalism experience, with particular expertise in employee benefits and other human resource topics.
