Is your company one of the lucky ones to have enough staff? Congratulations, then you're pretty much alone in the wide corridor. For many companies and companies, the vacant labor market represents an existential challenge. Companies are now responding, for example by either extremely simplifying application processes or specifically looking for skills instead of degrees. And then there is the third way: the targeted development of specific knowledge and skills among existing personnel.
If you've been reading my blog posts for a while, you might remember the Post from January 2022, which was about finding talent in one's own company. Reskilling and upskilling are moving in a similar direction. Through targeted funding, such as continuing education and training, employees are prepared for the next career step or should be retained in the company through attractive (continuing) education opportunities.
Reskilling focuses on learning new skills that employees need for a new task or position. Upskilling, on the other hand, focuses more on expertise and additional qualifications in order to be able to meet new requirements. Lifelong learning has always been an issue, but digital transformation, automation and AI mean that many activities are changing so quickly that I would like to recommend that every company prepare their existing staff for them — and not just professionally.
As is well known, the half-life of knowledge is only a few years and not all employees are aware of the significance of this development. In my opinion, companies therefore have the task of changing their mindset and improving their openness to lifelong learning. This includes a different error culture, spaces for experimenting and “spinning around” and learning, because the process of absorbing and processing information is now more important than the information itself. What brain research has discovered about this in recent years is really exciting...
Hardly any other country is as focused on formal qualifications and certificates in recruiting as Germany. This is felt, among other things, by specialists who come from other countries and have problems getting existing qualifications recognized. I therefore welcome skill-based hiring all the more, which focuses on skills and competencies. The challenges for companies and companies are obvious: When it comes to job advertisements, you have to define in advance what actual skills and competencies the company needs for this position. And when it comes to personnel selection, new tools are needed to be able to determine whether applicants actually have these skills.
A very exciting new trend for jobs with simple task profiles comes from the USA: open hiring. Whoever gets in touch first gets the job and is thrown into deep water. Whoever makes it can stay, anyone who doesn't make it will unfortunately have to go again. You can look at this method critically, but I find exciting that it allows people who usually always fall through the cracks to find a job. In Germany, six percent of people do not have a school leaving certificate, but they urgently need a job. In any case, I'm curious to see if and how this form of recruiting will prove successful in our job market.
Are you interested in an exchange? Then feel free to talk to me.
