Post Crisis: eSkills Are Needed to Drive Europe’s Innovation Society

Post Crisis: eSkills Are Needed to Drive Europe’s Innovation Society An IDC Study, Sponsored by Microsoft

Brussels, 1 December 2009 Marianne Kolding Vice President European Services Research, IDC

Copyright 2009 IDC. Reproduction is forbidden unless authorized. All rights reserved.

Answering Three Core Questions  Has the economic crisis accelerated the transformation to an

innovation society in Europe?  What is the impact on the need for digital competencies

across all sectors and all jobs now and in the next five years?  How will the skills agenda need to change from an education

system perspective and within the current workforce to address the need for ICT skills to keep Europe competitive?

Digital Innovation Skills (Knowledge Society Skills)

Skills demand for “Innovation professional” job roles (hybrid business and ICT)

Advanced ICT Skills Use of Technology-based Devices Basic ICT Skills

Skills demand for ICT professional job roles Skills demand for non-ICT professional job roles

General Digital Literacy © 2009 IDC

Source:/Notes:

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Methodology Overview  In-depth interviews with 46 Microsoft Business and Training

partners  Survey of 1,372 European employers: – Belgium, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy,

Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sweden, and the UK. Company Size (# employees) 1,000+ 9%

Industry Sector

10 to 49 20%

Public Sector 19%

500 to 999 14% Professional Services 25%

50 to 99 19% 250 to 499 19% 100 to 249 19%

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N=1,372

Manufacturing 30%

Finance 8%

Utilities & Energy 6% Transportation 5% Other 5% Retail / Wholesale 2%

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Key Messages from the Study /1  Increase in ICT skills requirements BEYOND the ICT sector is driven by

technology trends not the recession (over 60% of organizations agree)  In five years, more than 90% of all jobs will require ICT skills of some

kind – almost independent of sector, country and size of company  While a higher proportion of jobs in CEE than in WE require no ICT skills

at all, the CEE countries will catch up with Western Europe in the next 5 years e-Business skills 13% 12%

19%

Advanced ICT skills

15%

Skills to use technology-based devices

31% 29% 28%

Basic ICT skills

31% 10%

No ICT skills

N=1,372

14% 0%

5%

10%

15% Now

© 2009 IDC

20%

25%

30%

35%

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Key Messages from the Study /2  The recession has had more impact on demands for the ICT

professionals’ skills than ICT skills in the rest of the workforce – ICT professional skills must help improve efficiencies, using advanced technologies and must help show what ICT can do for the business – This creates a strong need for “hybrid” skills, where ICT professionals understand better the needs of the business and how to communicate better

“There is a drastic increase in demand for skills that understand what IT does for the business; who can combine the two. This is a long term trend“ Microsoft Business Partner

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Key Messages from the Study /3  The implications of the increased demand for ICT skills is that training

of people currently in the workforce must be undertaken

 Certification is crucial for ICT professionals and will increase in

importance moving forward. However, for ICT skills for the non-ICT professionals, the popularity is less clear.

 To secure the long-term requirements for ICT skills across the

workforce, employers across Europe feel that vast systemic improvements must be made within the education sector in order for graduates to enter the market more capable of utilizing ICT in their daily jobs. These changes will be necessary as far down as the primary levels of education.  Overall, there were few variations between countries, company

sizes and industry sectors (apart from industry-sector specific influences, such as more technology-based devices in e.g. the transportation sector than the finance sector) © 2009 IDC

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Key Implications for Europe’s Skills Agenda  There is a real and urgent need for action to meet the demands for ICT skills in

Europe in even the short to medium term

– ICT graduates need to enter the workforce with much stronger business understanding and "soft" skills”, as well as knowledge of leading edge technology, such as cloud computing and Web 2.0. This requires close ongoing collaboration between the ICT industry and the education sector.

 The strong demand for ICT skills in the European workforce BEYOND the ICT

sector means that

– The education sector must create specific programs that are flexible enough to meet the demands of rapidly changing ICT and business environments.

– Post-graduate training and life-long learning is necessary for the current workforce

 This is an issue of developing the skills that will enable innovation in European

organizations using the latest most efficient technologies available

– This requires a systemic transformation of the education system – Without action and collaboration between governments, education and the private sector, the lack of ICT skills will be the bottleneck that prevents Europe from being competitive in the global economy and a leading innovation society.

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Any Questions?

Marianne Kolding Vice President, European Services Research London, UK

Phone: Email:

Š 2009 IDC

+44 20 8987 7125 mkolding@idc.com

?

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