Partner Article

Ripple Affect: the need to invest in skills

It’s labour market focus week on Bdaily. Here, idg look at why it is crucial to invest in skills.

With mounting business priorities and pressures, skills development may seem like a ‘nice to do’ that will forever sit at the bottom of your to-do list. But taking some time to invest in skills now could mean a whole lot for your future.

Why? Because there is a crucial link between skills and people development and business growth and performance – at the end of the day, if you don’t have engaged, enthused and skilled people working for you, how can you compete and be the best that you can be?

The UK Commission for Employment and Skills, which provide strategic leadership on skills and employment issues in the UK, has identified that whilst a proportion of businesses do invest in their people’s skills, there is still significant scope for improvement.

In fact, they note that around 40% of businesses don’t invest in skills at all in any one year and there are substantial variations between different sectors and sizes of businesses. They have also found that 64% of employees feel they have more skills and talent to offer than are currently being utilised in their workplace.

Put that all together and there is a whole lot of people potential that could be harnessed - not only to help employees grow and prosper alongside their employer but also to positively benefit the local and national economy.

And that’s why we want to encourage investment in skills – because we believe in the potential of people.

Let’s take an apprenticeship for example. By taking on an apprentice you have the opportunity to train a young person to become a valued and experienced member of your team – supporting the future of your workforce, passing on knowledge and building in succession planning.

But more than that, you are giving that young person the opportunity to learn on the job, building their skills and helping them to gain a positive approach to work. In turn, this will benefit their community as they are taking an active role in the local economy and will also spend their income in the area too. Take it a step further and your apprentice will be contributing towards the forecasted £3.4bn that apprenticeships will add to the national economy in net productivity gains by 2022.

Similarly, developing the skills of people already in their job can boost the benefits for your organisation – whether this development takes the form of internal mentoring, exploring additional training or looking into other development avenues and opportunities.

And it’s not just limited to certain sectors either. Employers in the creative media industry for example are being actively encouraged to get involved in skills development with £10m being invested in skills for the creative sector over the next two years.

In real terms, this means that training will be made available to over 5,000 people working in film, high- end TV, animation, video games and special visual effects – investing in people and skills to support the growth of the industry and in turn create jobs and prosperity for the future.

Overall exploring skills and people development can bring benefits such as increased engagement, productivity and crucially growth your way, but it can also start a positive ripple affect that touches your local and regional economy and ultimately the national economy too.

But how can you practically explore what people potential you have to develop your business? One option that thousands of organisations already turn to is Investors in People – a flexible, tailored and easy to use framework that focuses on how your people can truly transform performance.

By highlighting the links between what your organisation wants to achieve and how your people can help you to do it, Investors in People can offer you a practical first step in unlocking your people potential. And that first step could lead on to a whole lot of ripples.

Organisational development specialists and an official partner for Investors in People in the North of England, idg is committed to working with organisations of all sizes and sectors to improve, develop and grow their potential through people.

If you would like to talk about skills and how people development can help transform performance for your organisation, contact us.

For more from Labour Market Week, check out; Focus on STEM subjects will drive innovation; overcoming the UK skills gap; why recruiters need to search for the x-factor; recruitment among growing industries; Bdaily meets the labour market advisor; and Adzuna’s market perceptions.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by idg .