It is not surprising that unemployment is high and the
demand for information technology
workers is also high. The reason for this predicament is most of
the workers that are unemployed do not have the technical skills needed for the
available jobs and the recent college graduate does not have the work
experience to fill the better paying jobs.
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Cisco is one company who is hiring. They are taking a different approach than
most companies. They work with different universities like San
Jose State University and Wichita State University. The collaboration of company and school
students can receive real world training while still going to school. Cisco offers a certification called “Cisco
Certified Network Associate.” A person
must pass two exams that cost $150 each and last 90 and 70 minutes long. If a student passes, they will be able to
apply for jobs that require that certification.
However, they will not be able to apply for the jobs that require
experience.
One company in Wisconsin had 17 information technology jobs
and 10 of them were help desk support.
The entry level jobs will be easy for this company to fill. But the problem is trying to fill the better
paying senior level jobs. The applicant
needs to have work experience in network design and understand the health care
system. Where can you find that applicant? Companies like this one face a real
problem. Because there is such a gap in
knowledge and experience, these job openings can be empty for years.
Bob Knott of SWC Technology Partners said, “there’s a
shortage of skilled workers across the board, not only at the entry level but
at the experienced level.” SWC does
their recruiting on campuses instead of posting on job boards. SWC hired 46 people and of those 46, only
seven came directly out of college.
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As information technology changes, new jobs will be formed. How will companies find enough candidates to
fill those positions? It takes a student
4-5 years to finish college, and companies want 5-7 years of experience. That is roughly 10 years before a company
will consider them for a mid to senior level position. The worst part of this scenario is,
technology changes all the time and in 5 to 10 years the knowledge that they
gained in college might be as useless as a floppy disk is today.How do you think companies like these will solve their hiring problem?
James Todd
REFERENCE:
IMAGES ARE FROM GOOGLE DOCS
I liked Ciscos' idea of teaming up with various universities. Companies should do more of this, in particular to offer a career path for those 'hot' jobs that are difficult to fill.
ReplyDeleteI have been in health care for many years, and lots of hospital systems take a similar approach. They work with local community colleges to offer a physical environment where nursing students can obtain the clinical experience that is required to complete a nursing degree. In the end, the hospital benefits by recruiting those same student nurses into vacant RN positions.
With IT jobs being difficult to fill, firms need to hard-wire this type of joint relationship scenario into their corporate toolkits for success.
Sarah Carpenter
Yes I agree with you. I know that Central Piedmont Community College teams up with energy companies to teach student about alternative energy. It is a smart investment for companies.
DeleteJAMES TODD
This is very interesting article; I do agree that schools should offer more hand on experience to any majors they offer. Knowledge you get from school is not good enough for most companies. I think companies can solve this problem if they work with schools like cisco or give an entry level employee a chance to gain hand on experience in their companies.
ReplyDeleteI know it seems like some companies do not want to invest in employees education.
DeleteJames Todd
Technology companies and companies that require a great deal of highly specified knowledge and experience, will more than likely be driven to set up their own 'universities'. The will have to offer targeted classes for whichever position and provide on the job training and internships for potential workers. This will require substantial investment in time and money on the company's part and may require a long term commitment (and no compete clause) from the employee.
ReplyDeleteI believe that companies need and want middle to senior management prospects they will have to start grooming them out of school or 5-10 years in advance.
That is a good idea about companies having their own universities. Yes companies need to find people and invest in them for many years.
DeleteJames Todd