I recently read the inaugural ‘State of the Nation’ survey produced by the Institute of Directors and it made grim reading when it came to the skills shortage.
Nearly half of Scottish business leaders reported a shortage in their workforce, so clearly this is a problem that’s going nowhere fast.
It wasn’t so long ago the job market was overflowing with talent – furlough had ended, and redundancies were made.
I think there were a lot of companies out there who thought, when they started recruiting again, that people would be battering their door down looking for work.
But the pandemic did something else – it caused a lot of people to reevaluate and make changes, often big life changes like relocating and moving careers.
Those working in sectors like hospitality had found themselves especially vulnerable during the ever-changing restrictions, and I can’t help but think this has made recruitment especially tough now things are opening up again.
We might be getting back to some sort of normality, but that’s only half the battle if there’s nobody to fill the jobs.
Given the challenge to find people with the right skills, it’s time for more resources to be ploughed into more professional development and training because this is a major concern and it’s not going to fix itself.
Offering internal training is absolutely crucial – it should be a core part of every business model. It makes businesses attractive to prospective employees, it helps companies develop and nurture the talent they have in-house, and crucially it helps to retain them.
Essentially, it improves morale, raises confidence, and helps boost innovation and productivity.
Most importantly, investing in your people makes them invested in you.
This isn’t the first report to highlight this serious issue, which means whatever we’re currently doing isn’t enough.
A report from the Open University highlighted this problem at the end of last year. The Business Barometer Report showed that, in particular, there was a shortage of specialist, entry level talent – for example, people with business-critical digital skills.
The OU findings also highlighted importance of work-based learning and apprenticeships, which is something I have championed before.
Apprenticeships can be a great and cost-effective way to bring people into your workforce who have the potential to make such a valuable contribution.
Those surveyed believed they were critical to long-term success, and I couldn’t agree more.
Apprentices will play an absolutely crucial role in the country’s recovery from the pandemic.
Nurturing talent from an early stage encourages loyalty and helps shape the leaders of tomorrow.
Digital skills are more in demand than ever before, so offering apprenticeships in these areas as especially appealing.
They open doors to so many roles – software, cyber security, data analysis and more – and creating a pipeline of talent in these areas is so important in today’s technology landscape.
Sustainability also remains at the top of the business agenda, particularly on the back of COP26, creating an array of opportunities.
More renewable energy apprenticeships are popping up than ever before offering an array of opportunities.
Organisations like Skills Development Scotland are helping to nurture talent in this space – last year it created the Green Jobs Workforce Academy, which aims to offer “a new route to a sustainable career”.
As well as helping to spread the message about the job opportunities available in Scotland’s growing green economy it is helping to supply the workforce needed to help the country meet its net zero carbon emissions targets.
This is the sort of stuff we need to see more of in order to nurture the skills needed to futureproof our economy.
Hydrogen homes project puts Fife on the green energy map
It was great to see a small neighbourhood on the coast of Scotland being selected as the unlikely test subject for green hydrogen gas power.
As part of the project, 300 homes in the towns of Buckhaven and Methil, located in Fife, will be offered hydrogen-ready boilers and cookers, free of charge.
This will be the first time in the National Grid’s history that it plans to use anything other than natural gas, and this change of direction is because of its ambitious target to use hydrogen to partially power homes within three years.
The region has a proud history of coal mining, so it is great to see its legacy as an energy provider being renewed with the latest in green technology.
The project involves a 200m high wind turbine that generates electricity, which will power an electrolyser that turns water into hydrogen gas and oxygen.
This will then be stored, ready to be sent to people’s homes.
This turbine has the capacity to power 1000 homes and, if the trial is successful, could save over 2650 tonnes of CO2.
That’s the equivalent of 50 per cent of the homes in the project ditching the use of their cars – isn’t that incredible?
Angus McIntosh, who is leading the H100 Fife project, is confident that it can be expanded, despite critics who say hydrogen is not the main solution for greener heating – especially as the cost of producing low-carbon hydrogen is currently more expensive than natural gas and the hydrogen production hubs are yet to be completed.
Scotland is famously blessed with wind power and using it to our economic and environmental advantage would be fantastic, so I will be keeping an eye on this one.
It Made Me Laugh
Who runs the world? Girls.
James Brown sang about this being ‘a man’s world’ but the soul legend’s famous tune could fast be going out of date.
Scottish schoolgirls are set to the be the future of investments, if results of a contest to encourage young girls to consider a career in the industry.
The competition was run by Future Asset and involved journalists and business leaders mentoring and advising the girls, allowing them to research and analyse 38 companies, culminating in pitching the one they determined to have the best future prospects.
Interestingly, 3 of the top 4 teams chose the same renewable energy company, Ørsted, while the 4th chose Accsys Technologies, who produce high-performance building material for renewable wood sources, suggesting the younger generation is more switched on about green energy.
Who runs the world? Girls.
It Made Me Weep
Dodge the pothole – if you can
Driving on Scotland’s roads is fast becoming a game of dodge the pothole and it doesn’t look like this is likely to improve anytime soon.
The estimated cost to repair the nation’s roads is almost £1.7billion, due to the many years of neglect, and councils are blaming government budget cuts for the deterioration.
The Scottish government however is hiding behind their stance that roads are ‘the responsibility of individual councils’ and that they have ‘to manage their own budgets’.
Roads are a huge part of Scotland’s tourism industry and, with staycations and road trips such as the NC500 growing in popularity and more cars and motorhomes heading to our famous beauty spots, the government should be prioritising these repairs, rather than squabbling about who should be paying.
