The imperative for upskilling in the contemporary business landscape cannot be overstated. If you are perusing this report, you likely recognize upskilling as a pivotal tool in your organization's success roadmap—an indispensable element rather than a subject open to debate. However, the essence of upskilling can take various forms, and your approach can profoundly impact the outcomes you achieve. For numerous reasons, crafting modern upskilling opportunities, which are more potent, efficient, and effective, has become paramount.
In our current era of talent mobility and the phenomenon colloquially known as "The Great Resignation," upskilling emerges as a strategic response to reduce attrition. The most compelling rationale behind upskilling is its capacity to enhance employee satisfaction, a key driver for improving retention rates. Elevated job satisfaction, in turn, contributes to heightened productivity, thereby amplifying the success and efficiency of your software development teams. The cascade of improvement triggered by modern upskilling is significant.
The benefits extend beyond retention and productivity; upskilling fosters an environment where employees can achieve their career goals. This benefit not only bolsters individual growth but also cultivates what is referred to as M-shaped developers—individuals possessing a breadth of knowledge across various domains while maintaining profound expertise in specific areas. This diversification of skills enhances your workforce's versatility and mitigates the risks associated with critical skills gaps within your organization.
In essence, organizational triumph commences with a knowledgeable and skilled talent base. By providing your employees with the tools and opportunities needed to learn and grow, you not only empower individuals but fortify the very foundation upon which your organization stands. In the face of dynamic market landscapes and the evolving nature of industry demands, embracing modern upskilling practices becomes not just a choice but a strategic imperative for sustained success.
Table of Content
We asked 725+ technologists across all industries a series of questions to establish a holistic understanding of upskilling confidence, how companies are upskilling, where they feel the most significant gaps currently exist, and the impact of those gaps.
Major Takeaways
Lack of work-life balance and insufficient compensation are the top reasons why technologists seek out new jobs, even ahead of lack of opportunities.
The main barriers to upskilling are a lack of dedicated time and budget.
Cybersecurity is the number-one skills gap in 2023
52% of respondents consider leaving their job at least once a month
Year-Over-Year UpSkilling Insights
UpSkilling Insights - The 2022 survey taught us that technologists' confidence in their skills was waning, and they were unsatisfied with company-provided resources. Concerns about shifts in needed technology skills, optimization for remote work environments, and talent migration created instability in upskilling confidence.
On average, organizations didn't make time for upskilling, hurting, and leaving technologists feeling undervalued. Sometimes, organizations make upskilling tools available but promote them poorly, leading to a lack of awareness: ever-changing industries and extreme fluctuations in talent availability cause shifting business priorities. The time requirements to meet those business demands and organizational goals may explain why organizations placed work ahead of upskilling.
As businesses fight to keep up, they must note how employees look at continued learning options. Companies must also consider the cost and benefits of upskilling and how withholding the opportunity impacts overall business plans.
This year’s survey provided similar results. Many tech leaders continue to be frustrated with the ever-increasing skill gaps and the struggle to close them. We also saw a year-over-year consistency in cloud computing and cybersecurity—they continue to be the most significant areas of concern for learners and leaders. One change to note: Cybersecurity jumped cloud computing as the top-ranking focus for individuals and organizations, which is likely attributed to the current global geopolitical climate.
While there was a massive increase in upskilling generally, there was also an increase in the overall confidence technologists felt about their ability to do their jobs now and in the future. Respondents with access to modern upskilling options show more confidence in their skills and trust in their organizations. They can access the learning experiences, courses, sandboxes, and modules they need when they need them. These technologists can access multiple types of upskilling resources and feel more vital personal satisfaction and connection to overall organizational strategy.
We can partially attribute these numbers to growing access to modern upskilling tools and
technologists, knowing they can quickly acquire the necessary skills.
The biggest takeaway? The top two selections are on-demand learning options technologists can do when time allows, complete quickly, and easily fit into busy schedules.
People want to access on-demand upskilling tools to fit professional development into their schedules better. This, in turn, also creates more productive collaborative learning periods. as learners can bring better and more specific questions to those sessions based on their own experiences. The more convenient and accessible the upskilling options, the more likely your employees will use them—and the more they’ll get out of those sessions.
THE TAKEAWAY
Organizations need to provide agile and modern upskilling options but prioritize them consistently as part of company culture. Legacy knowledge can create comfort in existing technologies. But tech moves fast, and we need to be prepared to learn at the same pace. The technology landscape continues to shift towards the cloud for financial and security reasons. As this space rapidly evolves, it is also pivotal for your employees to evolve. Organizations need to provide dedicated upskilling resources to meet these needs and continuously emphasize the importance of employees prioritizing work hours for upskilling.
Historical knowledge can rarely solve the increasing complexity of cybersecurity and cloud migration. The onus must be on organizations to provide tools to build that knowledge base from the ground up.
Skill Gap Analysis
Skills gaps extend beyond the software engineering and development fields. Survey respondents included data scientists, cybersecurity experts, IT operations, people ops, and other roles. We discovered that a lack of upskilling
opportunities creates problems across every team and up and down the org chart. It also impacts the ability to deliver products and features to end users, adds bottlenecks, and causes unplanned work for senior team members. Let’s not forget burnout, slow career development, talent attrition, and derailed team health and productivity.
When considering upskilling, it's important to remember that even though your developers may have the necessary skills to manage their current workloads, technology's rapid acceleration can quickly make those skills inadequate without consistent access to modern upskilling.
Providing your junior- and senior-level employees with continuous upskilling opportunities is essential. A lack of access to continuous upskilling leads junior developers to rely more heavily on their senior team members to fill the gaps. This increases the likelihood of burnout for senior developers, is unsustainable, and can lead to attrition issues.
Respondents also showed a strong desire to fulfill personal career goals and an interest in knowing how their work connects to company goals.
While we may expect technologists to want to further their careers, an overwhelming majority felt strongly about ensuring their skill sets align with company goals.
91% strongly agreed they wanted to improve their tech skills to fulfill personal career goals
86% strongly agreed they wanted their tech skills to align with their organization’s overall strategy
Jerry Maguire famously said, “Show me the money!” And while compensation is a strong driver of talent mobility, “show me the opportunity” might be more accurate. Employees want to grow within an organization and be part of a psychologically safe, collaborative work environment. They want the opportunity to have a balanced life and see their work’s impact on the organization’s overall success.
THE CAUSE AND EFFECT OF SKILLS GAPS
Knowing that technologists view cybersecurity as the most prominent skills gap on average, it’s no surprise that the most impactful negative consequence of technical skills gaps in an organization is also cybersecurity. While this top-ranking risk relates to data breaches and potential hacks from outside sources, several consequences directly relate to team health.
Skills gaps affect your organization's ability to store private information safely. They drive down revenue due to a lack of cloud migration capabilities and can fracture the development delivery pipeline. These gaps also cause onboarding costs to spike and put a massive strain on your recruiters. If your organization chooses not to provide upskilling options, you’re left with legacy knowledge that will quickly become obsolete—if it hasn’t already.
Companies must provide modern and agile upskilling and reskilling tools to maintain high-tech literacy across the organization.
Custom learning plans help overcome skills gaps across teams, whether team members need help with cloud enablement and secure systems or test-driven development. Team members can assess their skills and access on-demand learning specific to their level, increasing their knowledge of Agile methodologies and gaining confidence through certification. The result? Happier, healthier technologists and safer, more secure systems.
BARRIERS TO UPSKILLING
Each organization has various reasons for why technologists aren’t upskilling. They range from low bandwidth to tight budgets and include roadblocks such as unawareness of what’s available, a focus on hiring rather than upskilling, and a lack of leader support.
The consequences of technical skills gaps are wide-ranging. Technologists noted that a lack of time and budget are the most significant detractors to upskilling. This highlights that organizations must dedicate time and resources to upskilling as part of their team’s daily tasks. Every hour can’t be spent executing tasks. Technologists need time to step back to learn and upskill. This benefits both the individual and the organization.
Upskilling is vital to keeping attrition low, but you must provide dedicated learning time. You risk burnout due to overworked and overburdened contributors, leading to deteriorated team health and increased attrition. This leaves your org vulnerable to cybersecurity risks, which results in a lack of trust and loss of revenue.
THE TAKEAWAY
Creating a culture of upskilling takes time and budgeting, but the benefits far outweigh the cost of keeping the status quo. Employees expected more from their executive leadership in 2023, and those expectations include offering opportunities to upskill, learn new concepts, and take on varied challenges.
Providing upskilling resources and time to use them will motivate your employees to reach their personal goals and help your organization achieve its overall goals.
Technologists expect to feel content in their current and future roles and want a culture of healthy collaboration. If these aren’t top of mind, employees are much more comfortable moving on than ever.
Upskilling and talent mobility
Technologists want to use their talents to their full potential, especially in a climate where they’re more comfortable seeking new job opportunities.
When asked about this concept, 63% of respondents said they were confident that their company used their best skills.
Additionally, 71% shared that they had confidence that their current job provides growth opportunities.
It won’t take long for employees who feel their skills are underutilized to look for a new role. The best way to minimize the risk is to assess their skills and identify growth opportunities—internal mobility opportunities that align with their skills and interests or the chance to tap into new skill sets and apply them to their current role. Offer upskilling and reskilling programs customized to their interests, goals, and skill gaps they didn’t know they had to improve your chances they’d stay.
Pair upskilling with strategic internal talent mobility and external hiring strategies, and you have a solid solution for dealing with current talent deficits.
Upskilling, talent mobility, and external hiring should be complementary, not opposing, solutions. Increasing hiring budgets alone can negatively impact the engagement and satisfaction of existing technologists. Externally, hiring and onboarding new talent is necessary, but it shouldn’t be the singular solution. Organizational growth and natural attrition necessitate new talent, but upskilling can help them onboard more quickly while keeping top talent in-house.
PRODUCTIVE FEEDBACK
Employers can facilitate upskilling by providing direction on skills currently needed and feedback on skill proficiencies. Leaders can create productive 1:1s by discussing technical skills and how upskilling opportunities fit into employee bandwidth. We found that technologists prefer feedback in varying frequencies and multiple formats, indicating that leaders must provide frequent and ongoing feedback at various touch points throughout the year.
REASONS FOR ATTRITION
Technologists are more comfortable than ever-changing employers, but why they leave isn’t always as clear. We asked why respondents would take on roles at other organizations. The number-one reason that their current job did not provide a healthy work-life balance. Other significant factors included a lack of proper compensation and a toxic work culture.
It’s no surprise that a lack of work-life balance tops the chart. The call continues: Leaders and organizations must enable employees to manage their work better, remove blockers to efficiency, and create supportive, flexible work environments to address this concern.
The above list is a helpful guide on what to avoid, but let's look at what you can do to tackle work-life balance, create a culture that will attract new talent, and keep current technologists invested in staying. When we asked technologists what they look for in new opportunities, here’s what they said.
Technologists prioritize work-life balance and compensation over career growth opportunities and work culture.
THE TAKEAWAY
The Great Resignation isn’t some unstoppable force lurking out of sight, threatening to decimate your workforce and destroy your workflow processes.
It’s a natural aspect of our world that can provide incredible opportunities if appropriately handled.
Providing modern upskilling tools, work flexibility, and opportunities to learn and use emerging technologies may still cause talent mobility in your organization. However, the mobility will be more internal as leaders uncover the talents of their technologists and assign team members to roles where they can thrive. The current technical landscape means your organization can drive a collaborative culture with multi-faceted developers. Throw in an emphasis on employee satisfaction, and you’ll significantly increase their likelihood of staying.
If you don’t, technologists will seek career growth somewhere else.
SO WHAT NOW
Creating a healthy culture of upskilling takes time, resources, and much-continued encouragement. Employees want to learn new skills and further their careers, but they also want to know you’ll support them. Technologists don’t just need continuing education courses. They also need agile and flexible opportunities to learn in myriad ways.
We’ve now seen several years of data proving that employees aren’t satisfied with their current tools or the time provided to use them. Shifting an entire organizational mindset towards upskilling won’t happen overnight, but taking steps in that direction is necessary to retain talent and keep your production pipeline on track. By identifying and resolving the skills gaps in your company, you can substantially lower the risk of cybersecurity issues, reduce talent acquisition costs, and provide your organization the agility to migrate to—and work within—the cloud, even as technologies evolve.
ABOUT CHAUSTER
Chauster offers a broad portfolio of upskilling courses, sandbox environments, analytical tools, and strategies to make your organization a place technologists seek out and stay.
Thousands of organizations trust Pluralsight to help them upskill and reskill talent at scale. We’re the only partner who can provide:
Broad solutions for driving company-wide digital literacy programs plus individual and specialized tracks for individuals
Focused solutions for driving strategic cloud transformations across your most advanced and critical roles
Specialized experiences across cloud, software development, security, data and IT operations
Insights on skills gaps and where proficiency is improving for your users
Customized skills strategies for your most pressing objectives
Individual on-demand learning and custom, collaborative virtual instructor-led training programs
Software delivery analytics to help you gauge time to total productivity after a learning program,
When factors like organizational design, collaboration, and processes widen skills gaps and get in the way of software development, we can help. Our complete portfolio ensures your organization's workflows make the most effective use of people—and their skills—for all your software delivery needs.
You work hard to bring in top talent. Let us help you help your talent stay with your team so you can reach your goals.
Comments