Barely a day passes without a new report warning us about the danger of failing to close the digital skills gap.
The government last year estimated that the shortfall costs the economy £63bn a year.
But are things getting better? Everyone knows that we need to improve and theres so much talk about teaching STEM subjects.
Surely we are closing the gap?
It seems that the opposite is happening. Deloittes Digital Disruption Index contains the shocking statistic that just 12 per cent of executives think school leavers and graduates have the right digital skills.
So when it comes to the perceived readiness of our young people to enter the digital workforce, we appear to be travelling rapidly in the wrong direction.
Learning the hard way
The problem starts with the way that young people are taught technology.
There are about 40,000 unfilled tech jobs in Britain. We should be churning out brilliant graduates ready to take up these positions. But were not.
The irony is that graduates who have degrees in computer science and tech can struggle to find employment. The reason for this is simple. The skills students are learning on these courses are outdated by the time they come into the workplace.
Even if the course was written the day before the students start, it will still be three years out of date by the time they are ready to begin work.
The tech companies we talk to at Opus all point to this. Sometimes they even have to teach new recruits to unlearn what theyve been taught at university, so they can teach them again to their own standards.
Get with the tech
But there is a way to solve the problem. The future of education should have business at its heart.
Businesses should take a proactive role in order to find the people who are right for the jobs they need doing. They can do this by partnering with universities and giving students meaningful work to do.
In part, the problem is the way that people look at tech. Some still see it as a career for maths geniuses who have been coding since they were seven. This is outdated. If you want to go into sport, or music, or fashion, tech skills give you a head-start.
We should also be offering a tech version of a law conversion course, which graduates undertake after completing a degree.
This is not necessarily for people who want to be heavy-duty techies, but rather for regular people who need to speak the tech language.
Enter the real world
We are trying to do our bit at Opus, by creating a programme (called
–Nology) that offers a tech career conversion to people from a wide range of backgrounds.
We have partnered with four of the Southwests biggest universities – Bath, Bristol, Cardiff, and Exeter – and we are trying to debunk some myths around tech.
The idea is to provide proper experience working on tech projects before candidates start work.
It helps overcome employer fears about hiring people with “no real world experience” – something I hear all the time. These grads get coding, testing, user experience – all the basics. And there is a chance to work with some of our big-name clients, including Asos and Tommy Hilfiger.
Programmes like this are a step in the right direction. Whatever we do, it is critical that we involve business in the future of our digital education.
We can all sit around bemoaning the situation, or we can do something about it. If it starts to happen now, the future looks bright – for businesses, for students, for everyone.
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