Closing the digital skills gap to build a bridge to employment

The Covid-19 pandemic has dealt a crushing double blow to the labor market and to the education system. It has wiped out millions of jobs, disrupted the academic year and left us with great uncertainty as to which industries will recover, and how schools and universities will have to reinvent teaching.

But this shock, though brutal and unexpected, was just the last straw a crisis had long been brewing.

For too long as a society we have failed to close the skills gap, says Brian Napack, President and CEO of Wiley, a global leader in research, education and publishing. We keep failing even though we all invest a tremendous amount in education and training: governments, corporations, and individuals running up high levels of debt.

Accelerating innovation has made the skills gap an urgent priority: technological change today disrupts industries and transforms jobs at a faster rate than ever before. Many corporations are in panic modethey struggle to find the right talent, just as a large share of their experienced workforce hits retirement age. Students meanwhile struggle to identify the path to a rewarding career.

Wiley, which sees its mission as helping the world advance through scientific research and learning, responded early on to this challenge by transforming its business model, its very identity. We dont see ourselves as just a provider of content: Wiley is focused on careers, on helping people throughout their professional lives, says Napack.

Sensing a unique opportunity to make material progress, to make a difference, Wiley re-centered its business model around a bridge strategy to close the gap between supply and demand of skills.

Alumni of Wiley's MTHREE training program

Wileys MTHREE division acts as the tip of the spear, with the most ambitious and transformational approach: it works with leading corporations to understand what specific combinations of skills they need; then it collaborates with universities to select students and equip them with those exact skills combinations; once the students are hired into the required positions, it moves to what Napack calls pastoral care: upskilling the employees over the course of their career. This model results in an impressive mid-90s retention rate for the employees.

This strategy solves two crucial problems:

Digital skills and lifelong learning are the keys to successful careers

In a world subject to faster change in technologies and business models, lifelong learning becomes crucial. But its equally important to be equipped from the start with the right set of basic skills that will allow us to adapt and thrive throughout our careers. Wiley calls them digital skills, defined in a broad sense as the skills needed to operate and succeed in the modern knowledge-based economy. These include not just familiarity with digital tools, but also critical thinking, problem solving, effective communication and collaboration. Here is where the skills gap is particularly severe and needs to be addressed as quickly as possible. These 21st century skills need to be built into each and every academic curriculum, says Napack.

Helping to bridge the skills gap will likely become an existential challenge for schools and universities. The value of a college degree is already being questioned, given the dangerously high levels of student debt and the worsening skills gap in the labor market. The current recession will intensify the financial pressures on the economy overall and on the education system in particular. Schools and universities that remain unable to provide the right skills at the right price will see students migrate away to other institutions and modes of learning.

Corporations also need to up their game. CEOs and Chief Human Resource Officers need to shift mindset and adopt a truly strategic approach to human capital, says Napack. Corporations need to treat their employees as a true strategic asset, take a 10-year+ view to developing talent in collaboration with the rest of the learning ecosystem. Too many of them are instead still stuck in a short-term reactive mode, scrambling to fill vacancies as they arise.

Wiley knows this has to be a team effort and has partnered with corporate leaders, policymakers and educators to form the Digital US coalition, which aims to equip all US workers with digital skills by 2030. The coalition has unveiled its goals and strategy in a well-articulated recent report.

Today our societies feel in survival mode, striving to contain the pandemic and to keep the economy alive. But to survive and thrive in the long term, to keep raising living standards for people across the world, to ensure broader access to opportunity and reduce inequality, we must take a smarter strategic approach to building the right skills and transforming education and learning.Under Brian Napacks leadership, Wiley is committed to playing a leading role.

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How To Close The Digital Skills Gap: Wileys Bridge Strategy To Reinvent Learning And Career Development - Forbes