There are currently 500,000 job openings in the information technology sector. The demand for trained IT employees has already been outnumbered and this gap continues to go wider and wider, we’ve learned from a web development group at appendTo.
When President Obama revealed the TechHire Initiative, he improvised the great impact that it will have on middle class Americans, especially those without the degrees
Here are three ways organizations can take advantage of TechHire to improve their business.
- THE $100 MILLION COMPETITION
TechHire’s main objective is to find the possible paths fastest for low-skilled people with barriers to training and employment. TechHire concentrate on accelerated learning programs thus providing entry-level programmers with the skill they require for employment in months rather than years.
To leverage and drive innovation, TechHire is launching a $100 million H-1B grant competition which will help participants learn as efficiently as possible
The employers will also benefit helping to promote various training programmers as those efforts will lead to a wider hiring pool thus making it easier for them to fill up the tech positions.
- SUPPORT THE GROWTH OF LOCAL AND UNDERSERVED POPULATIONS
TechHire thrives to expand IT job opportunities to underserved areas as well as underserved population. In addition to geographic gaps, socioeconomic gaps also exist thus preventing education from being accessible, but these gaps can be bridged by accelerated training models as they create more opportunity for people to learn in their communities
Once the basic training needs are met, the next step is to generate new opportunities for the interaction of employers and potential workers which can be achieved by organizing events like startup weekends,hackathons, tech meet ups, startup weekends and establishing co-working spaces.
- SOMETHING MORE THAN JUST A DEGREE
The third thing the employers must commit is using data and innovative hiring practices. In other words, rather than depending on traditional system, like a college degree, employers must think out of the box when assigning potential hires
Skills are much more important than schools or degrees, since many reputed universities are behind when it comes to providing computer science education that is up to date. Moreover, GPA’s resumes, previous work experience only show half the story. They fail to provide the “soft skills” that an individual acquires.
The main issue here is not the lack of talent, but a lack of proper hiring and training programs that enables a broad range of people to acquire their desired skills, which can be minimized by deploying more inclusive hiring practices, scaling and developing innovative training efforts.
