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Jan 18th 2014 | From the print edition
In this section
Earning with the fishes
All hands on deck
Meat and greens
On the zoonose
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Skills and youth
How to cut youth unemployment in a fast-changing jobs market
ACROSS developed economies, finding
work has become tougher for the young.
Almost a quarter of those in Europe were
jobless in 2013. But behind that figure lies
a paradox: only two-fifths of employers
were confident of finding enough qualified
graduates to fill entry-level positions,
according to a new report by the McKinsey
Centre for Government, the consultancy’s
public-sector arm. In the eight countries
surveyed, where youth unemployment
ranged from merely high to record-
breaking, on average a third said finding
the right skills was a serious problem (see chart).
That reflects a mismatch between what education systems provide and what employers
need. Mechanisation and technological advances mean the next generation will have to
be better prepared for work (see article). In recession, firms are more insistent on hiring
staff who can quickly get up to speed. The real shortage is of the right skills, rather than
of jobs.
Yet universities and colleges are startlingly complacent. Of
the hundreds McKinsey’s researchers talked to, three-
quarters were convinced that they had prepared their
charges well for work. Alas, just over a third of employers
agreed. That means an army of young hopefuls, eager for a
job but ill-equipped to do one.
Improving matters means ditching the outdated notion that
education happens first and employment later, says Mona
Mourshed of McKinsey. Educators need to get employers
involved in course design, teaching and assessment, she
says, as well as in tracking and learning from the future
career paths of students. Switzerland offers careers advice
and work experience to pupils as young as 12. In Britain Bath University does particularly
well at finding high-quality placements for its students.
New approaches will have to acknowledge young people’s worries about the cost of
education. Some firms have started to look for potential rather than polished new hires,
and to sponsor the education of the most promising. In Charlotte, North Carolina,
Apprenticeship 2000 provides training courses for industry in fields such as machine
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technology; employers pay the fees, help to write the curriculum—and guarantee a job
afterwards. The Siemens engineering plant in Berlin takes trainees ranging from modestly
qualified school-leavers to graduates, and helps to future-proof them by teaching such
soft skills as teamwork and problem-solving.
Short, focused online training courses offer a more affordable approach for smaller firms.
FernUniversität, Germany’s only state-funded distance-teaching university, now has
90,000 online learners, some in Russia and Hungary. IBM’s INNOV8 simulation game
trains users to improve supply chains and customer services. Such approaches could be
used not only to prepare youngsters for jobs, but to help mid-career workers to update
their skills as employers’ needs change. Technology may have undermined long-held
assumptions about the nature and permanence of jobs. But it also offers at least some of
the remedies.
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