roundtable
ones, which were felt to be lacking in the current student population.
However, recent research showed that millenials possessed very different expectations to their employers.
Rogers: “In our 2016 Annual Salary Survey, one of the key themes was the mismatch between what employers thought their employees were looking for ... and what the employees actually wanted themselves.”
Jeffers highlighted a different problem from his perspective: “In terms of IT engineers, it’s difficult to find the finished article on the South Coast with people gravitating towards the Thames Valley or London. That said, given the opportunity we could bring on Level 1 & 2 engineers to level 3 standard in a very short time using our Investors in People gold training programme.”
On the training theme, Sykes picked up on the dearth of suitable AI courses claiming that there “is literally no talent pool out there, no college courses, and the university programmes are about 25 years old. Hence, we’ve had to set up our own academy and knowledge transfer programmes, in order to train AI developers ourselves”.
Bloxham regarded the issue of talent being “hard to find” to be an indicator that the economy was buoyant.
Business needs to be more involved in the education and development of youngsters
The education system itself was not deemed to be helping to adequately prepare them for working life.
Naha pointed out that schools could be playing a greater role to encourage bright young talent with an interest in technology. Schools that do provide scholarships tend to do so for areas such as sport, music, drama and arts. Right now there are a very limited number of scholarships available for those with the talent and ambition to progress a career in IT.
Reed claimed that “companies’ wiring is to employ kids out of school with qualifications, but there is a massive opportunity for business owners to help with preparing them for the workplace, with many schools screaming out for more help and support from business”.
When asked to compare the merits of the US with the UK educational system, Reeve, who is due to relocate to the US shortly, reckoned that the UK was better for passing exams, but in the US, “they have smaller classes, are more sociable, and enjoy a different way of life ... so it depends what better means?”
‘If you don’t train your staff, you won’t go anywhere as a company’
The discussion moved onto the development of staff, with Pickering
pointing out that “some employers are still unwilling to spend money on training – I know people working in finance who’ve received no training in the past 10 years, even though technology has moved on immeasurably during that time. If you don’t train your staff, you won’t go anywhere as a company”.
Referencing his time as a school governor, Pickering added that: “At a recent conference, the discussion was about the challenge of educating kids now for jobs which don’t exist yet, for example, personal profile managers for social media?”
Staff engagement – it’s not all about money these days
Murray asked the table whether it was now all about culture, about making your firm attractive to potential employees with initiatives such as CSR policies?
Atherton highlighted the open and inclusive culture at Centerprise, with quarterly meetings involving all staff and a monthly newsletter where, “everything, good and bad, gets filtered down ... and back up again”.
Reeve admitted to being surprised by the attitude of her younger staff when they recently held a fundraising day for their chosen charity, Age UK: “All the older staff left the room, but about 15 millenials stayed, offering to volunteer and to give their free time helping out – I really saw a different side to them that day.”
Shields commented about the importance of engaging employees and millennials through internal ongoing education and mentoring in addition to programmes such as health and well-being.
On the subject of charities, Peter James, business development coordinator, Thrive, agreed that younger employees, in particular, loved the engagement side of volunteering, and looked for the companies they worked for to share similar values: “Nowadays, it’s important for them to research the responsible, caring side to their potential employers.”
Finally, on the subject of employee satisfaction, both Bloxham and Reed discussed the importance of social media, with sites such as glassdoor, an online review system where ex-employees rate their companies, gaining increasing prominence.
Concluding remarks …
“Roundtables like these are incredibly useful for sharing ideas and opinions – it makes you realise that it is a level playing field out there, with all companies facing the same problems and generally coming up with similar solutions.”
THE BUSINESS MAGAZINE – THAMES VALLEY – APRIL 2017 Dan Rogers
Gamil Magal
Peter James
Martin Reed
David Murray
businessmag.co.uk 37
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