Making IT work… for my employability
IT skills are becoming more like administration and business skills in that employers assume everyone to be capable in these areas. In reality people have differing levels of knowledge, understanding and experience. This is hard to measure both as a candidate and as a potential employer.
To increase your employability, up-skill yourself at work or at home. You can increase your current value to the business, and demonstrate your new skills in appraisal interviews, supporting your pay and promotion opportunities. If you are looking to change jobs or change careers, plan ahead and get learning. There are many good training providers in Worcestershire, including the Chamber of Commerce, Quanta, Pitman, Worcester College of Technology and many others.
According to the Ambition 2020 report from the UK Commission for Employment and Skills, there will be a shortage of 3,403,000 people with level 3 qualifications by 2020. Furthermore, there will be a shortage of 682,000 of Level 4 or above. This means the UK needs over four million people to up-skill in the next six years! Great for training providers, but what can you do to get ahead?
My recommendations include looking at the Microsoft Office Specialist qualification. This is great if you are a Word and Excel ninja, and spend a lot of your professional time producing reports and views for your employer. For specialist training in the finance area, I would recommend Sage, Xero, Kashflow or Quickbooks training. These are all highly recognisable by employers, and you can cross-train relatively easily.
For the more creative person, look at a Microsoft PowerPoint, Microsoft SharePoint, PhotoShop or DreamWeaver. Again, familiarity and experience with these packages will improve your chances of promotion or getting that exciting new job.
Finally, and I am guilty of this too, what about just good old fashioned typing! Just because the typewriter went out in the 1980’s doesn’t mean we don’t have to type anymore. On the contrary, we should all be much better at typing than we are, and I’m an advocate for what Pitman call their ‘Typing accuracy’ training course. Imagine how much quicker you could churn out reports, and ideally get home on time as a result. Your dog would be a lot slimmer!
