AbilityMap

From teacher to cybersecurity professional - Sara Snell proves the power of transferrable skills. Sara went from being a school teacher to a state government cyber professional. "Cybersecurity requires critical thinking, attention to detail, problem-solving and communication skills to be effective". AbilityMap's latest research supports and expands upon this list of transferrable skills for effectiveness in cyber. Our insights have helped organisations identify employees most suited to a career in cyber and this is also having a positive impact for our military veterans transitioning into civilian work. Our findings will be released soon, but if you're interested in learning more, get in touch with us. #cybersecurity #transferrableskills #careertransition #womenincyber

Yesterday we shared a post highlighting that workforce diversity could be the key to offset the entrenched skill shortages in Australia. There is even reason to believe that it could set us on a path towards gender pay equity, according to some. As Greg Jericho writes, "Fortunately, the data reveals that a key solution to the skills shortage is one that delivers higher wages and also reduces the gender pay gap. There is strong evidence that when more men work in traditionally women-dominated jobs, the average pay goes up, and that when more women work in traditionally male-dominated jobs their average pay also rises." For lovers of a good chart, this article is for you. It's encouraging that the data supports accessing non-traditional talent pools to address skills shortages supporting the findings of AbilityMap's recent research that indicates Australia doesn't have a labour shortage issue, but a skill identification challenge. Perhaps a 3-year training program might not seem like such a long-term solution when compared with the recurring, entrenched shortages that have plagued some occupations for the best part of a decade. #skillshortages #cybersecurity #diversity

The annual occupational shortage list from Jobs and Skills Australia is out, and it's the jobs not in the list that's caught the headlines. The good news is that, for the most part, ICT jobs have dropped off the list, and for most states of Australia (sorry NSW and Victoria) cybersecurity professionals have also moved out of shortage. Although this is a welcome relief, these are not the key statistics grabbing headlines: It's the accompanying analysis of workforce diversity and prevalence of skills shortages that has tongues wagging. Workforces with a large gender imbalance (i.e. over 80% male or over 80% female) experience more shortages than those with a more balanced workforce. Similarly, occupations with higher proportions of older workers tend not to experience shortages to the same degree either. It makes sense. If the majority of your workforce comes from half of the population, your opportunity to find the people you need is reduced. The biggest barrier organisations face to balancing their workforce diversity is the time required to teach the technical skills required to transition into new occupations. Instead, organisations prefer to look to migration to solve their problem, a problem which JSA refers to as "entrenched shortage". What it highlights, though, is something that AbilityMap has been finding in its research, that Australia is facing a skills identification problem, not a skills shortage. There are workers out there who want to work, we just haven't identified who might be suited to transition careers - yet. #skillsidentification #cybersecurity #diversity

"Out with the old, in with the new" - vernacular that is. Achievers Workforce Institute (AWI) conducted a survey of 3,800 employees and 1,400 HR leaders from across the world. Their findings are well worth digging into, but the one that caught our eye was their new skills matrix. 'The hard skills vs. soft skills system originated when the workforce was entirely different. There’s no contemporary rationale for judging professional development based on an old, outdated skills system.' AWI is not the first group to form this conclusion. The term 'soft skills' has been on the nose for almost as long as their importance has been recognised, but AWI's research calls for something more nuanced than merely relabeling old-fashioned terms. AWI data argues for a new skills matrix: one that: - redefines what skills employees need - offers clarity into their professional expectations, and - helps the 60% of managers who say they want to hire for transferable skills but struggle to identify suitable candidates. AWI proposes a new skills matrix that can be broken up into three parts:  Technical skills: Skills that are formally taught and require specific knowledge, tools, or training. Examples include coding, machine operation, and CAD design. Transferable skills: Skills learned formally and informally from different experiences that apply to several different roles. For example, professional writing, project management, negotiation, and customer service. Essential skills: Rebranded soft skills, which have historically been overlooked in formal training but are no longer a nice-to-have but a need-to-have. These include accountability, proactivity, time management, and adaptability. Using this new vernacular, AbilityMap has you covered for transferrable and essential skills, both in defining your success criteria for roles and evaluating candidates for hiring and promotion. The maturity we're seeing amongst our clients embracing skills-based hiring, skills-based workforce planning and providing genuine capability development and career pathing opportunities for their employees is evidence that these practices are the new norm. It seems that, regardless of the label, working with great people who get it and get on with it is what most of us seek in a team, and that appears to be a universal truth. #essentialskills #skillsbasedhiring #transferrableskills https://lnkd.in/griC9Hid

Our latest white paper has landed and is full of helpful advice and steps to get your skills-based workforce planning from planning to action. Workforce planning has come a long way since the supply-demand + scenario modelling in Excel; planning a future workforce calls for more than filling rosters and FTE allocation but the skills an organisation needs to secure future growth, adapt to change and embrace the benefits that technology has to offer. Available to read online or download, this tool covers the why, what, how and when to embrace skills-based workforce planning with best practice examples and a 7-step implementation methodology. Grab your copy now! #workforceplanning #futureskills #worksmarter https://bit.ly/407Hf3d

Skills over degrees? Surely that's taking "skills-based hiring" too far... Let's apply a little "what if?" to this concept - what if we ditched degrees for skills, what's to be gained or worse, lost? Fast Company draws on multiple studies that distil down to the following benefits of skills-based hiring: ✅ Retention Deloitte found that organizations who use skills-first hiring practices were 98% more likely to retain high performers and have a reputation as a great place to grow and develop. ✅ Performance According to McKinsey & Co., hiring for skills is 5x more predictive of job performance than hiring for education and 2x more predictive than hiring for work experience. ✅ Faster Hiring Process Skills-first hiring is a less opaque process and can make hiring candidates more efficient, taking less time to fill positions. ✅ Better Talent Placement One of the greatest advantages of skills-first hiring is its ability to more accurately place talent where it will thrive. Organisations with a skills-based approach are 107% more likely to place talent effectively, according to Deloitte. The article doesn't highlight what's to be lost as there is so much to gain in the face of growing worker shortages and skills gaps. Let's assume we're talking about a predominately white-collar, non-technical workforce (i.e. not engineering, health care, scientific or other disciplines that require standardised training and qualification) where learning hard skills on the job is relatively easy. Ditching degrees has far fewer risks when we carefully define our target audience. If we ditch degrees as an entry criterion, we gain access to younger workers who may be yet to develop some of the soft skills that university indirectly fosters, such as critical thinking and self-management, but with growth and development opportunities offered through work experience, we can nurture those skills in-house thus giving the development and progression opportunities that are important for retention. With that in mind, it's hard to see the downside. The key to getting this right, aside from having the development and support established across your organisation, is knowing which soft skills are critical for your business. Mapping those skills for roles, teams and organisations is where AbilityMap excels, with powerful online tools to measure the critical skills in an organisation's unique environment. With those defined and candidates (internal and external) evaluated against the same criteria, you're setting your business up for successful skills-based hiring. https://lnkd.in/ei8BseNw

Transversal skills put your team ahead of the game, especially if we're talking cyber security. In an interview with Silicon Republic, Akshit Sharma, a senior security engineer at technology company Integral Ad Science (IAS) shared that 'while technical skills are crucial, soft skills are often crucial to ensure the longevity of a career.' “These non-technical skills enhance a team and company’s ability to not just respond to threats but anticipate and mitigate them in an ever-changing security environment...Ultimately, the best candidates combine both technical expertise and a proactive mindset to drive security initiatives forward and create lasting impact.” These transversal skills to which Akshit is referring are transferrable, human capabilities, and it's our area of speciality. Often seen as intangible and hard to measure, AbilityMap has cracked the code on measuring human skills, and our latest research highlights some surprising results on which capabilities constitute cyber excellence. #transferrableskills #cybersecurity #transversalskills

Think Cyber Security is all about technical skills? Think again. Increasingly, research and industry experience shows that interpersonal skills, especially those related to communication, are necessary for high performance in cyber security. As Howard Goodman, Ph.D. points out, gaps between OT and IT teams are no longer a luxury, especially in manufacturing. "By fostering collaboration, manufacturers can close the gap between network and security teams. This approach not only streamlines operations but also protects productivity and safety, making organizations more resilient to both traditional and emerging threats." While there are specific implications highlighted for manufacturing not taking this approach, there are lessons for all industries worth noting. AbilityMap has been actively conducting research in the cyber security space to identify the human capabilities necessary for high performance in cyber, and the results are quite surprising. If you want to know more, get in touch with us to see if your team has the required strengths for high performance. https://lnkd.in/gvEf3veb

With the ever-expanding technological and digital opportunities being embraced by organisations large and small, it’s no wonder there’s been an equally exponential expansion of leadership roles to oversee these new functions, including the C-suite. Adding to the C-suite comrades of the CEO, CFO, CIO, COO, CMO, COO and C3PO*, organisations are starting to see the rise of the: -             CTO – Chief Technology Officer -             CDO – Chief Data Officer -             CAIO – Chief AI Officers -             CISO – Chief Information Security Officer It has therefore been suggested that the introduction of a “SuperTech” Leader should be considered, a role which would typically have broad responsibility for all data and technology functions. Assuming this takes on, the following skills have been suggested (by participants in HBR’s survey) as necessary for the new “SuperTech Leader”: -             Leadership -             Business/Executive Relationships -             Business Strategy & Vision -             Technology Strategy & Vision -             Managing employees -             Technical execution skills “In other words, SuperTech leaders should be heavily business-oriented, with a technical underpinning.” Thomas H. Davenport concludes “There are times when specialists in particular technologies or management issues with them are needed. However, the trend toward specialized technology and data leaders has, we feel, gone too far. Greater coordination and integration is needed, and SuperTech leaders with a strong connection to the business can help make information technology a more effective business resource.” Presuming an organisation that has C-suite leaders representing the various technology functions must be a certain size, is this consolidation necessary, or does it diminish the significance of the various technology disciplines which, let’s face it, aren’t going away anytime soon? (* this is not a typo, just an attempt at humour, and reflecting the sheer complexity of the responsibilities of the C-suite)

Diversity & Inclusion require Openness and Understanding. AbilityMap's CEO and founder, Mike Erlin, has once again joined Brent Skinner on "Small Talk Window", Open Window Strategies #podcast at WRKdefined—and this time, we’re talking about a truly purr-fect topic! 🐱 Why #Catwoman? We figured it was time to give Batman’s elusive partner the HR recognition she deserves 🦸♀️✨, and demonstrate how risky it is to discount and disregard entire populations of amazing humans. Using AbilityMap’s #capabilityframework, Mike offers a creative lens to discuss her unique #humanskills (yes, she’s more than just quick reflexes and an iconic outfit) as we explore her strongest #inherentcapabilities. It’s clear embracing #diversity makes us, our teams, and our businesses stronger. This episode is a fun reminder that looking beyond the surface—whether it’s comic book characters or everyday professionals—can help us recognise and harness people’s unique strengths to elevate team performance. 🔊 Listen in now to find out why we think Batman couldn’t make it without her—just like no workplace can succeed without recognising unique talents and perspectives. Huge thanks to Brent Skinner for the opportunity to explore this captivating theme! 🐾 https://bit.ly/4eScFPB Interesting in learning more about the unique strengths of your team, try now: https://bit.ly/3zF12wg #skills #humanskills #futureofwork #worldofwork #workplaceinsights #recruiting #talentacquisition #hrtech #hcm