The country is facing an unprecedented labor shortage. However, there is one area that is more severely affected by the shortage of professionals. Approximately twenty thousand IT professionals are missing from the market today, but this is just the tip of the iceberg. How should IT professionals be recruited and retained? How can IT be sexy, and what training options can those who would like to enter the field choose from? Our interview with József Nyisztor, Managing Director of Training360 .
Is the magical twenty thousand just a scare, or is the situation really that serious?
What is certain is that the problem was already apparent ten years ago, but neither companies nor employees took it seriously enough back then. It is difficult to talk about exact numbers, because the profession is diverse. Although this image is still often strongly present in people's minds, IT is not just about programming. People still do not see enough of the diversity of the profession and its potential, so it is also an important task for us to make the field more popular and attractive, and to bring it closer to people.
How quickly and efficiently have companies been able to respond to this market situation?
There were those who just waved, those who, now that the crash has really hit, can only think in reactive strategies. Those companies that were more deeply affected by the problem switched to action mode, as they recognized that something had to be done. For example, recruitment had to be done with different tools and techniques. Fluctuation should not be taken lightly. Those companies are able to perform well today, which have adapted agilely to the challenges of the demand market by using the right tools, applying an active strategy.
What are the practices worth learning from these companies?
On the one hand, transparency. The conditions for employees must be provided, as previously promised. On the other hand, the company must be completely reorganized so that it can adapt to market conditions. For example, in a few years, a lot of young people from the YZ generation will be working, while the X generation is still present. It is important to see that you have to communicate with the generations in different ways, but you still have to find a bridge that connects them.
What can serve as a bridge?
Millennials often try to learn autonomously, which works to a certain extent, but they can gain real professional experience and valuable knowledge, for example, in a well-functioning mentoring system. Of course, Generation X also needs to be consciously prepared for mentoring. Younger generations want to remain loyal to themselves first and foremost, and then to the company. They specifically look for interesting tasks and challenging projects from which they can learn a lot. Slow, gradual development is not attractive to them, and they don't like to be bored. The best way for companies to prevent and remedy this is to rotate roles. Many multinational companies employ IT people based on similar principles. They know in advance how long they will be working on which project, and then they switch.
This may be more difficult to achieve for SMEs.
There are not as many opportunities there, there are not as many diverse projects, but regardless of this, SMEs also have the opportunity to provide new challenges to the IT people working there. Only they do not necessarily embark on completely new projects, but rather take on existing tasks from a different perspective. Technological development has opened up a lot of new areas within IT. I remember that I started my teaching career by teaching people who did not even know what a mouse was. Nowadays, everyone needs to understand IT at least at a user level if they want to succeed. At the same time, the public still typically judges the profession based on stereotypical beliefs. If there is only one IT person within the company, they will have the printer repaired by him, regardless of whether he is a software tester.
What could help with this?
The role of education is undeniable.
In response to the labor shortage, intensive IT training programs have mushroomed. What is new about your Career Start Program?
We build on a different foundation because we know the real needs of large companies and SMEs, as we continuously provide organizational development and professional IT training for these companies. Based on these needs, we put together the Career Start Program, in which we provide the foundations on which an entire career can be built, and on the other hand, we also offer a solution for how someone can go from junior to senior in the shortest possible time. During the basic four-month practice-oriented intensive training, in addition to professional knowledge, we also develop the students' soft skills. Our instructors, who are practicing professionals with several years of experience in the profession, also introduce them to the tricks of effective cooperation and teamwork. They help them prepare for an interview or present their projects. I already know for sure that a person's career is shaped by soft knowledge to a much greater extent than hard competencies, such as qualifications or language exams.
There is a great shortage and the range of training is constantly expanding. How can we prevent the profession from becoming diluted?
We are very selective about who we hire. Out of a hundred people, three to five people will then sit down at the desk. During the recruitment process, the candidates' competencies, preparedness, motivation and knowledge count, as the training is – uniquely for us – free for students, so they cannot “buy in” to the program. This way, we can start working together with much more committed, capable and ambitious students, which can even end with an international certificate and a junior position at one of our partner companies. This allows our developers to stand out anywhere in the world. We are proud of our ninety-five percent placement rate.
However, learning continues within the company.
In the two years following the conclusion of the Career Start Program, the juniors will continue their professional training, which we will implement together with the company in question. After all, a junior can only become a senior if, after completing the basics, they further develop themselves in a corporate environment, tailored to the company, through our professional IT training. Although the Career Start Program ends with employment, we offer a number of IT training courses in our training range, taught by experienced system engineers and development engineers. On the one hand, our aim is to provide marketable knowledge to people who would like to find employment as IT professionals, and to equip practicing professionals with up-to-date knowledge.
How can recent graduates and companies find each other?
We regularly hold open days for companies, where our IT graduates and developers present their projects and exam papers. We have a dual goal with this: on the one hand, we want companies to see the real people behind the profession and get to know them, and on the other hand, we want to show what professional competencies our students complete their basic training with, during which they learn not only how to make a project a success, but also how it is worth presenting it. It is important for companies to see that although they want experienced workers, there is very little of them. At the same time, with intensive training, they can get professionals who have all the professional and non-professional competencies that serve as a good basis for development and joint work.
November 2018