Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise
  • OHW+

Personnel Today

Register
Log in
Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise
  • OHW+

Career developmentLatest Newse-learningLearning & developmentTraining delivery

Collaboration is key for post-Covid skills challenge

by Vikki Bradney Spencer 3 Nov 2020
by Vikki Bradney Spencer 3 Nov 2020 Employers, education and industry need to come together to support the rebuilding of skills
Shutterstock
Employers, education and industry need to come together to support the rebuilding of skills
Shutterstock

Financial support has been a lifeline for many employers as a way to avoid potential redundancy. But training is going to become ever more important. How can organisations reskill their workforces as the economy changes? Vikki Bradney Spencer explains.

The world has changed an incredible amount in a short space of time as the Covid-19 pandemic has taken hold across the globe. In the UK, the need to reskill the countries workforce has been given extra urgency by the events of the past few months.

Learning and development

Government launches free learning for furloughed workers

L&D complacency risks UK firms’ competitiveness with global counterparts

The uncertainty and disruption brought about by the pandemic and an increasingly competitive jobs market have created new challenges for people across the country. As a result, rising numbers are trying to retrain and move into new industries.

Businesses have been affected, too, including small to medium-sized enterprises, which have needed to quickly introduce new digital capabilities to ensure their survival.

Considering there are nearly 6 million SMEs in the UK, accounting for 50% of the total revenue generated by UK businesses and 44% of the country’s labour force, the impact has been felt far and wide.

The speed with which these new digital tools are changing our working environments is driving the demand for associated digital skillsets. The size of the issue was made clear by the IBM Institute of Business Value 2019 Study, which forecasted that more 2 million people in the UK will need to retrain by 2022.

Skills challenge

Worryingly, the skills shortage shows little sign of easing up and the pressure is therefore on organisations to actively address the challenge both now and for the future. Closing the skills gap will require collaboration across ecosystems that span industry, education and government.

The government has already announced a number of packages to help those who face unemployment due to the pandemic to reskill. And this week City & Guilds called for the government to take a more regional approach to funding for skills.

Large employers are getting involved too. IBM has launched the SkillsBuild Reignite platform with partners including Open University, Institute of Directors, Jones Day, Social Enterprise UK and MSDUK so users can benefit from a wide range of online coaching and learning.

The platform will provide job seekers and entrepreneurs with access to free online coursework and mentoring support designed to help them develop the technical and professional skills needed to reinvent their careers and businesses.

Job seekers, individual business owners, entrepreneurs and any individual with learning aspirations can now tap into more than 400 learning activities with industry-relevant content on topics including artificial intelligence, cloud, data analytics and security as well as essential and professional and digital skills. The type and number of learning activities are growing daily.

Focus on recovery

Small and medium-sized businesses will also benefit from coursework and personalised coaching and entrepreneurs can seek advice to help establish or restart their businesses as they begin to focus on recovery.

Courses for small business owners include financial management, business strategy, digital strategy, legal support and more. Plus, IBM and partner volunteers will serve as mentors to help reinvigorate local communities.

SkillsBuild Reignite builds on the existing SkillsBuild platform, which was launched in the UK towards the end of 2019. Since then more than 2,300 learning activities have been completed. SkillsBuild Reignite expands this offering and is open to any person or small and medium-sized business, free of charge, for registration.

Bridging the skills gap and gaining the digital abilities required by today’s businesses has never been easier.

We know that we are in a pandemic that is set to continue having a great impact on our whole society as people continue navigating new ways of working.

Sign up to our weekly round-up of HR news and guidance

Receive the Personnel Today Direct e-newsletter every Wednesday

OptOut
This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

Prioritising skills building for job seekers and improving the skills base of business owners will help set both individuals and companies up for success in a fast-moving and ever-changing market across a multitude of industries.

L&D job opportunities on Personnel Today

Browse more L&D jobs

Vikki Bradney Spencer

Vikki Bradney Spencer is Corporate Social Responsibility Lead at IBM UK

previous post
Ariam Enraght-Moony made HRD at John Laing
next post
No guarantee of extended furlough for devolved nations

You may also like

Investing in skills when budgets are tight

12 May 2025

Leading with honest feedback: A responsibility in recruitment

24 Apr 2025

High-level apprenticeship spend doubles in five years

16 Apr 2025

Number of SMEs hiring staff in decline

10 Apr 2025

Gen Z and ‘conscious unbossing’: how can HR...

7 Apr 2025

How to build a commercially-minded workforce

3 Apr 2025

Why the apprenticeship shakeup is good news for...

20 Mar 2025

Scrapping NHS England could affect critical training, warn...

14 Mar 2025

Employee engagement: Growing disconnect between effort and recognition,...

13 Mar 2025

Schneider Electric doubles ex-military green skills scheme

13 Mar 2025

  • 2025 Employee Communications Report PROMOTED | HR and leadership...Read more
  • The Majority of Employees Have Their Eyes on Their Next Move PROMOTED | A staggering 65%...Read more
  • Prioritising performance management: Strategies for success (webinar) WEBINAR | In today’s fast-paced...Read more
  • Self-Leadership: The Key to Successful Organisations PROMOTED | Eletive is helping businesses...Read more
  • Retaining Female Talent: Four Ways to Reduce Workplace Drop Out PROMOTED | International Women’s Day...Read more

Personnel Today Jobs
 

Search Jobs

PERSONNEL TODAY

About us
Contact us
Browse all HR topics
Email newsletters
Content feeds
Cookies policy
Privacy policy
Terms and conditions

JOBS

Personnel Today Jobs
Post a job
Why advertise with us?

EVENTS & PRODUCTS

The Personnel Today Awards
The RAD Awards
Employee Benefits
Forum for Expatriate Management
OHW+
Whatmedia

ADVERTISING & PR

Advertising opportunities
Features list 2025

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Linkedin


© 2011 - 2025 DVV Media International Ltd

Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise
  • OHW+