Accenture

Latticing sounds great! How do I know which way to grow?

When you start to look around for career growth, rather than just up, a new world of options opens up. How do you narrow down the possibilities?

Here’s how to get a grip on your lattice.

First, don’t assume that the training your employer provides or encourages you to get is the best strategic fit for your career growth.

The Accenture Skills Gap Study found that employees were most likely (52%) to have gained technical skills in the past five years. Lagging far behind were problem-solving skills (31%), analytical skills (26%) and managerial skills (21%). But guess what skills employers claim are in shortest supply? Yup: those know-it-when-they-see -it creative and problemsolving skills — the very ones that employers are least likely to pay for.

Scrutinize the skill sets and job descriptions of people who currently hold jobs you’d like to have. (LinkedIn and BranchOut are great sources for job-skills-peeping.)

Match up what they have that you lack. What can you most likely get your employer to pay for? Technical skills, probably. You might have to gain creative, problemsolving and managerial skills by volunteering for leadership responsibilities on the job or in your off-hours.

Another way to tackle the where-to-start dilemma is to see how your situation compares to the norm. Leadership consulting firm PDI Ninth House recently tracked the strengths that men and women business leaders tended to have at various points in their careers. Both men and women senior leaders tend to be highly ranked on all skills.

But PDI found that middle management men are viewed as stronger in financial management and strategy; women are better at collaboration, trust, developing others, and customer needs.

Do your current strengths align with these gender norms? If so, you will need to explicitly pursue opportunities to backfill the skills usually considered a strength in the opposite gender. As you do, build case studies that show your skills in action; your success stories will show how you demonstrate the skills used by current organizational leaders.

President Obama’s 2013 budget reportedly includes $8 billion to fund workforce training through community colleges.

That’s a start – and certainly community colleges are prime collaborators with local industry, so deserve the cash. But it’s not enough to set up workers with a toolbox of today’s skills. Employees know they need to string those skills into a coherent path so they never again end up in a career dead-end.

A study released in November by Accenture found that 55% of U.S. workers believe they need more skills to be successful at the jobs they have now, or that they want to have. And 68% of employees say it’s up to them to pursue that triaining.

Employers may complain about the skills gap, but, guess what? They perpetuate it. Fewer than half of employees get employer-provided formal training, according to the Accenture Skills Gap Study.

Here’s how employers invest in training, according to the types of training employees told Accenture they got:

52% – technology
31% – problem solving
26% – analytical skills
21% – management skills

Employers don’t even inventory the skills their current employees have; instead, they assume that they have to start advertising for someone with new skills.

Latticing links the people employees have with the skills they need to qualify for the jobs employers need to fill. That’s how it solves the skills gap. Community colleges can build long-term relationships with local employers by weaving career paths into their curricula. And that will bridge the skills gap.

How Do You Know How To Grow?

Jobs Without People & People Without Jobs – How to Bridge the Skills Gap