Go1, one of the world’s largest corporate education content hubs, has released research results from an extensive analysis of more than 750,000 job ads in the UK. The company has uncovered the skills UK businesses are seeking and the industries which are most transparent about personal development and growth opportunities in their roles.
Almost two thirds (63 per cent) of UK companies are struggling to grow due to staff turnover and are losing valuable, talented employees. Skills gaps are becoming the biggest challenge in holding businesses back from expanding their teams, with 89 per cent of hiring professionals saying that soft skills are a ‘make or break’ factor when recruiting.
Recruiters are explicitly seeking employees with strong interpersonal skills. Over 70,000 job adverts are seeking self-assured new hires, with ‘confidence’ being the most in demand soft skill in the UK. Creativity (25,578) and the ability to problem-solve (25,373) also made the top three most in-demand skills. These qualities are most in demand from industries such as Legal, Customer Service, Insurance, Human Resources, and Banking.
The biggest skill gaps in the UK
| Rank | Soft skill | # Of job ads mentioning |
| 1 | Confidence | 72,875 |
| 2 | Creativity | 25,578 |
| 3 | Problem solving skills | 25,373 |
| 4 | Time management skills | 23,168 |
| 5 | Resilience | 18,709 |
| 6 | Leadership skills | 16,535 |
| 7 | Organisation skills | 11,485 |
| 8 | Curiosity | 10,628 |
| 9 | Project management skills | 8,393 |
| 10 | Patience | 8,318 |
Without skilful employees, it becomes trickier for businesses to remain competitive. This places greater importance and value on retaining the existing workforce before they start to feel under appreciated.
To do this, empowering employees is vital. Go1’s recent report revealed that 65 per cent of employees feel empowered as a result of training. However, failure to implement this could be detrimental to a business, as nearly 40 per cent of employees have quit their job because personal development wasn’t provided.
“The research shows that a greater importance is being placed on soft skills, which can at times be more difficult to quantify than certifications and experience levels,” said Chris Eigeland, CRO and Co-founder of Go1. “But to maintain the position of employer of choice, there’s room for improvement. Per industry, there’s still at least 65 per cent of job adverts that aren’t promoting personal development plans, which are key in helping to close the nation’s skills gap shortage.”
Although companies are now more upfront about the types of interpersonal skills for which they’re searching, just 10 per cent of job adverts are open about career progression. Across 22 UK industries, less than 12 per cent of job ads discussed the potential to be promoted.
Businesses that fail to invest in the development of their employee’s risk losing out on new recruits, and they may struggle to retain existing skilled workers. Industries that are transparent about career development are more likely to instead attract this talent. The research shows that Legal (36 per cent), Customer Service (26 per cent), Sales (24 per cent), and Retail (20 per cent) job adverts are more upfront about opportunities at the company, such as career progression, than any other industry, but there’s still room for improvement.
Inflation is now over 9 per cent, and according to Ayming UK, just 8 per cent of UK companies have been in a position to pay all employees inflation-matching pay rises. However, from Go1’s research it’s clear that businesses need to provide more than pay rises to increase retention and close the nationwide skills gap.
