Main News Desk

83 per cent of IT professionals ‘oblivious’ to skills initiatives

The Training Camp reveals worrying levels of ignorance among UK workforce about standardised career - August 21, 2007

UK employees want IT skills to be centrally assessed but many are oblivious that national bodies already exist for skills management. Accelerated Learning pioneer The Training Camp questioned 609 of its students and found that 79 per cent believed there should be a professional body for IT skills management.

However, 83 per cent of those questioned were unaware of not-for-profit bodies such as SFIA (Skills Framework for the Information Age), which have been set up to provide national recognition for skills required for certain tasks. IT skills continue to be in heavy demand. As business models move more towards projects with strict deliverables, IT professionals risk criticism of the quality of their skills, should a project fail.

SFIA provides a common reference model for the identification of the skills needed to develop effective Information Systems. The skills framework also enables employers of IT professionals to carry out a range of HR activities against a common framework of reference - including skill audit, planning future skill requirements, development programmes, standardisation of job titles and functions, and resource allocation.

Executive quote

“The UK skills shortage continues to hit the headlines, and the majority of people feel that a nationally recognised framework would enable us to standardise skill sets across the profession. But all this is irrelevant if the UK workforce has no idea of the support that’s available,” said Robert Chapman, CEO, The Training Camp.

“SFIA is an outstanding organisation and provides the exact information and support IT professionals are looking for,” he continued. “We have the mechanisms in place to alleviate the skills shortage, we just need to ensure the public knows about them – otherwise we’re fighting a losing battle.”

About the company

The Training Camp, the UK’s IT Training Company of the Year, provides accelerated learning courses for busy IT professionals. Students spend up to fourteen days on a residential training site and receive an average of 170 hours intense tuition. It is an attractive proposition for contractors, whose time commands very high premiums, and employers who need to minimise staff absence. The Training Camp has an above average pass rate of 85% - confounding critics’ claims that accelerated learning fails to produce results.

The Training Camp was founded by Robert Chapman and Stefano Capaldo in Summer 2001. Stefano was a former student in the US and rated the company’s approach so highly that he decided to launch a programme of courses in the UK. The Training Camp has since been recognised by Microsoft as a Gold Partner for Learning Solutions (MCPLS) and over 6,000 students have been trained in the UK to date. The Training Camp UK offers a range of courses covering all major vendors such as Microsoft, Cisco, Oracle, CompTIA, and Linux, as well as specialist certifications in the areas of Security, Project and Business Process Management.

Contact details

For press enquiries, please contact Jade Wilkinson at LEWIS: Tel: +44 (0) 161 601 7740 Fax: + 44 (0) 161 601 7741 Email: firebrandtraining@lewispr.com Internet: http://www.lewispr.com

Technorati tags: Firebrand Training | The Training Camp | SFIA |

Bookmarklets:

Recent Press Releases

2010 Archive

2009 Archive

2008 Archive

2007 Archive

Jump to:

Main News Desk

83 per cent of IT professionals ‘oblivious’ to skills initiatives

Executive quote

About the company

Contact details