The technological landscape and the demand for qualified specialists is developing rapidly, particularly in the field of artificial intelligence (AI). To illustrate the challenges and opportunities in this dynamic environment, Jobiqo CEO, Martin Lenz, asked the co-founder of mytalents.ai, Florian Hasibar, for an interview. The focus is on the question of how companies can address the growing skills shortage among employees and applicants and what role online job boards play in this context.

It becomes clear how important "upskilling" has become for the world of work - and why there is less the much-cited shortage of skilled labour but more a shortage of skills. Against this backdrop, online job boards have the central task of not only making the labour market more efficient through upskilling, but also making educational opportunities more visible. Upskilling is establishing itself as a decisive factor for the future of work.

Martin Lenz: Florian, tell us a bit about mytalents.ai and your approach to helping companies upskill their employees.

Florian Hasibar: Mytalents.ai supports companies in getting fit for the future and staying fit for the future. We help these companies to develop and expand their employees' skills in new technologies such as generative artificial intelligence. Mytalents.ai creates individual learning paths for each employee that are tailored to their specific needs. This is completely independent of whether they come from the marketing, sales, HR, finance or IT.

Martin Lenz: It seems that there is a considerable demand for such services. The more than 300 job boards that Jobiqo has developed worldwide for its international customers also show that there is not necessarily a shortage of skilled labour, but rather a shortage of required skills. How do you see it?

Florian Hasibar: Absolutely. The landscape of required skills is constantly changing. A good example is the field of generative AI: the number of job advertisements in which companies demand the associated skills increased by more than 450 per cent in 2023, as Computer World recently reported. This shows that companies are actively looking for these skills - and are also prepared to pay for them.

Martin Lenz: What advantages do employees who undergo further training in these areas have for a company?

Florian Hasibar: Skilled workers who are competent in dealing with new technologies such as generative artificial intelligence not only prove to be more productive but also more innovative. A survey by the leading learning platform edX also shows that 82 per cent of managers are willing to pay such employees more, and 74 per cent believe that these people should be promoted sooner. However, there is also growing dissatisfaction among employees, particularly among the younger generations. Around 39 per cent are considering leaving their company if they do not see the opportunity to develop further. This figure is even higher among Generation Z and millennials.

Martin Lenz: The Fifteen Seconds Career Compass recently showed that further training will be very popular in 2024. The younger generations in particular are actively looking for opportunities for professional development. How can mytalents.ai capitalise on this trend and support companies in meeting these training needs?

Florian Hasibar: That's an important observation. At mytalents.ai, we see ourselves as a bridge between employees' current skills and the requirements of the future. Our learning platform not only offers training and video courses, but also the direct application of generative AI and productivity tools in everyday working life with our product "mytalentsGPT". This means that users learn how to expand their own skills and can then implement this immediately on the platform. We thus enable individual learning paths with specialised courses for the respective department. It doesn't matter whether they are people coming straight from university or people who have been with the company for decades. At MyTalents.ai, it is important to us to provide the resources so that companies can not only retain their teams, but also motivate and promote them. 

Martin Lenz: How can online job boards help to capitalise on this trend and promote upskilling?

Florian Hasibar: Online job boards are in a unique position - not only to provide jobs but also to make educational resources and upskilling programmes, including micro credentials, directly accessible. These platforms could recommend the right "micro credential" courses or certifications that align with advertised positions, benefiting both employers and employees by actively addressing the skills shortage. Furthermore, employers can highlight these micro credential opportunities prominently on their company profiles and in job adverts, significantly boosting interest among potential applicants

Martin Lenz: At Jobiqo, we see many potential data points throughout the entire recruitment process - from generating reach and creating visibility for the job through to the search (or matching) and application flows - that could also be used to incorporate the topic of skills, skills matching and upskilling. Do you see it the same way?

Florian Hasibar: I see it the same way. In addition, by integrating real-time data on in-demand skills, upskilling platforms like mytalents.ai could not only help to better place candidates but also help companies to future-proof their teams. 

About mytalents.ai: As the leading platform for AI upskilling, mytalents.ai offers comprehensive 24/7 training that makes employees and entire teams fit for the challenges of the modern working world. mytalents.ai not only aims to act as a service provider, but also to make AI knowledge accessible at a low threshold. In a world in which AI skills are becoming less and less dispensable, mytalents.ai is committed to disseminating these essential skills and making them available to everyone.

About Jobiqo: Jobiqo provides a white-label job board platform that enables media houses, professional associations, universities and other organisations to run their own specialised job portals. Jobiqo uses advanced AI technologies for matching job adverts through to skill-based matching of candidates. In addition, our Programmatic Job Advertising Services (Jobiqo AIR) help to place job adverts in an effective and targeted way to reach high-quality candidates.