Improve your IT skills to get a job, urges BCS
Date: 24 Aug 2009
With some of the toughest conditions for job-seekers in recent memory, BCS (British Computer Society) is encouraging workers and recent students in the London borough of Waltham Forest to make sure their IT skills are up to scratch in the race for employment.
A predicted surplus of A Level students without a university place and a tighter employment market will mean more people chasing fewer office-based jobs during the second half of 2009. Earlier this year the proportion of job adverts for permanent IT positions in the UK that asked for ECDL (European Computer Driving Licence) almost doubled.¹
Peter Bayley, head of qualifications at BCS says: “In the middle of a recession people often just hope for the best. However, with stiff competition for even entry-level office jobs, people need to go that extra bit further to secure employment. Many people put ‘computer skills’ on their CVs, but having a qualification such as ECDL proves you have the core IT skills employers are always looking for.”
Jackie Blay has witnessed first-hand the changes in workplace technology during the 34 years she’s been working at the TUC. Computers were first installed at the TUC’s buildings in the late 1980s. Until then, staff were still required to use manual, and then later electric typewriters.
Jackie, 51, from Chingford, has also moved with the times, recently completing an ECDL (European Computer Driving Licence) qualification, and then a further ITQ qualification, both of which are licensed to training providers by BCS. These have helped her easily generate documents and reports on computer systems that would otherwise have taken her much longer.
She explains: “When I first started we had to use manual type-writers and duplicate the work on Gestetner or spirit duplicating machines. We typed onto waxy paper and the indents on the keys made holes in the paper which were then put on a drum into which the ink would be poured and the drum turned round.”
Over the years Jackie has worked in the typing pool, through to various secretarial roles, to her present day job as a personnel training administrator. She had considered doing the ECDL qualification for several years before she finally took the plunge.
Jackie says: “Not long after completing ECDL, I was asked by a manager to create a report, which I did using the Access programme, whereas I would have tried to do something like that using EXCEL. And since then I’ve also put our safety training slides into Powerpoint and made it more interactive with diagrams and images, to encourage more audience participation.”
She adds: “It did take me longer to work out how to do things before I did the ECDL course. It’s most certainly improved my job and made it so much easier. Before I would sometimes have to look around the programme to find out how to do something—now I just get on with it.”
ECDL is an internationally recognized qualification administrated by BCS in the UK. It comprises seven modules, ranging from everything from the basic concepts of IT, through to managing files, spreadsheets and using presentation software. The modules can be taken in any order over three years. A list of ECDL providers can be found at: www.bcs.org/qualifications
A BCS report called ‘Why We Should Learn To Love IT’ shows the majority of 16 to 30-year-olds (57%) accept that ‘those without IT skills will struggle at work’ and a large number (49%) think ‘employers should get extra financial help to train people in IT business skills’.
