Steve Dukes – COO – Confused.com
Steve Dukes is the COO of Confused.com, one of the UK’s leading fintech organisations and comparison services. In addition to his role, Steve is also a fintech ambassador and member of the Technology Connected Technology Leadership Council.
2020 was set to be the year for clarity and resurgence, but instead we’ve been met with uncertainty and severe disruption.
The impact of the virus has meant that a quarter of the UK workforce and 7.6 million jobs are now at risk. And businesses in Wales are taking the brunt of the economic downturn.
Yet while being in the throes of a pandemic has reminded us how fragile life is, it’s also given us a window for opportunity and reflection. As we’ve been adapting to challenges over the last few months, we’re realising what’s important and we can anticipate what’s needed for the future. It’s highlighted gaps in markets, businesses and skillsets, as well as the opportunities that are there to take.
And what’s certain, is that businesses need to lead the way in identifying and teaching the necessary skills as priorities evolve.
COVID has uprooted us in many ways – it’s changed consumer behaviour, the way we interact and what we prioritise. It’s thrust a mirror on how our economic, social and political systems operate. For some businesses, it’s emphasised that having a website alone won’t suffice, instead we must be able to run businesses digitally in their entirety.
The recreation, accommodation, hospitality, cultural and creative sectors are bordering on unsustainable damages, having stopped the trading of more than 75% of their businesses. But we’ve seen some sectors thrive. We learnt that industries like finance, insurance, food, tech and data remained at the forefront of consumer need.
In fact, the resilience of certain sectors has fast-tracked the future direction of many businesses and the way they operate. It’s allowed them to put a laser-focus on achieving what they stand for. For us, it’s meant focusing on our customers and honing how we do that, which has allowed us to grow our profit by 55%. It’s what has kept us going.
It’s created a clear divide between companies that are ready for rapid transformation and those that will need to re-evaluate how they do things from the bottom up.
But what’s become glaringly obvious is that further digitisation is a necessity.
While businesses need to adapt and digitise, it’s not possible to do so convincingly unless our staff have the right skills to keep up. For us to build a resilient economy, that means arming staff with tools that go beyond basic digital literacy. We need to build real capability in the key areas that use digital and tech skills and teach the behaviours and methods that enable innovation.
That means putting more resource into making sure our workforce gains a base level of understanding in areas like tech, marketing, products, data and design, so they can collaborate effectively with peers and find solutions. It’s becoming more common for all staff to work closely with technology and technologists, so there’s a need for common ground.
We need to focus on teaching transferrable skills like analytics, problem solving, quick thinking and finding alternative paths so our staff can effectively work together.
That also means ensuring that we have a healthy talent pipeline entering the business. By 2030, there will be a shortage of more than 85 million tech workers worldwide. Without the talent to drive digitisation forward, it won’t be possible to upskill the rest of our workforce. And if we can’t teach our workforce the right skills, then our businesses can’t thrive.
We should be working hand in hand with educational institutions to align what’s being taught with what's needed.
At Confused.com, we’ve launched graduate academies for tech, analytics, and marketing and work on projects with local universities to ensure there’s a steady flow of skills and talent between the two sectors. The academies are also open to existing staff who want to change their career path. In the last few years, we’ve had several members of staff move across to tech from areas such as marketing or commercial, having had no prior experience.
Examples include a member of staff who joined from being a healthcare assistant, and ended up becoming an analytics lead. While another transitioned from an SEO marketing executive to becoming a data engineer. It’s never too late to change career paths and as businesses, we should make transitions accessible.
We shouldn’t assume that we can’t catch up or even overtake when learning about skills that are new to us. Often all that’s needed is an open mind and someone to learn from. There’s a range of new skills required that very few people have expertise in due to their infancy, which makes it a level playing field. I know this from my own experience, working as a smartphone specialist at the birth of the smartphone trend. Age didn’t matter, the area was new to everyone.
Our ‘School of Tech’ initiative paired data engineers with staff in other areas of the business to learn about the benefits of AI. That’s now transitioning to the Confused.com university, which will develop staff skillsets across tech, data and design, which are our key foundations.
When another ten years pass, we might be looking at different skills priorities again. But we won’t stop.
While the pandemic has caused the world to stop in its tracks, that momentary pause also gave us a window of opportunity to reflect on what we need for the future.
In the next decade, as my children start considering their career options, I’m encouraging them to choose emerging skills that will be necessary for their tomorrow.
For those of us in the present, it’s our responsibility as business owners and leaders to make sure everyone has access to building skills in the areas we have just seen are required now.
