Rewiring the global talent market to support a sustainable future

It has long been known and written about that in order to thrive, we need to rewire the global economy (Rewiring the economy, CISL (2015)), and we often hear that not enough progress is being made. Despite this, we see the vast majority of our clients at AMS truly embracing the topic of sustainability and setting themselves very challenging targets. Within one click (or less!) on a corporate website you will find information around sustainability targets (and it you don’t, then the likelihood is that you soon will). It is encouraging to see this and heartening to know that sustainability is clearly a top-table agenda point in every organisation that wants to thrive in the future. However, at the heart of achieving these sustainability ambitions is the approach organisations take to attracting, retaining and developing the right talent.

I was excited to read the ‘Green skills report’, recently published by one of our strategic partners, LinkedIn. This report confirms that there is significant evidence emerging that ‘green skills’ are becoming much more prevalent globally, and consequently the talent pools of ready-to-hire talent for green jobs are increasing in size. In every one of the 48 Countries studied, the share of workers who hold a green job or list at least one green skill on their LinkedIn profile is growing, and approximately 1 in 8 workers globally have green skills today. The data shows that over the period 2018-2023 the share of green talent grew by 5.4%.

The above statistics are encouraging, but despite the share of green talent in the workforce growing by a median of 12.3%, the share of job postings requiring at least one green skill rose by 22.4% (between 2022 and 2023). Simply put, demand is outstripping supply…. which as we all know, will lead to wage inflation, and even more challenges. We need to think of ways to mitigate these challenges, which means we need to ‘rewire the global talent market’. This is where a skills-based approach to hiring comes in. I firmly believe that of all the sectors in the global economy, it is the green sector that is set to benefit most from a skills-based hiring approach. The skills-based hiring approach, which concentrates wholly on skills and adjacent/transferable skills and not previous job title and credentials will inevitably lead to more candidates being considered for roles that they were previously excluded from, and in the case of the green economy this could result in amazing benefits for society and our future world!

I’ll be providing further thought on some of these topics throughout the rest of this year, but if there is any call to action from this 2 minute read it would be for:

• Candidates to update their LinkedIn profiles with the ‘Green skills’ they have, and
• Recruiters to search for ‘green skills’, rather than previous experience and job titles, when looking to fill jobs that require them.

If you are struggling to fill the roles that will help you achieve your ambitious sustainability targets because of the shortage of ‘green skills’, please reach out. At AMS, we believe being a responsible business is good business and we would be delighted to support other businesses with the same approach.