What are some practical job skills I need to learn?

Posted by admin on September 8, 2009 in Jobs

In the last 4 years, I have hired 4 employees either straight out of university or within one year of graduating university. The common theme among all 4 of them were they were bright and energetic employees. However, it soon became apparent in 3 of the 4 employees that they were computer literate but without any practical computer skills. Let me explain.

While they could surf, tweet, facebook and instant chat circles around me (and, remember, I am still young enough that I used computers as a teenager so I am by no means foreign to computers), 3 of the 4 could not program in formulas into a spreadsheet program, maintain macro’s in MS Word (since they were working off templates), organize their outlook into sub-folders or navigate their way around a book-keeping program (although this does require some training).

A sample size of 4 is far too little to make sweeping generalizations so I asked some other people if they knew how to do the above in other age groups to avoid selection bias. The general consensus seemed to be no (especially working formulas in Excel or other spreadsheets).

The issue for young workers is that older workers can rely upon subordinates, life experience and informal networks built through years in a workplace to over-come these technical deficiencies. For younger workers, in a last hired, first fired environment, the ability to utilize a computer practically to make one’s job, and their superior’s job, more efficient can be a real competitive edge in being hired or in being retained; an employer is not really impressed per se by your ability to express yourself in 140 characters as they are your ability to use spreadsheets and power point presentations to support your/their position.

For those of us, young and old, who neither want to pursue a career or do not particularly want to learn some practical computer skills to help your employer, remember that a key foundation of personal finance is balancing your budget and one of the better ways to do this is to master a spreadsheet program. Thus, if not for work, it may be helpful to learn some computer skills for yourself.

For those looking for some templates, Cannon Fodder recently offered his financial calculators on Canadian Money Forum.

Best of luck on the first day back to school.

3 Comments on What are some practical job skills I need to learn?

By guinness416 on September 8, 2009 at 12:26 pm

We’ve had new hires without some of the same knowledge, but they pick it up extremely quickly (you’d want to see how fast a 22 year old can learn to get around AutoCAD compared with me only a decade older!). I vaguely remember some of this stuff being taught at college years ago, I’m surprised it isn’t SOP to learn it today.

By First Home, Budget Spreadsheets, Gold and More | Financial Freedom on September 11, 2009 at 7:36 am

[...] My Wallet has some practical job skills that everyone should [...]

By Riscario Insider on September 23, 2009 at 11:43 pm

As guiness416 points out, the ability to learn is key. That’s really what schooling teaches. Nowadays, there’s so much free basic training available online. Even videos.

Back in university, we had a four hour course in APL, a very powerful programming language for the mathematically-inclined. This let us put APL on our resumes. Once hired, our professor said we could learn on the job at the employer’s expense. That strategy worked (and continues to work).