Whether it’s in the UK, Europe, America or beyond, the telecoms industry is in the midst of a digital transformation that will define the decades to come. Connectivity is at the heart of everything we do, and it is being stress-tested by the ongoing pandemic. Crucially, however, it is holding up.
For instance, connectivity has, and is continuing to play, a critical role in helping the UK manage its mental, physical and economic welfare during the pandemic. Research has shown that 78% of the UK feel that connectivity has been vital in helping them cope over the last year, while from an economic standpoint, mobile communication has accounted for one-fifth of the UK’s output.
But for the industry’s major players, the hard work does not stop there. Providers must stay ahead of the innovation curve, racing against their competitors to be the first to deploy digital transformation projects. However, this may require replacing and retiring legacy equipment and establishing a clear technology roadmap aligned to strategic business priorities and, importantly, assigned to the right leadership. And for this to be a success, you need the right talent and the relevant skills and experience within your workforce.
Finding the gold at the end of the rainbow
Connectivity is evolving quickly towards 5G to the benefit of both consumers and businesses. With the right equipment, consumers can now enjoy ubiquitous, fast, reliable coverage and download speeds, while businesses can build new intelligent applications that fit into the idealistic ‘smart city’ — whether this is drone deliveries, connected cars or real-time traffic updates.
Of course, it’s not just 5G either. Innovation in the provision of broadband services is accelerating too. Increasingly, industry players such as British Telecoms (BT) are replacing FTTC (fibre-to-the-cabinet) with the much faster, more reliable FTTP (fibre-to-the-premises), which, in times of remote working, is critical for keeping us all connected. For companies like BT, these operational changes are building positive customer sentiment while simultaneously ensuring the UK is ready to compete on the global connectivity stage.
Naturally, this transformation carries a significant financial incentive too. Those at the forefront of this digital innovation will be amongst the first to reap the revenue and customer retention benefits. But despite the promise of gold at the end of the rainbow, such transformation can cause telecoms leaders some major headaches along the way. With technology moving at such pace, it can expose serious skills gaps or leave talent recruitment strategies in disarray.
It begs the question, how can telecoms leaders plan for talent and skills in three, five or even 10 years’ time?
It’s a collaborative effort
The answer lies in being able to prepare for the unknown. Innovation today, and the skills needed to accompany it, might be completely different in 12 months’ time. So, as a form of best practice, the telecoms industry must look to avoid the ‘big bet’ on certain technologies or processes, whereby large parts of the workforce spend valuable time and resources focusing on developing a particular set of skills. Instead, they need to adopt a pragmatic approach that allows them to remain agile to changing trends and demands.
How? A proven approach is to embrace a granular view of the workforce — predicting which employees in which team are best suited to particular projects, or have certain aptitudes towards specific skills or technologies. But industry players cannot do this without the support of technology partners. BT, for instance, has successfully collaborated with institutions like MIT and organisations such as Pluralsight, to provide a data-driven workforce view. With the latest AI and real-time data resources at its fingertips, BT has had access to a comprehensive map of its workforce capabilities and understand how to reskill its employees quickly and efficiently to support the seamless execution of various different projects.
Looking at this in greater depth, through AI tools such as Pluralsight’s Skill IQ, BT has been able to completely rethink the timelines for its strategic workforce plan. Not only can it accelerate its drive towards polyglot infrastructure but it can segment its talent by location and thus, better plan ahead. For instance, if it needs a number of employees to work on a digital transformation project in Scotland, it can quickly identify how many local workers can be deployed immediately and how many need to be reskilled. This effort can take HR leaders months to organise and action, yet through AI, it can be implemented at the touch of a button.
This granular understanding of its workforce has meant that it can prioritise effectively and remain at the forefront of 5G, FTTP and global digital connectivity. All the while, it has set an industry precedent in how to compare internal skills composition against market and business objectives.
Fending off competition
Each telecoms leader wants to be at the forefront of innovation in order to define the market for the next decade and beyond. And in turn, reap the financial and customer retention rewards. Yet there remains a sizable talent challenge that’s preventing many telecoms companies from doing so. With a well-documented skills gap, the industry faces the additional hurdle of being able to predict and action both micro and macro technology trends within the existing workforce.
As demonstrated by BT, the focus must turn to the granular, mapping out existing workforce capabilities and plotting a clear path for development down to each individual employee, not just teams. With the support of external technology partners, companies like these can act pragmatically when it comes to workforce development, upskilling workers as needed to underpin business objectives – and fending off competition, as a result.
(Photo by Andrew McElroy on Unsplash)
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