Creating a National Skills Academy for IT

Karen Price, Chief Executive of e-skills UK, reports on a major new initiative designed to make it easier for IT professionals to find the learning they need.

Launching in autumn 2010, the National Skills Academy for IT will bring together the best of education and training for IT professionals across England. 

Developed by employers working together via e-skills UK, the Skills Academy will increase the uptake of training and make career planning simpler and easier. Backed by government, the National Skills Academy for IT is part of the network of National Skills Academies:  employer-led centres of training excellence set up to deliver the skills that employers need in each sector of the economy.

Every sector, public and private, is now dependent on technology and it is widely agreed that technology-enabled innovation is the main driver of growth across the world’s economies. This growth relies on highly skilled IT professionals. In the UK, the technology sector makes a major contribution to the economy, generating £83,000 gross value added (GVA) per head – nearly four times the UK average.  This value is created by highly skilled IT professionals. Continued investment in the development of these individuals is essential for UK economic recovery and competitiveness.  The National Skills Academy for IT is bringing together employers and training providers to help employers make the best return on that investment.

The National Skills Academy for IT is being developed by major UK employers including Accenture, BA, BT, HP, IBM, Logica, Microsoft, Oracle and Sainsbury’s. It will provide access to the qualifications and courses that employers value, using a common language for skills and knowledge that everyone understands. In addition to bringing together high quality training for IT professionals, the Academy will make it easier for employers to identify the skills gaps they need to address now and for the future.

The National Skills Academy for IT will not deliver training directly; it will work in partnership with providers of quality training. The training promoted by the Academy will include existing offerings as well as new qualifications and courses developed with employers – ranging from large development programmes to bite-sized courses. Organisations and individuals will be able to receive training in the ways that work best for them, incorporating e-learning as well as face-to-face methods, and on-the-job learning alongside academic study. In addition, organisations will be able to have their own internal training recognised alongside external training.

The Skills Academy will support collaboration among training providers – including public, private, higher and further education, building on the unique strengths of each.  By working through the Academy, training providers will be able to participate in a vibrant new marketplace for IT skills development, created by employers who are working collaboratively to address the sector’s skills needs.

For IT professionals, the National Skills Academy for IT will make it easier to find the learning they need. New skills developed by individuals will be recognised against sector-defined standards of competence, building on their existing skills portfolios. This will help to develop a more versatile IT profession, making it easier for IT professionals to move between different roles, organisations and sectors in the course of their careers.

The IT professional workforce has grown throughout the recession and will grow at four times the UK average for the next decade.  The National Skills Academy for IT will help to ensure the skills of this growing pool of IT professionals are world-class, helping all sectors in the UK compete successfully in the IT-enabled global economy.

The National Skills Academy for IT is now in its development phase and will be open for business in the autumn of 2010.  If you want to find out more, please register your interest at www.itskillsacademy.ac.uk