Employers can only create, design, manufacture, sell, in short do business, if they have the right skills in-house to do so. Knowing your in-house skills or lack of them, can define potential bottle necks in your strategic process. Anticipating what the skills of the future might be and planning to meet these changes is key to the future of an organisation and at the same time can maintain the value and employability of staff. As it becomes more difficult to find the right skills in the market, knowing your in-house capabilities means you are not restricted to looking outside for new skills and retraining or upskilling staff becomes a realistic and cost-effective alternative.

Giving employees the ability to search the skill pool to find people with key skills they are missing can prove very beneficial, speeding up development and/or innovation cycles. Being able to find the right skill sets for bid writing or an engineering project is often the key to its success.

Working with employees on a personal level to place their skill set within the larger organizational framework can be a key part of an employee progression programme. To do so can show whether their skills will remain relevant and in which areas they might consider / need upskilling or retraining.

Defining personal skills as a key strategic asset could provide you with the agility you need to stay ahead of your competition in areas such as:

• Project Management
• Product Development
• Mergers & Acquisitions
• R&D