A balance needs to be struck

The statistics do not seem to make sense

The statistics do not seem to make sense. One in five companies say they are wary of recruiting IT graduates because of a lack of business skills. And a massive 70 per cent of students graduating in technology subjects do not go on to pursue a related career.

But the sector has more than 150,000 jobs to fill every year. And there are warnings ­ repeated to the point of monotony ­ that gaps and shortages are threatening the UK’s ability to compete with China and India.

It is not just a short-term problem. Ground lost is disproportionately difficult
to regain. And as the flow of entry-level staff dries up, the pool of future experts also shrinks.

The commercial sector cannot have it both ways.

Hiring graduates has always been a mixed blessing. On the plus side, they are cheap, malleable and keen to learn. But, there are also downsides­ not least that they lack hands-on experience, and the wider skills such experience brings.

That is not to say that education should pull up the drawbridge of the ivory tower. Or that attempts to develop degree courses that provide a mixture of technical and business skills are misguided. Quite the reverse.

But employers also have a responsibility, as among all the hand-wringing about the UK’s precarious skills base there is a tendency to look to the government for
the answers.

It is too easy to conjure up the demon of offshore outsourcing to browbeat the education system into trying to take on a role more suited to employers themselves.
If graduates need business skills, it is up to employers to get involved with providing them, not least because those are skills often better learned on the job than in a lecture hall.

Clearly there is a balance to be struck. But business is traditionally sceptical of government meddling, and should carry that attitude into the skills debate.