.webp){kind=icon}
.png){kind=icon}
%201.svg){kind=icon}
The AI talent wars that were “heating up” are now reaching nuclear levels. The talent shortage has obliterated the traditional hiring process, forcing tech leaders into an arms race they can't win with conventional tactics.
As described in a Fortune article, there’s “a tribal element to Silicon Valley’s latest talent wars” that includes “recruitment raids” to woo top AI researchers and engineers “like prized assets on the battlefield.”
For business and tech leaders, the stakes are incredibly high; the survival and growth of their companies depends on AI talent. Almost half (44%) of global executives say a lack of in-house AI expertise is hampering their firm’s ability to adopt artificial intelligence.
According to a new spotlight paper by IDC, sponsored by Andela, businesses need a fresh new approach to tackle this.
The AI Talent Battle Opens on Two Fronts
Companies are actually fighting “a war on two fronts,” writes Abhinav Shrivastava, Research Manager of Talent Acquisition and Strategy at IDC, a leading global market intelligence, data, and events provider.
Shrivastava describes not one, but two AI talent battlefronts. The first is a push to hire AI talent. The problem, of course, is that supply falls far short of demand. In the US alone, the demand to fill 1.3 million AI positions far outstrips the supply of 645,000 AI technologists. Bain & Co. warns this imbalance could leave half of all AI jobs unfilled in the US by 2027.
On the second battlefront, companies are struggling to ensure the AI skills of their existing employees keep up with AI technology itself, which is evolving at warp speed.
Shrivastava writes, “On the one hand, skilled talent is in short supply, making it highly challenging for businesses to identify, engage with, and hire the most suitable candidates. On the other hand, the skills relevant today will soon become outdated, necessitating a continuous cycle of upskilling and reskilling to ensure that the workforce remains relevant."
IDC advises companies to address this two-headed problem with a two-pronged approach that focuses on skills-based hiring and upskilling/reskilling.
The Hiring Pivot That's Saving Companies Millions
Less than one-third of companies say their employees have a formal degree or diploma in AI, according to IDC’s December 2024 Global IT Skills Survey.
Why is that? Traditional academic institutions simply can’t provide workers and job candidates with AI education fast enough to match the pace of technological advancements in artificial intelligence.
To remedy this, Shrivastava urges companies to make “a fundamental shift” in their talent acquisition strategy, prioritizing candidates “based on their competencies instead of degrees or job titles.” Rather than limiting the search to people who already have AI-based degrees or job experience, this skills-based hiring approach immediately deepens the pool of prospective AI talent.
The benefits of this model are indicated by a 2024 survey of US tech workers and employers that found:
- 89% of companies were happy with their move to skills-based hiring
- tech workers without college degrees were 20% more likely to remain in their jobs
Build Tomorrow's AI Skills Before Your Competitors Do
AI upskilling and reskilling is a key way to combat the severe shortfall of AI talent. But this needs to be a continuous effort throughout each organization. Think of your company like an AI greenhouse, cultivating homegrown AI talent on a vine of ongoing training and education initiatives. IDC says this can include:
- specialized skills training by vendors
- experiential learning like live projects or hands-on labs
- mentorship programs and community-based learning initiatives
Since AI technology never stops advancing, your workforce’s AI skills shouldn’t either.
The Proven Solution Cutting Hiring Time By 66%
Andela has the expertise and experience to help businesses make these critical shifts in their AI talent strategy. First, it broadens companies’ access to AI-skilled talent through:
- the Andela network of more than 150,000 technologists with over 800 tech skills in Africa, Latin America, North America and Europe.
- extensive vetting and verification of talent for technical competency, problem solving, soft skills, and cultural fit.
- Qualified by Andela: a platform featuring real-world coding challenges, automated code scoring, live code playback, global benchmarking, plagiarism detection, and customized assessments.
Andela’s proven talent model and comprehensive technology platform get real results, including 66% faster time to hire and $80,000 in cost savings per hire, according to Forrester.
Second, Andela contributes to extensive upskilling and reskilling initiatives through:
- Andela AI Academy: a learning scheme for technologists within the Andela Talent Network to upskill in the latest AI tools. The AI Academy recently launched with its first eight-week GitHub Copilot certification program.
- Learnosity: businesses can train their workforce in various tech skill sets via this assessment solution, which is fully integrated with Qualified by Andela.
- Andela Learning Community (ALC): Andela has partnered with Google, Meta, Salesforce, AWS, Azure, Cloud Native Computing Foundation, Codewars, NVIDIA and Pluralsight to train over 100,000 students and technologists in AI, data science, cloud, and software development through scholarships and specialized learning programs.
Don’t fall further behind in the AI talent wars and skills gap. Talk to an Andela expert to access a wider pool of AI talent and ensure your workforce has the most important AI skills – for tomorrow as well as today.
