NFER Essential Employment Skills Survey Data, 2023

The data collected was NFER’s main source of information for a specific strand of their five-year research programme funded by the Nuffield Foundation “The Skills Imperative 2035”, which identified what the labour market will look like by 2035, what ‘Essential Employment Skills’ (EES) will be most needed to do these jobs, and who is most and least likely to be affected by changes in jobs and skills requirements. The primary research area for which the data were used is embodied in the main research report “Rethinking skills gaps and solutions (The Skills Imperative 2035: Rethinking skills gaps and solutions - NFER) along with its two Technical Supplements. These reports build on NFER’s prior research and quantify the current availability of EES amongst the population, namely: communication, collaboration, problem-solving, organising, planning and prioritising work, creative thinking and information literacy. These also measure the skills gaps between the EES people possess and the skills required for their jobs, and explore how these gaps might change between now and 2035. Among its key findings are i) 13 per cent of workers in 2023 have ‘substantial’ EES skills deficiencies, meaning the skills requirements of their jobs surpass the skills they possess, which may be jeopardising their ability to fulfil their job requirements effectively. ii) Nearly one in five workers in managerial jobs (e.g. HR managers and directors), professional jobs (e.g. accountants) and associate professional occupations (e.g. engineering technicians) have substantial EES skills deficiencies. iii) The number of workers in England with ‘substantial’ EES deficiencies may grow from 3.7 million workers in 2023 up to seven million workers in 2035. iv) Self-report data indicate that 14 per cent of workers have substantial EES under-utilisation, i.e. skills they possess are higher than those required to do their jobs. Moreover, skills under-utilisation is more widespread among jobs such as skilled trades, sales, customer services and administration.