Bridging the Gap: Overcoming Skills Mismatch in the Youth Workforce

In Youthful Cities’ Skills and Ladders series, we reveal the challenges youth in Canada are experiencing in the job market, in the world of work, city life, and some solutions for these issues. The insights come from data gathered through DEVlab, a project funded by the Government of Canada and in partnership with Tamarack Institute. Through this year-long project, Youthful Cities has been investigating what youth need to succeed and how we can develop more dynamic, engaged, and vital young workforces in cities. 

In this series, we analyze our findings, and identify “skills” as abilities that youth possess or need, and “ladders” as supports to better connect with career opportunities, improved work conditions, and available resources. Both components are needed for  an ideal outcome, requiring collaboration between youth and education, business, and government stakeholders towards solutions (i.e., using skills to climb these ladders and using ladders to support skills)

Our data focuses on youth (16-29) from Calgary, Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver. It’s based on hundreds of interviews we’ve conducted with youth and professionals that work with youth, our extensive survey responses, and curated article database. For those who need a shortcut to tease out the most important insights, we’ve chosen a few issues that were particularly surprising and salient for a deep dive. In this post, we focus on the mismatch between the skills that youth have and the skills they need.

Skills Mismatch

The term “career ladder” often describes the progression from entry-level roles to higher positions within an organization, typically bringing increased wages, responsibilities, and skill development. But what if you’re equipped with education and skills that don’t align with entry-level positions? What if your job search happens in the aftermath of a global pandemic, during a national affordability crisis, where network connections and job experience are hard to come by?

This is the reality many young people face today. It feels as though the career ladder is set in the middle of an obstacle course, and you must overcome numerous barriers just to get a foothold. One of the most significant of these barriers is the skills mismatch.

Understanding Skills Mismatch

A skills mismatch occurs when there is a disconnect between:

• The skills an individual possesses.
• The skills required for available jobs in the labour market.

This gap manifests when people lack the necessary skills for their jobs, employers struggle to find qualified candidates, or rapid changes in the world of work make it difficult to connect existing skills to job requirements (YC00004: The Future of Work). 

Through our interviews, youth reported that employers often expect specialized skills and experience in addition to formal education. This emphasis on prior experience, even for entry-level jobs, creates a classic mismatch between the skills youth possess and the expectations of employers. As a result, highly educated youth often find themselves underemployed, lacking the work-integrated learning opportunities that employers demand.

Skills: What Youth Bring to the Table

Our data shows that youth feel confident in skills like problem-solving, adaptability, collaboration, and organization. However, they are less certain that employers value their creativity and independent research—key curiosity-driven skills that are critical to thriving in the workforce.

Curiosity-driven skills are those that stem from a proactive desire to learn, explore, and create. These skills are often developed outside traditional learning environments and include:

• Independent Research: The ability to seek out information, identify credible sources, and synthesize findings to solve problems or innovate.
• Critical Inquiry: The practice of questioning assumptions, evaluating evidence, and thinking deeply about complex issues.
• Problem Solving: Tackling challenges by thinking creatively and analytically, often leading to novel solutions.
• Creativity: The ability to generate new ideas, approaches, and solutions, often by connecting disparate concepts or perspectives.
• Continuous Learning: An ongoing commitment to self-improvement through acquiring new knowledge and skills, adapting to changing environments.
• Effective Communication: The ability to convey ideas clearly and persuasively across different media, tailoring messages to diverse audiences.
• Collaboration and Teamwork: Working effectively with others, leveraging different perspectives, and building on collective strengths to achieve common goals.

To bridge this gap, youth can leverage these curiosity-driven skills creatively. For instance:

• Creativity: Showcase your projects in a portfolio, collaborate on local initiatives, or use social media to highlight your services and skills.
• Curiosity: Engage in community-based initiatives, pursue micro-credentials, and network strategically to demonstrate your eagerness to learn and contribute. (YC00080, YC00030, YC00102)
• Independent Research: Take the initiative to deeply understand potential employers and industries, tailor your applications to address specific needs, and bring new ideas to the table.

These curiosity-driven skills are future-proof and essential across industries, making them invaluable in any career path. By emphasizing and effectively communicating these abilities, youth can better position themselves in a competitive job market, overcoming the barriers posed by a skills mismatch.

Ladders: How Stakeholders Can Help

To address the skills mismatch, educational institutions, businesses, and governments must collaborate with young people to mobilize their skills and expand work opportunities:

• Educational Institutions: Provide up-to-date skills training aligned with job market needs, including career guidance, mentorship, and access to internships. Support recent graduates through continued access to career services. (YC00049, YC00004, YC00011, YC00018, YC00013).
  
• Industry: Partner with schools to offer work-integrated learning opportunities like co-ops, internships, and job shadowing, ensuring youth gain both technical skills and real-world experience.
• Government: Ensure equitable access to education, development, and employment opportunities by funding youth services that tackle poverty and unemployment. Promote existing resources and services, making them more visible and accessible. Such resources include multi-stakeholder platforms like the Canada Hiring Program, job banks and employment service apps.

Sources: (YC00102, YC00004, YC00016 coded references relate to resources you can find in Youth Data Lab‘s chatbot)

Through collaborative efforts between education, industry, and government, we can create a supportive ecosystem that empowers youth to match their curiosity-driven skills with meaningful work. By addressing the skills mismatch, we help young people climb the career ladder with confidence, ensuring a vibrant and thriving workforce for the future.

Next Steps:

1. Look forward to our upcoming posts in the Skills & Ladders series, where we’ll delve deeper into other critical issues and solutions for empowering youth in the workforce.
2. Delve into more data about the urban workplace with the Urban Work Index 2024.