Digital transformation and automation swelling the deficit in the LatAm job market

Advances in technology are demanding increasingly qualified staff at companies and leading to changes in job requirements.

"We don't see that businesses lack a particular job position, but that success depends on certain tasks that [the company] needs to do to generate value for the client," André Maxnuk, president for Latin America at consulting firm Mercer HR, told BNamericas.

"With technology, it's very important to automate everything that can be repetitive and really put human capital into competencies that are critical within the organization," he added.

According to a global survey conducted by the company, 90% of executives think that jobs will change significantly in the future.

Maxnuk said that the skills most in demand at present are those related to the technology area, IT and processes to transform business models.

The Mercer executive also suggested that demand for cognitive skills (adaptation, growth mindset, empathy, flexibility) will continue growing, as more technical activities will eventually be replaced with automation.

Meanwhile, according to Jorge Gamero, director of Experis (Manpower Group) for South America, "[job] demand is focused on information technology profiles, data management, technical support and telecommunications."

TALENT SHORTAGE

Maxnuk points out that it is difficult to attract human resources in digital areas, because these positions have not yet been fully defined and due to the fact that exceedingly high demand in the region has led to large rotation rates, meaning that hiring and retaining staff is one of the biggest challenges for firms.

“The shortage of talent has been a problem that has plagued experts for more than a decade and, specifically, around the world one in five organizations are having problems finding the right technological talent,” Gamero told BNamericas.

The Experis executive said that although the outlook for hiring in the region looks positive for the third quarter of the year, with 47% of employers intending to add staff, the problem continues to be finding talent that is specialized in technology.

"I don't think that in the next 10 to 15 years we’re going to have a reduction in demand," Francisco Amadeo, general director of operations at Intive Americas, warned recently when speaking to BNamericas.

According to figures from the Andean community of nations (CAN), by 2024 the deficit of IT professionals in that region is estimated to be 410,000 people. Kaspersky also puts the current deficit in the Latin American cybersecurity sector alone at a similar figure.

“Latin America is something of a paradox,” Maxnuk said, pointing out that while the region manages to create great unicorns that produce human resources with global prestige, there are generally still very low levels of education. 

"In that case, skill development issues are critical to the success of the region," he said.

"The countries that grow the most in GDP are those that invest heavily in training, human capital and technology," he said.

DEVELOPMENT

“I believe that companies in Latin America are still going to suffer because most of them have the strategy of buying [human resources], although many of them are realizing that they also have to develop,” said Maxnuk.

Various companies have reacted to this by starting their own staff training programs.

This week, Oracle announced the opening of a new edition of its Oracle Next Education (ONE) training and employability program in Latin America. It will receive 16,000 young people in the region who will be trained in technological and soft skills for periods of six to nine months.

Microsoft, meanwhile, announced in May that in the first quarter of the year it reached a milestone of more than 1,400,000 people trained through its Global Skilling Initiative.

Avaya is also working on recruiting recent graduates and training them internally, because “it's not easy to attract talent in the technology sector,” Galib Karim, the firm's global senior vice president for Latin America, told BNamericas.