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Employer Quotes

The quotes below are from employers in this industry: Financial Services

They are talking about this topic: General Skills

 

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The quotes below are about this issue:
Employers are looking for hires with strong interpersonal communication (including teamwork) and writing skills.

Employer Quote Region
"Employer 1: That's what I hear in workforce development—that the younger people have spent so much of their lives texting that they don't know how to communicate verbally. That they can't express themselves and figure out what you want and understand what you're communicating. Do you think that's it?

Employer 2: And videogames...

Employer 3: Sure. They're sitting there with headsets on and they're killing the guys, they're sitting there doing Call of Duty 4—or whatever the heck it is—and sitting there doing that with no face-to-face interaction. The use of eye contact, all these things that we used to have to actually master to be able to communicate. They don't have those skills. Again, with texting...I mean, my son is dating a gal right now and they text back-and-forth. I say, 'Why don't you just give her a call?' 'Well, nobody does that.' They don't call. How do you ever learn to communicate if you never do that? I mean, I don't get it."		 Central
"I think it's a combination of the two. We need to make these people really tech-savvy to do the research I'm talking about and all of that—it's kind of this high-tech, high-touch—it goes back to John Nesbit's book of the '70s. We live in a high-tech, high-touch world. Well, then we need to prepare people for a high-tech, high-touch world. High-touch for the really important things, high-tech for the mundane, routine things. I mean, that's from 1974 but that's the world we live in. He got it right, but I don't think we as a society have that figured out." Central
"And everything's tweets or whatever. Let's see if I can get my point across in 64 characters or something like that. That's not what our world is. It's conversational. If you're uncomfortable doing that, you'll lose a lot." Central
"I had that experience last week. There was a support person I was working with out in Philadelphia. I had a quick conversation with him and he said, 'I'll follow-up with an email for documentation.' But he also said—and I don't know if it was a compliment or whether he was giving me a little jab—that 'I know you like to talk on the phone or have a conversation, but I just don't have time for that.'

There have been a lot of systems that are built for logging questions if you're in a solution center. All of that is good for documentation. But once you get to a certain point, a lot of questions need to be conversational. They aren't one-on-one, they're one-to-many kinds of responses. One quick answer leads to two more questions. That five-minute dialogue solves the problem, versus a day-and-a-half of emails."		 Central
"I've been listening to everyone today with a lot of interest, and I can't summarize this in just a couple of minutes but I'll try. I'm really worried that my institution is going in the wrong direction as it meets some of the general workforce requirements that you've talked about. I mean, this was meant to be an industry-specific discussion. But we've talked about attitudes and confidence. We've talked about work ethics; we've talked about interpersonal skills. I'll go back to my office, and I'll have electronic communications with my students over an online course where they haven't had to make eye contact with me. I'm really worried. By the way, the growing share of our work is in that area, and we check it off in terms of efficiency. But I worry that we're producing widgets, too, and this is what you talked about.

By the way, I've resisted this trend. I make students come to my office. I make them make eye contact. They pick up their tests from me. I make them tell me where an answer came from. But I worry that I'm sort of the old-fashioned guy, whose younger colleagues don't see the value of face-to-face communication. I think we need to have from you folks—the business folks—I think we need to have your voices come out louder and in more than just an industry-specific way. I think you need to make a general case. The direction that we've gone in, that we've gone too far, or at least we're going in the wrong direction as it relates to some of the general workforce needs that you have going forward. Kids just don't necessarily have the sense of wanting to communicate with their professors. They come and they're scared to meet us. That's just sad. It doesn't have to be that way. Somehow, it needs to be communicated that this is unacceptable going forward."		 Central
"The other thing I think would be helpful is a better understanding of intergenerational interaction and the differences between generations. Because I think the ability to communicate is a problem when people have only communicated with their contemporaries. That's not the world we live in. You've got to be able to relate to everyone. So, I think that's a basic skill that needs some work." Central
"The other soft skill is teamwork. In our area, you've got to work effectively on a team. You're backing up other people, and you've got to have good interpersonal skills." Central
"Yes, you're right; they're having problems with the face-to-face interaction. An idea would be something like Toastmasters—at the level where they're getting put into situations where they're having to interact. Some of those speeches are thrown out. You don't know the topic until you start. It's within a peer group, so maybe they'd be more comfortable building that skill there." Central
"We used to force introverts to converse and be more outgoing. Now, we're encouraging extroverts to use introverted communication." Central
"I think that's where our shortage usually is—in those soft skills. If they're doing everything online and not having the ability to take classes that are more interactive and that have a team environment and that create the opportunity to work in small groups, then that's something that we have to teach once they get here. And we don't want to take the time to do that. We expect that that should be a part of their learning environment prior to getting to us.

Understanding prioritization, time management, leadership—all of those things that I think are very core in the first couple of years at school—and if they're doing everything online, they're not getting that interaction with their counterparts. They're not learning how to work with others that may not work the same way that they work. So, that's a huge component."		 Metro
"I agree with everything that people have said here about professionalism, and I also think just basic writing skills are important. Like writing an email. And I think people are so used to texting. I've heard of some of our junior-level staff texting their managers to say, 'I'm not going to be in today. I'm sick.' And they need just that basic professional behavior of picking up the phone and making that call. Some of those basic skills I think are missing, and that can cause a lot of problems." Metro
"We try and encourage students. They have to get 150 credits to take the CPA exam. If they're not going to do a double major or minor in something, we always recommend that they take some sort of a communication class because, let's face facts, their primary method of communicating is texting. They will literally be sitting right next to each other at lunch and instead of opening up their mouths and speaking they're texting to one another, and they think that that's just common place communication. And that's okay because that is what they do, but they need to understand that—when they're doing a financial report for the CEO of a company—that they can't text it. That's not professional communication." Metro
"They need to be professional—especially when you're putting them in front of a client. You have to make sure that they are professional—that they can speak professionally and that they can write professionally. And that they know how to act at a client site. And we do question some of the students that we talk to on campus and make decisions based on that...public speaking classes just do wonders for students." Metro
"I think that the biggest challenge that I've come across when trying to find candidates is not the volume of applicants. We have a pretty good volume of applicants. It's when we bring people in to interview. A lot of times the hiring managers ask questions and the candidates can't articulate clearly or concisely their answers. They're not able to give clear or concise examples. And so I almost think it goes back to maybe earlier in somebody's career...or maybe a school of helping people to develop those skills of communication and articulating what they want to do, what they have done, and even thinking about if accounting is where they want to be." Metro
"Employer 1: I would like to ask you about the critical thinking skills? And how important is it for the IT people to be able to communicate and have soft skills?

Employer 2: Very. They need to have the communication skills and they need to have the critical thinking skills to be able to take a business problem and develop a technology solution. I mean, they're working in teams, but that is still a critical point.

Employer 1: And for us, they also have to have the communication skills, and I would say leadership skills, too."		 Metro
"Employer: One of our huge components is the writing component. So, we do a lot with the area high schools and even some of the area colleges in terms of job-shadow events and e-mentoring programs. And, certainly that is the first thing that comes across, right away, when they send you an email and it's all in text language, and you're trying to understand what they're trying to tell you. But that's the first impression that I get and that employers get.

So, I want to emphasize the importance of writing skills because we do get cover letters and we get emails from potential applicants that are not appropriately written—they're more like texts. And for anyone here that has teenagers, you know that's how they tend to communicate. So, I feel for you guys, because they do want online classes. It's easier for them. But that's not what they necessarily need. So, part of it is marketing. They're going to sign up for schools that offer that, but it's so important they get out there and do that socialization and professionalism piece and not turn everything into a text. They have to learn it, because by the time they get to us, if they haven't, they're not going to get hired."		 Metro
"Educator: I do a lot of teaching online and I feel that one of the biggest things I struggle with is getting students to understand that the emails they write are a big reflection of who they are.

Employer: You've got that right.

Educator: And you can say it over and over: 'You've got to make this clearer, or you've got to check your spelling.' And it is amazing how hard it is for them to recognize it. You read an email and you kind of know who that person is from how they've phrased that email. It's really a struggle, it is."		 Metro