‘It’s too expensive, learners don’t know where to start, and don’t know enough about digital credentials’

Report: IBM survey finds many misconceptions and questions around STEM training

February 14, 2023

Six out of ten workers worldwide say they’re in the market for a new job and there is a huge interest in STEM careers. However, there are a lot of questions and misconceptions about the right pathway to attaining those jobs, according to a new survey from IBM and Morning Consult.

“Learners and workers around the world are planning to make a change, with about 60% of respondents looking for a new job in the next 12 months,” says IBM.

Here’s the breakdown.

61% of students and career changers are actively looking for a new job now or plan to within the next year
More than 80% of all respondents have plans to build their skills in the next two years
At least 90% are confident they can develop skills or learn something new from an online program

The biggest misconceptions around switching to in-demand STEM careers is that training is “too expensive, learners don’t know where to start, and don’t know enough about digital credentials,” according to the survey of 14,000 students, career changers, and job seekers in the United States and 15 other countries.

Here’s the breakdown.

61% of respondents think they are not qualified to work in a STEM job because they don’t have the right academic degrees
40% of students say the greatest barrier to professional or technical skill development is that they don’t know where to start
60% of respondents worry that digital credentials may be costly to obtain
Being able to continue to work while earning a credential is particularly important to career changers

The survey was released along with the news of 45 new partners being added to the global IBM SkillsBuild initiative.

The new collaborations will make free online learning widely available, with clear pathways to employment, explains IBM. Many of the organizations they are working with will help “skill women, including mothers returning to the workforce, ethnic minorities, low-income individuals, and refugees.”

“Technology training can have a transformational effect on a person’s life,” says Justina Nixon-Saintil, IBM Chief Impact Officer. “There are many misconceptions about what’s needed to pursue a rewarding and lucrative career in today’s rapidly advancing workplace. This is why we must raise awareness of the breadth of science and technology roles that exist across industries.”

You can read more on the survey and announcement here.

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Dana Beth Ardi

Executive Committee

Dana Beth Ardi, PhD, Executive Committee, is a thought leader and expert in the fields of executive search, talent management, organizational design, assessment, leadership and coaching. As an innovator in the human capital movement, Ardi creates enhanced value in companies by matching the most sought after talent with the best opportunities. Ardi coaches boards and investors on the art and science of building high caliber management teams. She provides them with the necessary skills to seek out and attract top-level management, to design the ideal organizational architectures and to deploy people against strategy. Ardi unearths the way a business works and the most effective way for people to work in them.

Ardi is an experienced business executive and senior consultant who leverages business organizational transformation through talent strategies. She uses her knowledge and experience to develop talent strategies to enhance revenue and profit contributions. She has a deep expertise in change management and organizational effectiveness and has designed and built high performance cultures. Ardi has significant experience in mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, IPO’s and turnarounds.

Ardi is an expert on the multi-generational workforce. She understands the four intersecting generations of workers coming together in contemporary companies, each with their own mindsets, leadership and communications styles, values and motivations. Ardi is sought after to assist companies manage and thrive by bringing the generations together. Her book, Fall of the Alphas: How Beta Leaders Win Through Connection, Collaboration and Influence, will be published by St. Martin’s Press. The book reflects Ardi’s deep expertise in understanding organizations and our changing society. It focuses on building a winning culture, how companies must grow and evolve, and how talent influences and shapes communities of work. This is what she has coined “Corporate Anthropology.” It is a playbook on how modern companies must meet challenges – culturally, globally, digitally, across genders and generations.

Ardi is currently the Managing Director and Founder of Corporate Anthropology Advisors, LLC, a consulting company that provides human capital advisory and innovative solutions to companies building value through people. Corporate Anthropology works with organizations, their cultures, the way they grow and develop, and the people who are responsible for forming their communities of work.

Prior to her position at Corporate Anthropology Advisors, Ardi served as a Partner/Managing Director at the private equity firms CCMP Capital and JPMorgan Partners. She was a partner at Flatiron Partners, a venture capital firm working with early state companies where she pioneered the human capital role within an investment portfolio.

Ardi holds a BS from the State University of New York at Buffalo as well as a Masters degree and PhD from Boston College. She started her career as professor at the Graduate Center at Fordham University in New York.