Southeast Asia faces major skills gap in talent crunch

Southeast Asia is facing a growing skills gap amid robust growth in investments, according to Swiss staffing giant The Adecco Group.

The CEO of The Adecco Group, Alain Dehaze, said Southeast Asia faces a workforce crunch in many sectors, especially in information technology, digital, healthcare, analytics, automation, and robotics.

Furthermore, skilled talents in the region are much less mobile than their counterparts elsewhere.

Dehaze stressed that investing in human capital, as well as financial capital, are among the drivers of economic growth and that “companies need to adopt progressive HR practices to integrate multi-generations at work, and to leverage workforce flexibility through a mix of contingent, freelance and open-ended contracts.”

Additionally, companies need to take a more data-driven approach to talent management.

According to Dehaze, “some countries in Southeast Asia, such as Thailand, need greater cooperation between governments, academia and businesses.”

This is to “ensure that the right skills needed in the workplace are being taught by the academic institutions.”