McKinsey’s ‘Education to Employment’ Report Highlights EMSI’s Career Coach

You know about the supposed shortage of skilled workers that employers grouse about. You know about the shortage of jobs that many laid-off workers are quick to mention. And in a new report, McKinsey sheds light on what it calls another critical shortage: a dearth of hard data on the skills gap and successful education-to-employment programs.

The report, “Education to Employment: Designing a System that Works,” focuses on the conundrum of high levels of youth unemployment worldwide and a shortage of jobseekers with critical skills.

McKinsey’s report presents case studies of education-to-employment programs that work, and in the third chapter, details the key facets that a successful system should include. One element tied to success is collecting and disseminating good data, particularly information on “career options and training pathways.” On this point, McKinsey mentions Career Coach, a tool from EMSI that helps colleges communicate with students and potential students about careers and the local labor market:

Collect, package, and push good information about career options and training pathways: Young people need to be able to make informed choices about their career and education. In some cases, this may simply be a matter of aggregating data that already exist but are scattered among different sites. In the United States, Economic Modeling Specialists International has developed a Web-based program, Career Coach, that aggregates data from 90 federal, state, and private data sources, including the Department of Labor, the Census Bureau, and Indeed.com (a job-listings site). This database can provide timely information on local employment (job seekers can set a search radius) such as current and projected job openings, estimated earnings, and specific educational programs that will prepare an individual for a given occupation. Education providers can purchase access for their students to this database on a subscription basis.