Member Article

Can the North East retain more tech talent?

One of the biggest challenges the North East tech sector faces is sourcing, training and retaining talent for the tech sector. It is one of the region’s key growth sectors, and yet without a strong talent pipeline that growth will slow, causing us to lose out to other regions of the UK.

According to research, technology companies employ over 34,000 in the north. This is up from 25,000 in 2013, based on a report by Lord Adonis.

The third Harvey Nash Technology Survey in 2014 reported that 35% business owners are already experiencing a skills shortage. There simply is not enough developers. Finding a skilled developer can turn a great product into a world class product.

Attempts to fix the talent pipeline

Tees Valley’s largest employer of digital economy workers, Visualsoft, an e-commerce firm, needed to open a London office and launch an academy style training course at a local higher education college to safeguard their own talent pipeline.

Paul Callaghan CBE, Chairman of Leighton Group, had the same problem ten years ago. At one point, his solution was to open an office in Ontario, Canada, just to ensure they had enough talent for their client projects. He told The Guardian that “Universities were creating graduates, but they were all being attracted to the south. The University of Sunderland was, at that point, one of the major suppliers for Microsoft down in Reading.”

For young professionals and entrepreneurs, the North East has a major advantage over London: cost of living is 40% cheaper up here.

And yet, as Paul Lancaster of Sage UK pointed out in a BuzzFeed article, “Too many people, particularly young people, still believe that they have to move outside the region — London being the obvious example — to find ‘a good job’ and forge a career.”

Competing against London?

London will always be an attractive city for smart, hard-working, ambitious young men and women. It’s one of the strongest economies, most diverse, most interesting cities in the world; it has been this way for centuries.

The North East has its own pace, rhythm and lifestyle, which appeals to some, but not to others. No city or region can force people to stay.

This region simply has to keep doing what it has been doing this past decade: keep building, investing, shipping code, training the next generation, supporting startups, and once in a while, shouting about its successes.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Benjamin Kerry .