Data expertise is now a highly coveted skill in businesses of all sizes, with many organisations employing entire teams to manage the vast volumes of data they handle to create meaningful insights and models that power decisions and digital products.
However, despite being worth up to £73.3 billion to the economy, the UK’s data industry does face a recruitment crisis. Research from the Department for Digital, Culture, Media, and Sport in 2021 found that almost half of businesses (48%) are recruiting for roles that require hard data skills, but many (46%) have struggled to recruit for these roles in the previous two years. It’s estimated that there are around 234,000 unfilled roles requiring data skills.
