Business and finance among most valuable career skills

Research from global recruitment firm Michael Page has revealed skills that workers and recruiters believe are the most valuable to careers in 2018. Finance and business skills both make the list.

The research surveyed 1,196 British workers and 240 recruiters.

Awareness  

Workers and recruiters have very different opinions on business and finance skills, with 69 per cent of recruiters believing commercial awareness (i.e. financial acumen and awareness) is important for career development in 2018. This is compared to just 17 per cent of worker respondents.

A number of other key business skills were found to be underrated by workers. These included stakeholder management, which was cited as a valuable skill by 55 per cent of recruiters and just 12 per cent of workers.

Being able to calculate and communicate return on investment, was cited by 33 per cent of recruiters and 7 per cent of workers.

Strategy and change was also cited as a top core business skill by 42 per cent of recruiters and 20 per cent of workers.

Reminder

Commenting on the study, Personal Career Management Managing Director Corinne Mills said: “Ultimately, recruiting staff is a business decision and this survey is a useful reminder to candidates that they are more likely to be appointed if they are attuned to an organisation’s business imperatives, and have the commercial skills to succeed.”