Event to match local employers and students

A109 Light Utility Helicopter flight with mayor Gisborne City from the air in November 2023.

WITH more and more unskilled jobs being filled by robots and computers, digital expertise is becoming increasingly important for both job-seekers and the companies looking to employ them.

The Gisborne Chamber of Commerce hopes to get ahead of these challenges later this month when it plays match-maker between local employers and Eastern Institute of Technology students.

“Numerous studies show how crucial education is to the future economic performance of a region,” says Gisborne Chamber of Commerce marketing manager Suzanne Winterflood.

“The Gisborne Chamber works with a number of educational organisations across the East Coast, from schools to EIT. We facilitated Activate Tairawhiti’s VFX workshop that was attended by a number of digital-savvy high school students, and arranged for literacy advocate and education expert Dame Wendy Pye to talk at the Eastland Group Innovation & Inspiration Speaker Series.

“Now we’re partnering with EIT on a unique evening for students and potential employers.

“Representatives from 10 key local organisations — in industries as diverse as hospitality, digital, financial, government, health, media and infrastructure — will come along to EIT on September 23 and talk to students.

“They will cover the kinds of roles their organisations and industries offer, their company ethos, and what they look for in employees. In return, the students will have the opportunity to network with the businesspeople who may employ them in the future, learn about the potential jobs available on the East Coast and hand over their CVs.

“The idea is to show students who have invested in further education that they can have a career right here . . . and to show employers the levels of education and skillsets available to them locally.”

Activate Tairawhiti chief executive Steve Breen said changing demographics meant employers would be chasing a smaller number of people to work for them in future, but it would not be enough to “simply be young” to get a job.

“The nature of work is changing, with increasing mechanisation and a growing amount of unskilled work being carried out by robotics. Therefore a young person needs to develop skills that will make them attractive to an employer. This includes a growing demand for computer/digital skills such as programming and software development.

“These skills take time and applied effort to develop. The best time to acquire these skills is while a young person is still at school, where they have access to knowledge and a supportive learning environment. They can develop a core set of skills at relatively low cost that will be of value to an employer.

“Once in work the opportunity to specialise and earn a higher level of income becomes more readily available.”

The MindLab by Unitec Gisborne education director Tim Gander said the needs of employers were already changing, and it was important for education to adapt to those changes.

“The jobs that require people to follow simple instructions and process low-level tasks are now becoming automated by powerful machines, so we need to diversify our approach to teaching and learning to encourage these skills and attributes which are unique to humans.

“It is difficult to find an area of employment that does not involve any form of digital technology to maximise productivity or communication.

“It is extremely important that we address this transition to digital now, rather than saying it is ‘the future’ — it is happening in all occupations today and employers are looking for a different set of skills. Therefore it is essential that we embrace digital technology in our approach to teaching, learning and sharing.”