White Paper

We don’t have to reinvent skills training models. Public, private and non-profit sectors can work together, and draw from international experience.

The rise of income inequality in advanced economies has generated serious debate and academic research, with much of the recent attention focused on the increasing concentration of wealth in the richest segments of the population. In this report, the McKinsey Global Institute has approached the issue of inequality from a different perspective by examining the share of the population whose incomes have stopped advancing when compared to people in the past with similar incomes or demographic profiles. This is an aspect of inequality that has received relatively little attention, perhaps because prior to the 2008 financial crisis less than 2 percent of households in advanced economies were worse off than similar households in previous years. That has now changed: two-thirds of households in the United States and Western Europe were in segments of the income distribution whose real market incomes in 2014 were flat or had fallen compared with 2005. In this research we set out to quantify the proportion of households in advanced economies with flat or falling incomes. We try to understand how much the recession and slow recovery since the financial crisis were the primary causes, and how much is attributable to other long-run forces. Finally, to help inform a debate, we catalog interventions that have been used around the world to address the problem and that could become part of a societal agenda to overcome the issue.

To make our innovation economy more inclusive we must better map workers’ skills and employers’ needs and enable people to gain future-relevant skills.

This report presents the final results of the study Comprehensive analysis of emerging competences and economic activities in the European Union in the electricity, gas, water and waste sector. The report is part of a series of sixteen future-oriented sector studies on innovation, skills and jobs under the same heading, commissioned by the European Commission (DG Employment, Social Affairs and Equal Opportunities). Eleven of these studies were executed by a core consortium led by TNO (Netherlands Organization for Applied Scientific Research) and consisting of TNO Innovation Policy group (Leiden, the Netherlands), TNO Labour (Hoofddorp, the Netherlands), TNO Innovation and Environment (Delft, the Netherlands, SEOR Erasmus University (Rotterdam, the Netherlands) and ZSI (Centre for Social Innovation, Vienna, Austria). The core consortium was in charge of the overall management of the study, the further elaboration and application of the overall approach and methodology, as well as data collection and analysis (see annex 1 for team composition).

Our strong skills (NCF) is a tool for recognizing and valuing generic skills. This tool is based on a group facilitation approach. It is aimed at adults of all ages and in all conditions and allows them to make three formal learning: know how to recognize strong generic skills; know how to recognize strong generic skills in others; recognize generic skills useful in work situations.

This set of Appendices sets out two supply chain case studies that fed into the study on Maximising employment and skills in the offshore wind energy sector supply chain. The main report is available separately to this set of Appendices and incorporates the main findings from the supply chain case studies. This first Appendix introduces the supply chain case studies, setting out: • the purpose of the case studies; • case study selection; • methods for undertaking the case studies; and • reporting structure for the case studies

In summary, this report is a technical paper describing the complex matching procedure that we have undertaken between the O*NET and UK SOC. It examines the feasibility of matching US and UK occupations, and includes an evaluation of the quality of the matching and some assessment of the sensitivity of the resulting profiles to the various assumptions that are necessarily made at different stages of the process. We also provide some examples of the occupational skills profiles that can be constructed, and compare these profiles with some other extant measures of job skills and activities in order to provide some assessment of the validity of the methodology that we have developed.

The offshore wind energy sector has been identified as having the potential for employment growth in the next decade. This study is intended to explore the extent and nature of that employment growth and implications for government, employers and other stakeholders in light of current spending and policy priorities. In particular the research explores the role that skills demand and supply may play in helping the sector achieve its full potential; and the lessons for other emerging sectors that might help to rebalance the UK economy1 • risks to making the most of the employment opportunities afforded by offshore wind energy generation; and . The study’s aims were to identify: • responses to those risks and potential actions that could be taken by government, industry, firms, individuals and providers of education and training to make the most of the offshore wind energy sector’s employment and skills potential. The first phase of the research comprised a wide-ranging literature review on the public policy environment and the offshore wind energy sector, including previous research on employment forecasts, and a series of bilateral consultations with employers, training providers and other stakeholders in the sector. The findings of this initial phase were analysed and synthesised for calibration at two policy-workshops, which were also used to discuss potential actions on skills issues. Two in-depth supply chain case studies were conducted on existing offshore wind farms to draw out learning, practice and observations for the future. In preparing the final report, the study also drew on the latest employment forecasts for the sector.

Up to now, diversity initiatives have focused primarily on fairness for legally protected populations. But organizations now have an opportunity to harness a more powerful and nuanced kind of diversity: diversity of thought. Advances in neurological research that are untangling how each of us thinks and solves problems can help organizations, including governments, operationalize diversity of thought and eventually change how they define and harness human capital.