Authored by on Friday, Nov 20, 2015
Shout out to Tech Crunch's Baron Schwartz, a voice joined recently into the growing chorus calling for a breakthrough in developing talent to grow our tech-based economy. In his November 6th piece, The Tech Talent Shortage Is a Lie, Schwartz points out that the term "talent" refers not to people who are fully trained and ready-to-be-hired, but to people with the aptitude and potential, who nevertheless need traning.
"Who should be responsible for developing talent? On one side, we have enthusiastic, curious people without much experience. On another, we have employers who want experienced people but don’t want to invest in the training themselves. And between them, we have colleges that offer students educational groundwork in computer science but don’t want to transform into coding trade schools."
Annmarie Lanesey has taken on the cause of establishing a coding program that fits the needs of Tech Valley employers and its underemployed populations. Since late 2014 she has been convening people and organizations, gathering information, and building bridges throughout the Capital Region toward that goal. Stay tuned to this blog as we share some fruits of that effort in the coming months.