Improving Hiring, Retention, Engagement & Skill Development in AEC

Hiring, Retention & Related Challenges in the AEC Industry 

With the ongoing retirement of the Baby Boomers, the COVID-19 pandemic, the increasingly technical (and digital) nature of work, and the so-called “Great Resignation” of 2022, many employers are faced with skills gaps, problems attracting and hiring top (and especially skilled) job candidates, employee engagement retention problems, and problems with upskilling and reskilling members of their existing workforce. 

That’s the case in many sectors of the American economy, and it’s certainly true in the Architecture, Engineering & Construction (AEC) industry as well. It seems nobody can dodge these issues.

Here are a few statistics we shared in the webinar: 

• On average, it takes 45 days and costs $4,000 to hire a new employee 
• It takes 12 weeks to get a new hire up to full productivity 
• 15% of newly hired employees quit within three months 
• 55% of workers are currently planning to look for a new job next year 
• Only 34% of workers are engaged at work 

Poll Results

In our webinars, we always do some live polls of webinar registrants to learn more from our listeners, and these are always fascinating.

In our first poll question, we asked the attendees what the current situation was at their organization with training for Autodesk products. We had an even split, with 50% saying they currently had no Autodesk training and 50% saying their situation was perfect.

In our second poll question, we asked what the attendee’s organizations were struggling with most. We had close to a three-way tie for first, with roughly 1/3 of attendees saying hiring qualified, skilled workers was their biggest problem, another 1/3 saying upskilling employees throughout their entire career was the biggest problem, and yet another 1/3 saying keeping employees engaged and retaining them was their biggest problem. 

How Online Autodesk Training for AEC Can Improve those Hiring, Retention, Engagement & Upskilling Issues 

Let’s face it, the issues revolving around hiring, retention, engagement, and job skills in the AEC industry aren’t just complicated, they’re complex. They’re not simple issues with a single solution, they’re systems issues that need consideration from a wider perspective, such as human performance improvement (HPI). 

But surely, one part of the solution can be providing job training and continuing education opportunities to workers. Workers value these opportunities because it helps them develop new skills, stay relevant in a changing job market, continue working at a competent level within their current job, and helps them along their desired career path within your organization, performing increasingly responsible work and receiving according higher pay (and greater job satisfaction) as a result.

Simply put, providing job training and continuing education to your workers gives your organization a competitive advantage in the talent-attraction race with your competitors, and if you’ve not offering these perks, your job candidates and current employees will go to an organization that is.

Help with Hiring Qualified Job Candidates: Pre-Hire Skills Assessment

To begin this section of the webinar, which deals with using the Vector Solutions online Autodesk training tools to more effectively hire qualified job candidates with the job skills your organization needs, we learned that one in three people admit that they’ve “fudged” or falsified their resume.

So trust but verify, and that’s where the Pre-Hire Assessment component of our Autodesk training packet comes in handy. This tool allows you to build a skills-based assessment that’s specific to the job role you’re hiring for and then ask candidates to complete the assessment as part of the job application process. This is also helpful to the job applicant, because it lets them know how well prepared they are for the job and gives them an idea of how successful they might be if hired. 

Help with Onboarding New Hires Quickly, Efficiently, and Effectively

Next, we can move our attention to onboarding a newly hired employee. The great thing here is the employer can use the results of the new hires pre-hire skill assessment to create a custom, personalized learning path that fits the new employees learning needs and is designed to help the employee succeed in his or her new job role.

This allows the new worker to close the skill gap quickly and greatly reduces the amount of time it takes the new hire to begin working at the required productivity level.

This is a win/win, because the employer wants to speed up the new hire’s progression to competence, and the employee wants to feel supported on the job. 

For more general information about employee onboarding programs, please see our Better Employee Onboarding recorded webinar and Better Employee Onboarding blog article. 

Help Upskilling & Reskilling Workers Throughout their Career Progression

Of course, your employee’s professional development needs aren’t over when new employee onboarding is completed. Instead, they need to continually learn new programs and new functionality all the time to develop autonomy, mastery, and purpose (the secrets of a motivated employee). And this is even more true in today’s highly technical workplace. 

Our in-application learning program, called Assist, gives the worker performance assistance right in the application as they work, providing necessary reminders and skill development opportunities at the moment and time of need. As the webinar explains, this helps keep workers productive and billable.

You may find the following related articles of interest as well:

• How COVID Gave L&D an Opportunity to Assist with Upskilling & Reskilling
• The Increasing Importance of Upskilling
• The Continued Importance of Reskilling

Help Retaining Employees Through Employee Career Life Cycle 

As you’d expect, making an investment to support your workers by providing online Autodesk training products like these will help your organization retain your workers longer—and avoid the high expenses of having to recruit, hire, and re-train new workers. 

Product Demo: Online Autodesk Training for AEC Industries 

The webinar does include a short product demo. The best way to learn more about that is to register for the webinar and watch & listen. The demo begins at around 9:00 and continues until about 23:30. 

Online Job Training & Continuing Education Offered by Vector Solutions 

Last but not least, we briefly explained the offerings from Vector Solutions for AEC job training and continuing education. These include a learning management system (LMS) for managing your training & continuing education; online job training courses; accredited continuing education courses to keep AEC licenses and certifications current; licensing & certification management services, and more.

Just contact us if you’d like to learn more, whether it’s to just ask a question or two, set up a demo or preview, or whatever’s on your mind.