Networking, security and programming training are most in demand

Networking and operating systems, security and programming training are in the highest demand among technology and developer professionals, according to a Skillsoft research.

The Skillsoft Signals report also revealed that technology professionals prefer micro-learning and that video is their preferred learning modality, followed by books and courses.

The report explores learning consumption data analysis of more than 25 million hours of learning across Skillsoft’s user base of nearly 12 million technology professionals between February 2018 and January 2019.

The report captures the pulse of in-demand technology skills and shifting priorities vital to global organizations. It also provides insight into the specific programs, software, platforms and technical skills that IT professionals are placing emphasis on to stay ahead of the curve.

As organizations move from the classic command-and-control structure with quarterly product releases to a lean, agile model that requires continuous deployment at scale, organizations are increasingly seeking a new breed of enterprise technologist—one that can seamlessly transcend multiple disciplines.

The emergence of SecOps and roles such as Data Scientist demonstrate the growing importance of employees that possess a versatile skill set and are proficient in multiple technologies to ensure that organizations can continually adapt and effectively balance the scale of innovation and security.

Key learning consumption trends from the report include:

• CompTIA dominates security training: CompTIA certification training, which represents four of the five most popular security assets, delivered the most hours of content consumed across the entire Skillsoft Technology & Developer portfolio with 1.65 million hours served or roughly 56 percent of security content served to learners in 2018.
• The explosion of Python: While training for Java remains the most consumed amongst programming languages, learners’ total hours of Python training jumped by 20 percent or nearly 200,000 more hours from 2017 to 2018.
• Certifications are king: Networking & Operating Systems leads in hours of training served at 6.3 million, primarily because of the high number of certification preps. Security certification preps are up by 58 percent YoY while Cloud certification preps are 53 percent ahead of 2017; CompTIA A+, CompTIA Network+, Certified Ethical Hacker, CompTIA Security+ and Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP) are the most popular certifications. Certification prep courses are up by roughly 20 percent across all areas.
• Continual learning is critical to reducing skills gap: As technology rapidly evolves, the half-life of requisite skills is drastically reducing. Further, many new functions, such as DevSecOps, require that employees have a broader skill set than ever before, meaning enterprise technologists and developers must continually focus on up-skilling, re-skilling and pre-skilling. Micro-learning efficiently facilitates continual learning, enabling learners to digest more training content in less time and directly within their flow of work.

“To keep ahead of the unrelenting pace of technology and the quickly diminishing half-life of skills, organizations must invest in upskilling, reskilling and pre-skilling to ensure enterprise technologists and developers attain and maintain the most advanced, modern skill sets,” said Mike Hendrickson, VP, Technology & Developer Products, Skillsoft.

“From our data, it’s clear that most organizations are thinking about skill development and how to continually adapt their current tech stacks, future tech infrastructure and business models given the prevalence of learning activity around CI/CD, DevOps, data, cloud and security topics.”