With the digital economy growing at a phenomenal rate, the first White Collar Coding Challenge for business leaders in the Channel Islands launches this spring.
With more people working in technology jobs in the south east of England than in California, and London the ‘app’ capital of Europe, the Channel Islands are ideally placed to take advantage of this growth. However, the digital sector faces a skills gap. The EU estimates that by 2020 there will be up to 1.3 million jobs unfilled due to the lack of relevant skills.
According to Richard Rolfe a former award winning head teacher, ‘Our reliance on computers has grown exponentially and so it’s really important that we also understand them. We’re not expecting people to start becoming coding wizards, what we are aiming to do is give business leaders the confidence to make informed strategic decisions about how technology is used in their company and help them understand the business opportunities open to them in the digital economy.’
KPMG in Jersey & Guernsey have put several staff through training with Richard Rolfe and Jordan Love who have co-founded a digital business called CodexDLD. KPMG Managing Director and former Chairman of the Jersey IOD, Jason Laity, says developing an understanding of the digital revolution is critical so that businesses can consider how to be a part of it, ‘Developing an awareness of areas such as building web-sites or apps gives people the confidence to begin engaging in digital conversations, and also enhances valuable problem solving and logic skills. We have to get people to “think digital” and education and training are a part of that process. Lots of today’s coders are self-taught but the rest of us need teaching’.
The White Collar Coding Challenge will consist of a team of five participants who, during the course of one day, will learn how to build a web app, style it and then upload it for the world to see. There will be a maximum of ten people per day.
Jordan Love, an EU code week Ambassador, says people shouldn’t be afraid to give it a go, ‘Lots of people think digital is only for the young, or that coding is going to be too complicated, but I’ve trained lots of older people who had absolutely no prior knowledge and they’ve loved it. White Collar Coding is about breaking down the barriers, showing everyone that anyone can learn to code and understand our digital world.’
The first White Collar Coding training will take place in February with more dates available in March and April. For further information visit: www.whitecollarcoding.com
