Speaker 1: You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and
Speaker 1: Tim Stenebek on Bloomberg Radio. We're going to turn our
Speaker 1: attention to COP twenty eight as ENVO envoys representing more
Speaker 1: than one hundred and ninety nations are gathering in Dubai
Speaker 1: this week for the UN's annual Climate Change Conference. The
Speaker 1: summit did get underway today and just among those issues
Speaker 1: green hiring. I didn't know, but yeah, I guess it
Speaker 1: makes sense.
Speaker 2: This is a thing, Carol.
Speaker 1: Right, businesses are hiring, are using green hiring to recruit
Speaker 1: hire environmentally friendly employees, Companies looking to seek initiatives to
Speaker 1: transform sustainability and climate change. And I guess they want
Speaker 1: a certain type of worker.
Speaker 2: That's true. And there's another issue emerging in this and
Speaker 2: it's called green ceiling, Carols. So where nine to ten
Speaker 2: women lack a single green skill or green work experience
Speaker 2: according to some data from LinkedIn. So even the women
Speaker 2: are joining the green talent ranks at a faster rate
Speaker 2: than men, progress isn't as close enough when it comes
Speaker 2: to the gender in these skills.
Speaker 1: For story we've heard before, all right, So joining us
Speaker 1: now is some depth on the subject to Sue Duke.
Speaker 1: She's vice president of Global public Policy and Economic graph
Speaker 1: over at LinkedIn. She does us on Zoom from Dublin, Ireland.
Speaker 1: I'm so great to have you here with us, Sue,
Speaker 1: how are you and talk to us a little bit
Speaker 1: about green skills and green hiring.
Speaker 3: It's great to be here. Thank you so much for
Speaker 3: having me. Workers going green and jobs going green has
Speaker 3: been a very consistent and growing trend on our platform,
Speaker 3: and over the past year, even while hiring in the
Speaker 3: broader economy has slowed down, we've continued to see that
Speaker 3: trend speed right up, as workers with green skills are
Speaker 3: in demand and being hired at a much higher rate
Speaker 3: than workers who don't.
Speaker 1: Can you tell me what green skills are? Though? Go
Speaker 1: take a step back for me, because I'm like, what
Speaker 1: is Why are those different than your skills in general?
Speaker 3: Great question. A green skill is a skill that's either
Speaker 3: taking pollution out of the environment or conserving natural resources.
Speaker 3: So think of a skill like sustainable design. That's a
Speaker 3: great example. Sustainable design is a skill that's being used
Speaker 3: across a whole host of green jobs, but it's also
Speaker 3: a skill that we see showing off in a host
Speaker 3: of traditional jobs. It's being used by construction workers, interior designers,
Speaker 3: park managers. So we see these green skills that are
Speaker 3: focused on making economic activities more sustainable being used not
Speaker 3: just in green jobs per se, but in a whole
Speaker 3: host of traditional jobs as well.
Speaker 2: So how do you actually acquire green skills?
Speaker 3: What we are seeing, as you said, is that workers
Speaker 3: moving into this space typically have some kind of green
Speaker 3: experience or green skill. Often they're coming from a stem
Speaker 3: background of science, technology, engineering, or maths background. And that's,
Speaker 3: of course because a lot of the green economy is
Speaker 3: focused on the fundamentals of maths and science. What we
Speaker 3: need is to help workers acquire these skills. And what
Speaker 3: that means is that we need governments, companies, and workers
Speaker 3: all coming together to invest in and expand green upskilling
Speaker 3: and reskilling programs so that workers are getting these skills,
Speaker 3: acquiring these skills, and applying these skills across all industries
Speaker 3: across the country.
Speaker 1: Hey, Sue, give you an idea. You know, I love
Speaker 1: you know LinkedIn. There is so much data and information
Speaker 1: that I'm sure you guys see on a regular basis,
Speaker 1: on a daily basis, So when it comes to green
Speaker 1: jobs in general, I'm curious. Can you give me an
Speaker 1: idea of how many jobs that are posted or that
Speaker 1: you see, or that you see talked about or people
Speaker 1: with profiles, how much is actually somehow connected to the
Speaker 1: green economy.
Speaker 3: What we see is that the green economy, so the
Speaker 3: green renewable energy economy, that is growing very, very significantly.
Speaker 3: So we have seen that renewable energy sector grow its
Speaker 3: share of workers over twenty six percent in over the
Speaker 3: twenty six countries that we've studied for this particular report
Speaker 3: over the past number of years. So growth there is
Speaker 3: very very strong, very sustained, and we fully expect that
Speaker 3: to continue. There is then the rest of the economy,
Speaker 3: and that is also a space that needs to transition
Speaker 3: to net zero. And what we see there, in fact,
Speaker 3: is that the vast, vast majority of green skills showing
Speaker 3: up out there are concentrated in those sectors everything from
Speaker 3: construction to utilities, to manufacturing to retail. That's where we
Speaker 3: see these green skills popping up. But that's also where
Speaker 3: we see the skills shortage. Right. We continue to see
Speaker 3: companies in every sector and in every country in the
Speaker 3: world at a disadvantage when it comes to being able
Speaker 3: to recruit the skills that they need to power this transition.
Speaker 2: Well, you talk about a disadvantage, and we mentioned earlier
Speaker 2: the green ceiling, why is it that women also have
Speaker 2: an issue also in this particular corner of the market
Speaker 2: when it comes to this kind of gender skills gap.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you're absolutely right. We see a very significant gender
Speaker 3: gap opening up when it comes to this transition, and
Speaker 3: just as worrying, we're actually seeing that gap grow over
Speaker 3: the past number of years. We look at when it
Speaker 3: is that workers are transitioning into these kind of roles,
Speaker 3: and one of the drivers for this gap is that often,
Speaker 3: as I said, workers are coming from a stem from science, technology,
Speaker 3: engineering and maths background, and women has been well done
Speaker 3: documented are often on the back foot and are there
Speaker 3: a low representation when in those careers. Then we're seeing
Speaker 3: that flow through to these green jobs. And the second
Speaker 3: piece goes back to the green economy, those green renewable
Speaker 3: energy economy that you spoke to, and they're once again
Speaker 3: women are on the back foot and have historically been
Speaker 3: very strongly underrepresented in those kind of industries. So there's
Speaker 3: a big gap to be made up there as well.
Speaker 1: Wait, so help me out. So is it just a
Speaker 1: case of women are not getting the education in the skills,
Speaker 1: or is it they're not learning on the job. What
Speaker 1: is it that is creating that gap? Does it start
Speaker 1: with education? And not enough women still in STEM, which
Speaker 1: we talk a lot about here at Bloomberg.
Speaker 3: That's certainly part of the driver that workers with the
Speaker 3: background and STEM are finding it much easier to transition
Speaker 3: into these roles, and therefore women who have a low
Speaker 3: representation in those kind of backgrounds, in turn, are finding
Speaker 3: it more difficult to transition into the green economy. But
Speaker 3: it's also exactly as you say, it comes back to
Speaker 3: this green skills issues, both for men and for women.
Speaker 3: We have got to start investing in these reskilling and
Speaker 3: up skilling programs so that we're equipping both men and
Speaker 3: women with these in demand green skills so that we
Speaker 3: can plug this gap and get to grip with this
Speaker 3: mismatch in green skills that's out there and growing all
Speaker 3: the time.
Speaker 1: One thing I want to ask you, Sue, I do
Speaker 1: wonder STEM, stems and demand. Right, we talk about every
Speaker 1: company is a technology company, right, They've got data, they've
Speaker 1: got to parsit, they've got you know, a lot of
Speaker 1: technological systems that they've got to maintain. But having said that,
Speaker 1: does the green industry not pay as well as maybe
Speaker 1: a worker that goes to Silicon Valley or a big
Speaker 1: tech company or a big financial firm.
Speaker 3: What we see very clearly is that workers with green
Speaker 3: skills are getting hired at a higher rate than workers
Speaker 3: who don't. So all the indications are that acquiring these
Speaker 3: green skills are going to be very good for your
Speaker 3: future career, for your future employability, and of course it's
Speaker 3: for the planet.
Speaker 1: But my point is that they're getting what they need
Speaker 1: is a STEM background, right. A STEM background is also
Speaker 1: what is desired by almost every company, right because they're
Speaker 1: technology companies. They need data people, they need people who
Speaker 1: understand math technology. So I'm just wondering, are the workers
Speaker 1: that are needed for the green economy getting rude to
Speaker 1: go elsewhere where they are getting they're making more money.
Speaker 3: Basically, there is certainly challenges in attracting talent into this space,
Speaker 3: but I think what we're increasingly seeing are these growing
Speaker 3: opportunities in this space. Right, This huge demand is out
Speaker 3: there growing all the time, and we will increasingly see
Speaker 3: workers taking up these opportunities as companies go out to
Speaker 3: find this talent and develop and nurture it in these industries.
Speaker 1: It just sounds like demand is certainly out there, whether
Speaker 1: it's in certainly the green world and the greene como
Speaker 1: me Hey, Sue Duke, thank you so much, Vice president
Speaker 1: of Global Public Policy and Economic graph at LinkedIn, joining
Speaker 1: us on Zoom from Dublin, Ireland. This, of course is
Speaker 1: COP twenty eight is underway. We're gonna have a little
Speaker 1: bit more conversations. I think you know STEM in general, right,
Speaker 1: just so in demand.
Speaker 2: It is, especially when you're thinking about technology, the growth
Speaker 2: and then the type of jobs that feed into it.
Speaker 2: But it's interesting when she talked about how not enough
Speaker 2: women in STELL and how that translates when you are
Speaker 2: looking at this green ceiling she's talking about.
Speaker 1: I heard it before