neelie kroes calls for closing digital skills gap at the wef in davos - randstad supports pledge for digital job creation in europe.

Randstad Holding nv fully supports the pledge to close the digital skills gap in Europe as made today by Neelie Kroes, Commissioner for the Digital Agenda and Vice-President of the European Commission, at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.



Randstad is an advisor of the Grand Coalition for digital job creation, an EU-wide partnership targeted at addressing mismatches and filling vacancies of IT practitioners to boost employment. Ben Noteboom, CEO of Randstad emphasizes: "We recognize the ever-growing scarcity of IT skills across Europe, a challenge that our clients are facing on a daily basis. We pledge our expertise in IT recruitment to ensure every open IT vacancy and potential candidate will get full exposure to available opportunities. We look forward to supporting the digital agenda and most importantly increasing employment in IT. This will be an ongoing commitment for the EC's 2020 road map and beyond."



The Randstad pledge to the digital agenda is as follows:



* Promote IT vacancies to academics via local Randstad job and career events, putting emphasis on the number of IT jobs and providing information on the opportunities available. At such events we will promote the digital agenda and available resources of the Grand Coalition;



* Support IT professionals by widening our job search to similar type of IT positions that could be of interest and raise the awareness of the benefits of updating their skills and certifications;



* When our professional IT recruiters identify skill gaps with candidates, we can direct them to the recommended support associations to further attain certifications and new skills. Timing of job fulfillment will be key. This is where Randstad's job fit, boss fit, company fit processes will support;



* Support mobility among the EU Member States and its companies; we can identify countries where IT skills are in demand and countries where IT skills might potentially be in supply and available to transfer to these countries;



* Leverage existing knowledge in IT recruitment from other parts of the world, for example the USA where we have a large exposure to the IT market;



* Continue and expand the use of the Randstad global vacancy database to provide input to the European Commission's DG for Employment, Social Affairs & Inclusion and other stakeholders.



For more information on the European Grand Coalition for digital job creation, please visit the EC website.