The sense of urgency is clear. Having basic e-skills is crucial. The results of a European study released by International Data Corporation (IDC) and Microsoft Corporation revealed that 90 per cent of all jobs will require ICT (information and communication technology) skills in five years’ time. Microsoft Europe chairman Jan Muehlfeit and Microsoft Malta country manager Pierre Mallia told this newspaper in an interview with Francesca Vella that it is extremely important to act fast and bring more and more people into e-skills programmes

Earlier this week Microsoft Malta announced it will be investing €85,000 to upgrade 140 computers at its community technology centres, and another €40,000 to translate its Digital Literacy Curriculum programme into Maltese.

Microsoft Malta, as Mr Mallia pointed out, is not a standalone organisation. Rather, it is an important player that enables development.

“We firmly believe in partnership. We are an organisation that can help join the dots. In the years to come, as the nature of employment changes, Microsoft Malta will be an active player in providing assistance and guidance to prepare people for new jobs.”

Microsoft’s entire business model is built on partnership; in Malta alone, the organisation has 120 partners, and these include schools, the university, and the Malta College of Arts, Science and Technology (Mcast), among others.

One of the key challenges that the country faces is being able to supply the right profile of people for emerging niche industries such as digital game development.

Mr Mallia explained: “I’m not referring to the gaming industry, but the development of video game consoles for instance. In this regard, we will be running a summer camp in partnership with the university. We would like to try stimulating awareness, first with educators, then with students, to start creating a small pool of skills in this niche sector”.

Microsoft Malta has been seeking to target e-skills programmes towards different segments of society. The Digital Literacy Curriculum teaches basic ICT skills to unemployed people; DreamSpark offers students free access to a broad range of Microsoft technologies; and BizSpark helps those who want to start up their own business by connecting them with financial partners and offering them market support.

Largely, said Mr Mallia, most of the Microsoft programmes have been made available to the public on a voluntary basis.

“But this needs to change given the new economic realities we’re faced with in Europe. There needs to be a wake-up call in Europe and even in Malta to some degree. We need to increase the sense of urgency and get more people into e-skills programmes.”

He mentioned in particular the ageing population, the increasing migration of traditional jobs to the emerging economies (such as India and China).

In Denmark, if you lose your job, you’re given a substantial amount of dole money with the proviso that you get yourself enrolled in a re-skilling programme.

Mr Muehlfeit said that what’s particularly interesting about Denmark is that because they use this model, people are very flexible.

A survey had found that about 80 per cent of the Danish population supports globalisation because they are skilled and therefore have a flexible mindset. In contrast, said Mr Muehlfeit, only 38 per cent of the German population supports globalisation.

“In Denmark they don’t protect jobs, they protect employment and employability. If you protect jobs, chances are that you are protecting jobs from the last century.”

On the one hand, Mr Muehlfeit spoke about the importance of equipping everyone with basic ICT skills. Narrowing the e-skills gap will avoid the creation of tension between the older and younger generation.

But it is not just that. Skills and e-skills in particular are very important for the future of Europe, said Mr Muehlfeit, adding that whatever will be possible to automate in the next five years will be automated.

Having a profession for life is an old concept, said the Microsoft Europe chairman. He himself is a software engineer by profession, but at 48, he says that he is learning all the time.

“We need to create a sense of curiosity in students. We need to show them the importance of learning all the time. I don’t think people in general in Europe are ready for that model.

“We have this heavy social model, but unless we increase productivity, that model won’t survive. There are a lot of things that need to happen, but creating a sense of urgency is crucial.”

Mr Muehlfeit explained that nowadays, people don’t simply compete on the basis of products, services, financial markets and the likes; today people compete globally and they compete for jobs, and that is precisely why skills in general and e-skills are so important.

“What we’re facing is because of global connectivity. Because we’re competing for jobs, young people need to be flexible. Take a factory with assembly lines, unless you introduce research and development, those jobs will disappear very soon. It’s all about well educated and skilled people.”

Speaking about Malta, he said it should keep its own talent, but also attract talent from abroad.

People in most Asian countries are hungry for knowledge and education and they really work very, very hard.

“We need to open the minds of students in Europe… Malta’s huge advantage is that English is widely spoken. How come you don’t have more international students at the University of Malta? Having students from different countries here will create healthy competition.

“If it were for me I wouldn’t talk about ICT anymore, but about enabling technologies. What I see is a huge opportunity with Cloud computing, which brings ICT capabilities (software, infrastructure, application platforms) to the end users on a pay per use basis.”

Mr Muehlfeit said that traditional businesses will not change, but it is the way we do business that will change. A small business can go global in a short period of time; all you need is an idea and a computer, you don’t need to have that much start-up money.

Turning to education, Mr Muehlfeit said technology can change education, making it more inclusive and specific to individual students’ needs.

To unlock human potential in children you need to figure out their talents and strengths. Based on that, you can then use interactive learning and technology that enables you to use more senses in the learning process.

Mr Muehlfeit explained: “You need to educate the educators and then change the whole system, and if you don’t do it in five years, kids will stop listening to teachers”.

He mentioned a teacher who worked at a Munich school who was very tough with students, and yet she was the most popular teacher.

When he asked her how come she is so popular, she said: “Each and every child is a genius; you just need to figure out where the genius is”. Based on that concept, she has opened four international schools, he said.