National internship service discovery research report - May 2024
In late 2023, MBIE engaged Summer of Tech to carry out a discovery project, to research, engage and work with different players/roles in the tech skills system to uncover and define requirements for a nationwide internship service as a way to address the tech skills shortage in New Zealand.
Here’s a link to download the background, insights and recommendations:
For a copy of the full report, including research methodology and findings, please contact us.
Insights summary
This research confirmed and validated the need for the country to have nationwide service for tech internships. The most pivotal learning from the research is those who play a role in the tech talent system or skills pipeline, are driven by economic factors and business objectives. The needs of learners going into industry, for their first tech jobs as interns, are not aligned with business needs.
As an industry, Tech has a huge potential not only to put New Zealand on the map, but to generate economic value. The Tech industry generated $20B of GDP in 2022 alone. We need to create a strong pipeline of talent to fuel the continued growth of the Tech industry to help drive New Zealand forward.
But such an internship service on its own cannot succeed without addressing the whole skills pipeline, the stages that students go through from learning to working. There is a critical dependency on both sides of the system to support each other. In the current economic environment, there are less job opportunities. Students who are unable to get work experience may exit to other industries, look for opportunities overseas or seek unemployment benefits. We need to address the gaps in the pipeline to create more effective pathways into industry.
There is a need for improvements in the earlier stages of learning to entice and keep students from dropping out, particularly learners from diverse backgrounds across gender, ethnicity, the disabled and/or neurodiverse people. There is a big drop off of engagement in tech from secondary school to tertiary education. More support is required to attract and retain learners in tech. We identified that primary school is the attraction into tech starts. This is where learners and their whanau are forming opinions on their potential careers.
Employer demand for tech skills is the key challenge to ensure the effectiveness of the skills pipeline. Over the last few years, the demand for skills has fluctuated. Currently, due to the economic climate employers have scaled back their hiring and this has reduced the demand for junior talent. Employer demand for junior talent needs to be created and maintained. Without their demand and needs met, adding to the talent pool will address only one side of the skills shortage.
Learners of all backgrounds and pathways need a chance to find their way, and be supported by a system that will look out for their interests and set them up for success, so they can trust and be confident there’s a pathway for them and a transition stage that will help them ease into the tech industry.
Many thanks to MBIE, and our advisory group that included NZTech, ITPNZ and MoE for your support on this project.
We are grateful to ALL our research participants for their time and contributions to our research, through shared resources, data, workshop participation and 1:1 interviews.
