Four out of ten jobs to be created in Spain throughout this year will be related to the digital environment, according to a report published by the European Union. In this context, Barcelona leads, just ahead of Madrid and Valencia, the ranking of Spanish cities with the highest demand for digital transformation profiles, a field that includes everything from a web developer or a data analyst to a digital marketing specialist.
The Catalan capital is becoming one of the most relevant technological hubs in all of Europe, but the digital gap between the supply and demand for talent also grows exponentially year after year, a fact that causes a slowdown in the digitalization process and a sharp increase in the salaries of these workers.
According to a study published by Barcelona Digital Talent, the demand for digital talent between 2017 and 2019 has increased by 80% in Barcelona, while the supply of professionals has grown by only 23% (up to the current 77,000). "One year after the start of the pandemic, the only sector that has grown in job offers, along with healthcare, has been technology and the digital sector," explains Jordi Arrufí, director of digital projects at Mobile World Capital.
According to the 2020 Labor Force Survey (EPA), 13% of jobs (14,700 in total) related to the ICT world in all of Spain were created in Catalonia, while in the country as a whole, employment in this sector has fallen by 3%. Not only this, but according to Arrufí, it is estimated that Barcelona "could absorb up to 10,000 more jobs each year" in a market that is in full expansion and that places the city as "the eighth technological hub in absolute terms on the continent."
Along these lines, the World Economic Forum recently published that new digital professions will go from representing the current 7.8% to 13.5% in just five years, which translates into the creation of almost 100 million new roles that do not yet exist and are directly related to the digital transformation process. "The lack of profiles in the digital environment has existed for more than 30 years, but now we are suffering from it more than ever," explains David Monreal, CEO and founder of the training center Skylab Coders Academy.
Most studies conclude that Full-Stack (complete website development), Data Science (data analysis), UX and UI designers (user experience design when browsing a website), and digital marketing specialists are some of the most in-demand profiles in the market right now. "The most sought-after profile is that of a programmer who has notions of design. That is why many designers have started training in programming, especially in bootcamps," explains Francis Roy, product design professor at IEBS Business School.
The lack of labor has created significant wage inflation in recent years, leading companies to experience real difficulties in filling these types of positions. "The salaries for these profiles are growing year after year due to the scarcity of personnel," explains Ignacio Hörmann, talent director at the international consulting firm Multiplica, based in Barcelona. Companies demanding these profiles are not satisfied with traditional hiring mechanisms, but must carry out "a much more proactive search with very well-crafted offers."
These are also profiles that do not value only the gross salary, but must be attracted with incentives that complement the payroll at the end of the month. "Flexible hours, the possibility of working on different projects, gym membership, or yoga classes are some of the benefits offered to attract talent," Hörmann emphasizes. According to the specialist in human resources in the digital field, the real challenge "is not knowing how to hire but how to retain a professional long-term in a market with very high staff turnover."
One of Barcelona's most important competitive advantages over its European rivals is the average salary, which, although it has increased significantly, is still far from its main competitors. According to the Digital Talent Overview 2020, the average salary for digital professions in Barcelona is around 37,510 gross euros per year, which is still far from the 46,559 euros in Paris, 50,746 euros in Amsterdam, or 73,206 euros in London. Madrid, on the other hand, lags behind the Catalan capital with barely 34,072 gross euros per year.
The significant increase in salaries has led to senior positions having remuneration comparable to that of management positions. "There are positions that are approaching a 30% salary increase in just one year," explains Inma González, talent director at the consulting firm Enzyme Advising Group. "The bubble reminds me a lot of the dot-com bubble. We have to be very careful, because it could have a very negative effect on the fit of any company's structure," she concludes.
Disruptive training
To meet this very high demand, the main universities are increasingly offering master's degrees and specializations in purely digital profiles, as is the case of the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC), or the Institut de Formació Contínua IL3, of the Universitat de Barcelona. Recently, in addition, the famous bootcamps have appeared, a teaching model born in the United States that consists of developing a series of professional skills related to the digital world in a short time.
"In four months a student leaves the school knowing how to program," explains Jared Gil, CEO and co-founder of Nuclio Digital School, a bootcamp for training technological profiles that received the 2021 Educational Excellence Award for the best digital education center. According to Gil, there are students who, without the need for prior training in the scientific or mathematical field, "end up finding work as programmers or user experience designers."
The proliferation of bootcamps in recent years and even months has not been enough to satisfy demand, reaching only 6,000 graduates throughout Spain in 2020. "To train good professionals you must have the best teachers, and for that you must also offer an attractive salary," says Monreal, founder of Skylab, a bootcamp that was born in Barcelona and has been awarded by Switchup as the best bootcamp in the world in 2021. In this sense, the salary bubble also extends to the teaching staff of these training centers.
Unprecedented gender gap
Not everything is good news in the digital world, and among other things, there is still a long way to go in the gender issue. According to a Talent Up report, only 26.5% of digital professionals in Barcelona are women (the European average is 25.1%), which shows a deep gender disparity despite being newly created positions. "It is very difficult to attract female talent," emphasizes Inma González, who explains that now "there are even fewer women than when I started working 27 years ago."
The only position where a certain equity can be found is in user experience design (UX and UI), with 51% women. However, the percentage plummets to 29% in the next position (business intelligence), and exponentially so in the rest. There are some initiatives in Barcelona, such as All Women Tech, which are exclusively dedicated to training professional women in the digital world, with an all-female teaching staff as well.
The objective is to reverse data that is even more serious if we look at student ratios, where women represent only 20% of the student body, and even more so in management positions, occupied by women in only one out of ten cases.