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from the apparently-you-need-an-assistant dept.
Coding is a vital component of tech education, but it won't be enough to sustain the next generation of workers.
[...] Pichai notes that workers today are required to have skills that scarcely existed five years ago, such as an administrative assistant needing to use online programs to run budgets, scheduling and accounting, among other tasks.
And he says these skills are much easier to learn than coding, pointing to $1 billion in new initiatives Google unveiled last year aimed at training and educating workers to help them find jobs and grow their businesses.
"Through these trainings, people learn about using technology to research, to plan events, analyze data and more," Pichai wrote. "They don't require a formal degree or certificate."
[...] "We should make sure that the next generation of jobs are good jobs, in every sense," Pichai wrote. "Rather than thinking of education as the opening act, we need to make sure it's a constant, natural and simple act across life -- with lightweight, flexible courses, skills and programs available to everyone."
(Score: 5, Interesting) by bzipitidoo on Sunday January 21 2018, @02:02PM (3 children)
All the technical skills in the world are of little value if one gets blindsided by office politics, suckered by the liars, thieves, and backstabbers desperate to cover up their own incompetence and embezzling and who infest the dysfunctional office. Those sort of people are always on the watch for the next fall guy, and naive engineers are particularly vulnerable, easily framed because they are supposed to be the technical wizards who ought to know better. Add in the vicious, clueless bosses who have no idea what's possible and what isn't, and moreover, do not much care ("make it happen!"), with a bunch of "yes people" too afraid to ever say "no" no matter how unrealistic the demands, and you have a recipe for failure. Better to be fired tomorrow rather than today. The dysfunctional office eventually collapses, but the good engineers mustn't think they can just ride it out and bide their time.
Engineers are not trained to cope with that. Education seems to take an attitude that they're smart and can figure that out themselves, it's not that hard, and that any time not spent learning tech is time wasted. And engineers aren't the only ones. Lot of Democratic politicians came across as gobsmacked by the outrageous lies told by their Republican opponents, couldn't deal with the loaded questions, the innuendo, the naked hypocrisy, and the all around uncivilized, third degree, below-the-belt campaign tactics they employed. The voters see that of course and have to decide if they'd prefer a naive but possibly honest twit, or a nasty, lying manipulator who nevertheless has demonstrated life experience and street smarts.
The show. Crossballs, is a good example. Unsuspecting experts were invited onto what they were given to understand was a news show, only to be thrown off balance and on the defensive by accusations both sly and blatant that they were frauds in it only for the sex and money, their education fake, their accomplishments stage managed trickery, and so on.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 21 2018, @07:12PM (2 children)
Reading Dilbert is a good start.
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Sunday January 21 2018, @10:36PM (1 child)
Dilbert is not funny to people who haven't worked in tech. Those not in the know who read Dilbert believe that it is hyperbole and that the real world is not really like that. Well, I got news for 'ya, friends. The real world is far, far worse.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 22 2018, @02:17AM
I cried after watching office space. It was too real.