Management consultant Peter Drucker once explained in just a few words why organizations fail.
It is not because they do things wrong, he said. It is because they do the wrong things. And it boils down to this: “Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.”
There is a serious shortage of managers, but even fewer true leaders. For example, companies that made slide rules continued to make them very well – but they failed to pivot when Wang Laboratories introduced electronic calculators. That was in 1964. The last slide rule was produced in the US in 1974 – a decade later.
During the pandemic, Israeli teachers were heroic in adapting to Zoom-based distance teaching, and Israeli children and youths were equally heroic in their resilience. They both did things right.
But were they teaching and learning the wrong things? And do we manage our educational system, but fail to lead it?
The answer to both questions is – yes. There is a critical skills gap emerging, between the skills that industry wants and needs when hiring workers and the skills that potential employees have acquired in school. And, happily, there is also a proven way to close this gap.
To explore this gap and how to close it, I spoke with Michael Steiner, an Israeli who heads BEST, an acronym for Boosting Engineering Science & Technology, an innovative robotics competition for US middle school and high schools, encompassing 850 schools and 18,000 students, whose “mission is to engage and excite students about science, technology and engineering.”
Steiner is the son of Polish parents who survived the Shoah as orphans. He served in the IDF for over two decades in pedagogic and training roles. He is passionate about the urgent need to train children in schools for future skills. These are his words, based on my own interview and an interview with Karl Woolfenden for the business website Business Class News.
Michael, can you speak about your 27 years in the IDF?
“The IDF School of Army Training is where I had the privilege of starting my army service between 1978 and 1981. I continued to contribute in various training capacities until 1995. Throughout all this time, I was engaged in training officers. We sought cognitive empowerment skills, deliverables, and measurables for future army leaders. As a side note, which I think is still the case, when you train a fantastic team, you constantly encounter issues that no curriculum, map, nor GPS can prepare you for.”
There are two views about post-pandemic education. One is: back to the “good old days” (which in some ways were pretty awful, especially in Israeli schools). A second is: build back better. Leverage the coronavirus crisis to create real effective change, especially in the realm of crucial future skills. Can you weigh in on this?
“We have been blessed with the most gifted generations we could ever ask for, ever. What we are not allowed is to cut corners in the investment in their skills training. People are not born skilled. Talent does not replace skills, and there is no shortcut for skills learning and training.
“The pandemic proved that the world is divided between those prepared and trained to function during and after the pandemic and those who are not. The first group landed on their feet and grew, during the most horrific biological war. And on the other hand, there were those caught isolated and lagging behind because of lack of skills training.
“Training everyone and getting ready to contribute are not someone else’s responsibility; it is the one critical commitment we all have in oder to stay in business. If we don’t, our shared future is clouded. I want to make sure I am clear. Talent will never bridge over the gap in skills training. People must be trained. Remember, even the IDF conditioned their promotion with skills training first!”
The BEST competition which you have led is an outside-of-school activity. We know now that a large amount of learning among young people occurs AFTER school hours, on their own. How in your view can we integrate the insights gained from BEST (and Israel’s FIRST robotics competition, which is similar), into school curricula?
“We need to look at the school model and ask ourselves what is the model appropriate for? I went through the educational system in Israel, and it succeeded to spark my curiosity. Primarily because of a group of dedicated and loving teachers. I don’t think I would be where I am today if not for them.
“Skills training, on the other hand, is a different business. What I do know is what happens when you train, as in the case of BEST, in teams. We do this in after-school hours and during weekends, and I assume for many of the teams, at night. This is because during school, many of the students are separated. In the 21st century, most if not everything is carried out by heterogeneous teams and not by individuals. The BEST program is carried out by teams and not individuals. Six to twelve rigorous weeks of about a thousand teams and before Covid, close to 18,000 students in 17 states train and acquire skills tirelessly.
“Can what we do in BEST be done in the schools? Yes, it can, and some of our school partners take our program into the schools, and it changes their schools forever.”
A major issue today is inclusion – closing not only the skills gap, but closing the gap between rich and poor, black and brown and white…. Can you BOTH close the skills gap, and close the social gap? If so, how.
“You are touching on one of the most essential and sensitive issues. My mother and father are both Holocaust survivors. Neither completed elementary school because of the Nazi occupation and destruction of Poland. And yet my father, with a skillset of a carpenter, evolved to be a quality engineer for the transportation corporation, with his hard-working two hands. With scarce food, my mother did her best to divide among the three children as much as possible. I remember my mother moving food from her plate to my brothers and me, with the excuse that she had a meal before dinner. We could have guessed that she was the one going to sleep with an empty stomach.
“BEST was created to bring STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) to those who have so much, not in their wallets but their ‘marbles’. In their personality, in their talents, and ahead, in their future. Some may call them “the underserved.” I respect them and often tell them how I wish them to carry the baton, fulfill the legacy that BEST empowers them to be, and be President, Mayor, Congresswomen, and anything they want to be. I see in them not only the potential but the capacity to be any of these leaders.”
“I’ve met with leaders in industry, especially in the innovation industry, across the world in many countries. I’ve heard from them directly. The skills gap is an issue that we’ve created. We benefit from the most sophisticated industry humanity has ever created. That’s the wonderful side. We’ve just witnessed it -- we flipped the vaccination that’s saved us, in record time. This required employees to come with a set of skills, like never existed before. Industry does not require them, industry demands them, and they do not compromise. They do not compromise about these skills in Mexico, Russia, China, South Korea, US, Brazil, Canada, Israel, anywhere, there’s not an ounce of compromise about these skills. Hence the skills gap. Most people who apply for a job are unaware of it. Had they been aware of it, maybe they would have taken preemptive steps, but they are not.
“Today, industry requires of an employee to be able to do a budget, to be specializing in human resource management, to do a pitch, to specialize in marketing, to be on top of his team in teamwork, adaptability, emotional intelligence and many, many more skills, which we have never required of any employee in the past. The skills list is one a prospective hire is required to have, and is tested on before getting a yes or even before getting an interview. This long list is so rigorous that either we train them or they will not get an interview. Either we train them or they will never have a chance to find a job. This is a harsh statement. It’s not harsh just for the young students we train, it is a harsh statement for the future of industry.
“The list of employment opportunities is way longer than the number of potential employees. The economy of the world will not grow if we don’t fix the skills gap. So it’s a two sided interest. We have to fix the skills gap so that the young people will find the job, but we also need to help countries and the industries within them to grow. So you need adaptability, teamwork, risk-taking and many more skills. For the employees at Pfizer, by the way. You need to be able to hire suddenly tens of thousands employees all over the world with these skills, so that Pfizer could save humanity.
“This isn’t the story of Pfizer only. This is the story of any technology company, because they tell their employees the same story, we are here to save humanity. To enable humanity to succeed because of what you do. They repeat these slogans every single day. This is how we grew to be where we are.
“We are telling young people that it is not about each of them, it’s about them as teammates, as groups. None of the challenges we train are for individuals, they are all for teammates, for groups, boys and girls together, from different backgrounds. It’s all heterogeneous. But the honesty of telling them what’s going on outside in the world is a key. We’re not telling them the full story. The full story is that the industry of today is professional, rigid, not in a bad sense, but it has become so professional that it does look like what you see, like the leadership academy of the US Army, which I visited. Either we train our kids for it, or they will never get in.
“The future? The future is bright – because the students are exceptionally bright and motivated. Wherever I go across the country, they take my breath away. The only side comment I would add – I think training for key skills is essential. Do not be naive and rest on your laurels and think that because you are gifted, talented and motivated, that is enough. It isn’t enough!
“The world is so sophisticated that training is an essential piece, especially in a world where every year things keep changing. You are required to train for the rest of your life. It’s true to every one of us. Training speaks a language to all of us all all over the world. So I’m begging the young people to wake up every day -- and train.
“I want to emphasize that skills should be imparted when children are very young. If it is something that they pick up when they are six, seven, eight years old, they will learn the skill of learning and they will never stop.
“For example, the skill of learning requires learning how to do research. Research is an essential part of growth. It is something which industry requires of every employee. This also needs to be trained. You cannot do anything without research. And research isn’t something you do online, it’s something you do with other individuals.
“So to parents, I would say – your kid is going to invent the next vaccination. I have no doubts. Send them to train so that they can fulfill that.
“To industry: In order to get these valuable employees, please engage. Make sure your employees become mentors. Make sure you support education, do it as quickly as possible. There’s no other way of securing your future employees with the right skills.”
The writer heads the Zvi Griliches Research Data Center at S. Neaman Institute, Technion and blogs at www.timnovate.wordpress.com