According to LinkedIn, the world’s largest professional network, technology-related skills have the highest year-on-year growth among SMEs. The SMEs of Malaysia are quickly adapting to the changes in the business environment by adopting digital technologies and hiring more professionals with technology-related skills. The fastest-growing skills of SMEs in Malaysia are:
- Cloud Computing
- User Experience Design Tool
- Data Visualisation
- Back-end Web Development
- Social Media
- NoSQL
- Data Science
- TypeScript
- React Nativs
- Blockchain
- Firebase
- Docker Products
Moreover, SMEs are often recruiting younger talents as they are thought to be more savvy in these particular areas. Gen Y make up 77 per cent of SMEs employees which means that as long as you keep on enhancing technology-related skills, you definitely rise above the competitive hiring market.
According to Olivier Legrand, Managing Director, Asia-Pacific, LinkedIn, small and medium business owners interested in attracting them (Gen Y) to be part of their teams can benefit from being open about their own aspirations, cultivating authentic connections, and sharing growth opportunities available to employees.
Stay relevant in the market by upgrading your skills

You can always sign up for workshops or short courses if you wish to learn more and upgrade your position in the hiring market. But, if you wish to go all the way in studying the course in-depth, you can always apply for a graduate school program or a master’s degree.
For SMEs, if you want to recruit more talents from Gen Y, consider these following tips

1. Consider both the hard and soft skills needed for your business
SMEs need to also look at soft skills such as creativity and critical thinking in the hiring process – not solely depends on the ability to innovate. These enable talent to respond to potential disruption or handle emerging possibilities for their business.
2. Celebrate your company’s culture and purpose
LinkedIn has founded that SME employees in Malaysia tend to indicate great interest in professional content. They often pay more attention to profiles that those working in large companies. As SME employers, you can take advantage of this by publishing job openings, posts, photos, videos and articles about what it is like to work in the company.
3. Offer learning and development opportunities
SMEs employees are highly interested in learning and developing themselves. As employers, you can utilise your power in making things easier for them by incorporating learning and development programmes for the staff. Quick online courses are sufficient and can be taken individually or as a group.
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