COMPTIA CHANNELCON — During this week’s ChannelCon 2022, CompTIA launched a new program to foster more careers in technology. This includes attracting a broader array of potential candidates.

Todd Thibodeaux, CompTIA’s president and CEO, revealed the association’s Project Agora during his state of the industry keynote. With Project Agora, CompTIA will create a resource-rich source of information and support for anyone interested in starting, staying and succeeding in technology careers.

CompTIA’s Todd Thibodeaux

“The goal of Project Agora is to create the most respected place to start, build and supercharge your tech career,” Thibodeaux said. “With amazing resources and broad support from our members, partners and industry, Project Agora will help people find success in the tech workforce.”

Unprecedented Labor Market Shift

The labor market is in a period of unprecedented transition. It’s characterized in large part by “frictional unemployment” as individuals search for, or transition from one job to another, according to CompTIA. One in four U.S. workers was actively seeking a new job or pursuing other career options during the second quarter.

While tech is among the top five industries job seekers were considering, it ranked behind several other sectors,. Those include sales, real estate, health care, hospitality and finance.

Factors contributing to a reluctance to consider tech as a career option include a lack of confidence in technical skills; concerns about the cost and the time it will take to learn those skills; and perceptions about tech industry culture.

Project Agora will help curb that reluctance, he said. It will allow individuals to explore in great depth tech jobs and careers.

Call to Action

CompTIA has identified 30 different job roles covering 90% of tech employment. The next step is creating resources to engage users and convert them from career intent to tech intent.

Thibodeaux issued a call to action to get involved in this effort. The idea is to build the best, most comprehensive collection of tech career resources available anywhere.

“Confidence gaps, career transition gaps and reskilling gaps are not insurmountable barriers, but rather opportunities to chart a new course for individuals and the companies that employ them,” he said. “Project Agora is all about unlocking potential, for the industry, and for millions of people we want and need working in it.”

Thibodeaux said the way the tech industry will get the talent it needs is by “fighting for it.”

“We need to tell better stories, more consistently, about how truly great it is to work in tech,” he said. “That it’s a big tent where companies invest in people from all backgrounds. It means accepting people who are 50%60% of the way there, but loaded with potential. It means creating and committing to long-term career paths for the people you invest in.”