COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT Exploiting the employment potential of ICTs
Date: 2012-04-18
Institutions: European Commission
Subjects: economic growth, information technology, job creation, new technology, new type of employment, software, transmission network

EUROPEAN COMMISSION 

Strasbourg, 18.4.2012  
SWD(2012) 96 final 

COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT 

Exploiting the employment potential of ICTs 

Accompanying the document 

COMMUNICATION FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE EUROPEAN 
PARLIAMENT, THE COUNCIL, THE EUROPEAN SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC 
COMMITTEE AND THE COMMITTEE OF THE REGIONS 

Towards a job-rich recovery 

{COM(2012) 173 final} 
{SWD(2012) 90 final} 
{SWD(2012) 92 final} 
{SWD(2012) 93 final} 
{SWD(2012) 95 final} 
{SWD(2012) 97 final} 
{SWD(2012) 98 final} 
{SWD(2012) 99 final} 
{SWD(2012) 100 final} 

EN 

   EN 

 
 
 
 
  
 
COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT 

Exploiting the employment potential of ICTs 

Accompanying the document 

COMMUNICATION FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE EUROPEAN 
PARLIAMENT, THE COUNCIL, THE EUROPEAN SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC 
COMMITTEE AND THE COMMITTEE OF THE REGIONS 

Towards a job-rich recovery 

TABLE OF CONTENTS 

1. 

2. 

3. 

Introduction .................................................................................................................. 3 

Defining and measuring the ICT Workforce ............................................................... 4 

Labour market challenges in relation to ICTs.............................................................. 6 

Disclaimer:  This  document  is  a  European  Commission  staff  working  document  for 
information  purposes.  It  does  not  represent  an  official  position  of  the  Commission  on  this 
issue, nor does it anticipate such a position. 

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1. 

INTRODUCTION 

Since the financial crisis began to hit labour markets in 2008, Europe has lost 5.6 million jobs. 
Recovering this lost ground is only possible if the EU returns to sustained economic growth, 
which  in  turn  requires  European  industries  and  services  to  retain  or  regain  international 
competitiveness. In this respect, the capability of industry and services to compete and evolve 
is  becoming  increasingly  dependent  on  the  innovative  and  effective  use  of  information  and 
communication technologies (ICTs). 

ICTs,  together  with  globalisation,  have  already  altered  the  global  value  chains  and  the 
economic structure of the world and consequently labour markets too. Whereas twenty years 
ago  globalisation  only  affected  the  production  of  goods  and  touched  blue-collar  workers,  it 
now permeates into every sector of the economy. Indeed, specific routine tasks across almost 
all  existing  sectors  are  inevitably  affected  by  the  pervasiveness  of  ICTs.  As  a  result, 
international competitiveness has become crucial for a much bigger part of the economy and 
ICTs play a key enabling role in this respect. 

Faced  with  new  emerging  markets  and  rising  competition  from  lower-cost  countries  with  a 
fast  growing  and  increasingly  skilled  workforce  such  as  in  China  and  India,  European 
enterprises have little choice but to adapt to this new environment. Thus, industry has to be 
ready to source talents and up its workforce skill levels. In today's technological environment, 
innovation almost always involves embracing ICTs, which in turn allows for optimisation of 
business  processes,  efficiency  gains  and  improved  knowledge  management  processes  and, 
consequently bigger market share. 

Hence,  if  European  enterprises  take  full  advantage  of  the  potential  of  ICTs  they  will 
contribute  to  creating  an  important  number  of  jobs  and  enhancing  competitiveness.  The 
demand for ICT professionals continues to grow whilst other jobs are disappearing. ICTs help 
improve  business  development  and  growth  across  all  sectors  thus  creating  further 
employment. Ensuring that EU workers have the necessary higher end skills will help attract 
investment and prevent loss of key ICT employment to other regions of the world. 

In  its  Communication  on  "e-Skills  for  the  21st  Century:  Fostering  Competitiveness,  Growth 
and Jobs" and its Europe 2020 flagship 2010 Communication entitled: "A Digital Agenda for 
Europe", the Commission already addressed the conditions that need to be met to exploit the 
potential of ICTs. 

The present Staff Working Document focuses on the impact of ICT on employment in more 
detail1.  Thus  the  focus  of  this  document  is  on  the  potential  for  job  creation  and  the  labour 
market challenges which need to be addressed in order to exploit it. A proposed list of actions 
for advancing action in this field can be found annexed to the main Communication heading 
this Employment Package. 

1 

It only partly addresses the concept of Digital Inclusion (the capacity of all citizens to participate in a 
digital  society)  since  this  has  been  covered  recently  by  a  separate  staff  working  document. 
Communication  "European  i2010  initiative  on  e-Inclusion  -  to  be  part  of  the  information  society" 
http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/activities/einclusion/docs/i2010_initiative/comm_native_com_2
007_0694_f_en_acte.doc 

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2. 

DEFINING AND MEASURING THE ICT WORKFORCE 

The relationship between ICT and the workforce can be classified into three categories: 

• 

• 

ICT practitioners have ICT as the focus of their work, for example they develop, sell, and 
maintain or support ICT systems. 
ICT  users  apply  ICT  in  support  of  their  own  work.  Typically,  this  implies  the  use  of 
common  software  tools  and  specialised  tools  that  support  business  functions  within  an 
industry. 

•  Entrepreneurs  and  individuals  in  management  positions  exploit  strategic  opportunities 
provided  by  ICTs  and  require  a  particular  set  of  skills,  called  e-business  or  e-leadership 
skills. 

The analysis that follows here on will focus exclusively on ICT practitioners and ICT users. 

2.1. 

Demand for ICT staff: practitioners and users 

There are several ways in which ICT affects employment and the world of work. On the one 
hand,  ICTs  allow  many  tasks  which  had  been  previously  carried  out  by  humans  to  be 
automated,  thus  potentially  leading  to  job  losses,  in  particular  with  regard  to  routine  tasks. 
This  has  a  negative  impact  on  the  labour  market  for  medium-skilled  white  collar  workers. 
Although  it  is  difficult  to  quantify  the  specific  role  of  ICT  in  this  regard,  it  forms  part  of  a 
general long-run trend towards more automation2. In any case, as ICT is a global technology 
this  impact  is  felt  everywhere  in  the  world:  postponing  ICT  investments  is  therefore  not  an 
option for Europe. 

On  the  other  hand,  more  and  better  qualified  ICT  practitioners,  researchers,  entrepreneurs, 
managers and users are needed. For example, the demand for ICT professionals continues to 
grow.  Indeed,  ICT  practitioners  were  one  of  the  very  few  employment  categories  which 
continued  to  grow  (at  around  3%  per  year)  even  during  the  current  economic  crisis.  As  a 
result, by the end of 2010, 4.1 million Europeans worked as ICT practitioners in the narrowest 
definition (programmers and computer assistant staff), up from 2.7 million ten years earlier, 
with another 1.1 million in closely related occupations. It is also important not to confuse the 
work of ICT practitioners with the ICT sector – 55% of practitioners work in user industries 
rather than in the ICT industry itself. 

2.2. 

Potential for re-insertion into the labour market… 

The employment of ICT practitioners is growing so fast that there are not enough workers to 
fill all the vacancies available in the sector. According to a recent estimate3, there will be up 
to 700 000 unfilled ICT practitioners' vacancies in the EU by the year 2015. The same trend 
applies  in  the  United  States  and  in  the  emerging  economies  of  India  and  China.  These 
developments offer excellent job opportunities for workers who are willing to pursue a career 
in this field. For advanced ICT professions, this will require a graduate degree in a computer 
related  field  or  a  training  certificate  provided  by  an  ICT  vendor  and  is  thus  mostly  of 
relevance for students and younger workers. For many other ICT occupations, a shorter and/or 

2 

3 

On  the  other  hand,  ensuring  higher  productivity  and  competitiveness  thanks  to  the  new  technologies 
also means preserving jobs in Europe in the future. 
Report for the European Commission “Anticipating the Evolution of the Supply and Demand of e-Skills 
in Europe (2010-2015)” Empirica and IDC Europe, December 2009. Updated forecast presented at the 
European e-Skills Conference on 13 December 2011 in Brussels. 

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on  the  job  training  period  will  be  sufficient,  especially  for  workers  with  experience  in 
technical  or  scientific  areas.  ICT  professions  are  multidisciplinary  and  extend  beyond 
technical  requirements  necessitating  soft  skills  such  as  communication  and  business  related 
skills (project management, problem solving, creative thinking, team working etc.). ICTs can 
therefore be a promising option even for workers who become unemployed in mid-career. 

…and/or starting your own business 

Moreover, the emergence of new digital applications creates the potential for entrepreneurial 
and  talented  ICT  practitioners  to  start  up  their  own  companies.  Since  ICT  is  a  global 
technology and digital services tend to be easily scalable, start-ups in this field usually have a 
higher  growth  potential  than  other  start-ups,  and  thus  a  significant  employment  potential  as 
well.  Unfortunately,  however,  so  far,  most  of  the  start-up  and  growth  activity  of  ICT  and 
Internet companies worldwide has taken place outside the EU. 

ICT facilitates business creation… 

ICTs  make  it  much  easier  to  create  a  new  business,  thereby  enabling  more  would-be 
entrepreneurs  to  pursue  their  ambition.  It  does  this  in  two  ways.  On  the  one  hand, 
eGovernment services (where offered by Member States) can facilitate and greatly speed up 
business  creation  processes.  On  the  other  hand,  emerging  cloud  computing  services  reduce 
financial  stress  for  new  companies  by  removing  the  need  for  up-front  investment  in  any 
additional  ICT  hardware  other  than  a  terminal.  These  developments  can  help  speed  up 
payments and establish a payroll thus enabling a business to take off quickly and easily whilst 
also  reducing  its  risks  of  failure.  The  emergence  of  cloud  computing  has  been  estimated  to 
provide an additional 400 000 jobs per year in the EU from 2010 to 2015.4

…but needs high-speed broadband 

Finally, one should not forget that ICT has the potential to provide even more employment in 
the future if the network infrastructure is improved. Jobs in ICT nowadays, whether as an ICT 
practitioner or ICT user, typically require access to the Internet, i.e. the presence of broadband 
networks.  Yet  many  of  the  areas  with  persistently  high  unemployment  have  only  limited 
broadband deployment (e.g. rural and remote areas), which limits the potential for future ICT 
careers for people in these areas. Also, flexible ICT working arrangements such as tele-work 
are typically only possible where there are high-speed connections, as is cloud computing5. 

4 

5 

"The Cloud Dividend: Part One. The economic benefits of cloud computing to business and the wider 
EMEA  economy";  centre  for  economics  and  business  research;  OECD  IT  Outlook  2010 
http://www.redstor.com/downloads/cloud-dividend-report.pdf 
To enhance improved coverage of broadband connection and ICT applications, the European Regional 
Development Fund (ERDF) provides about EUR 15 billion to ICT priorities (or 4.4% of total cohesion 
policy funds) to ensure access to basic Broadband (EUR 2.3 billion) and supporting ICT applications 
and services for citizens and SMEs (EUR 12.7 billion) in the programming period 2007-2013. 

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3. 

LABOUR MARKET CHALLENGES IN RELATION TO ICTS 

3.1. 

The pervasiveness of ICT skills 

Most jobs nowadays already require some kind of computer related knowledge. Whilst ICT 
specialists account for 3.2% of EU employment, advanced ICT users account for six times as 
many, i.e.18.5% of employed persons6, ranging from 9% to 31%, depending on the Member 
State. It has been forecast7 that, by 2015, 90% of jobs will need at least basic computer skills. 
Acquiring  those  skills  is  thus  rapidly  becoming  a  precondition  for  workers  to  become  and 
remain employable. 

% persons employed with ICT user skills – 2010 

% persons employed with ICT user skills

35.0

30.0

25.0

20.0

15.0

10.0

5.0

0.0

LU LT UK MT DK LV EE SE SI FI

IS IE NL HU CY NO BE DE

EU27 CZ AT SK FR IT PL ES HR GR BG PT RO TR

Source: Digital Agenda Scoreboard 2011 (Commission services on the basis of the Eurostat European Labour 
Force Survey). 

3.2. 

The labour market for ICT practitioners 

The  labour  market  for  ICT  practitioners  has  been  characterised  for  a  number  of  years  by  a 
shortage  of  supply,  i.e.  a  lack  of  skilled  workers.  As  a  result,  there  has  been  a  persistently 
large  number  of  unfilled  vacancies,  which  is  often  referred  to  as  the  "ICT  skills  gap".  The 
financial crisis has barely affected ICT practitioners: their unemployement rate rose by a mere 
0.6% to 1.8% in 20108. 

Surprisingly low interest of young people in a career as an ICT practitioner… 

Recent statistics on the number of ICT graduates in the EU give rise to additional concerns. 
Although  their  number  increased  from  71  000  per  year  in  2000  to  127  000  in  2006,  it 
decreased again in the following years, down to 114 000 by 2009. 

6 
7 

8 

http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/digital-agenda/scoreboard/docs/pillar/digitalliteracy.pdf 
IDC White Paper "Post Crisis: e-Skills Are Needed to Drive Europe's Innovation Society" (November 
2009). 
Empirica presentation at European e-Skills conference, Brussels, 13 December 2011 

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Computer science graduates in EU27

140000

120000

100000

80000

60000

40000

20000

0

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

2009

Source: empirica presentation at European e-Skills conference, Brussels, 13 December 2011. 

An  additional  complication  arises  from  the  increasing  number  of  ICT  graduates  leaving  the 
work force due to retirement: the number will increase from around 80 000 per year in 2010 
to about 120 000 in 2015. As a result, the number of ICT graduates in the labour force could 
soon actually drop, while the number of ICT vacancies continues to rise. 

ICT staff retirement forecasts, EU27 

14 00 00

12 00 00

10 00 00

8 00 00

6 00 00

4 00 00

2 00 00

0

2 0 0 7 2 0 0 8 2 0 0 9 2 0 1 0 2 0 1 1 2 0 1 2 2 0 1 3 2 0 1 4 2 0 1 5 2 0 1 6

Source: empirica presentation at European e-Skills conference, Brussels, 13 December 2011 

It is intriguing that the number of young people choosing a career in ICT remains so low. On 
the one hand, there has been a great deal of activity in Member States in terms of stepping up 
provision for ICT skills and digital competence. This has included curriculum reform, extra 
funding  and  resources,  new  programmes,  the  creation  of  virtual  learning  environments,  and 
the  use  of  ICT  in  communication,  administration  and  management9.  On  the  other  hand, 

9 

See  the  2010  joint  progress  report  "Key  competences  for  a  changing  world"  of  the  Council  and  the 
Commission on the implementation of the “Education & Training 2010 work programme” provides the 
evidence  of  SEC  (2009)  xxx  and  SEC  (2009)  xxx.  Similar  results  have  been  obtained  through  the 
EURYDICE study 2011. 

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Internet usage surveys show that regular Internet usage by 16-24 year olds ranges from 87% 
for the low-educated to 97% for the highly-educated10. 

In other words, virtually all young people now have at least basic ICT skills and are familiar 
with a number of internet applications11. 

Yet, the number of them who make the jump from ‘cool’ ICT, such as installing a webcam or 
converting a song into a different format for their personal listening, to ‘boring’ ICT, such as 
entering a graduate ICT programme, a  vocational ICT education, or creating their own web 
company,  remains  limited.  Despite  the  good  employment  prospects  in  the  sector  labour 
supply is scarce particularly among youngsters and this reticence to take a career in the field 
of ICT remains a serious challenge for policy-makers. Often, the difficulty of entering the ICT 
sector  is  overestimated.  A  recent  survey  in  the  UK12  showed  that  36%  of  students  thought 
that in order to work in ICT they would need a degree in ICT.  

Another  important  reason  for  this  mismatch  is  that  today's  youngsters  might  be  'digital 
natives',  but they  are not yet digitally competent13 in the sense that they are not able to use 
ICT  in  a  professional,  collaborative,  critical  or  creative  way.  Despite  the  many  initiatives 
undertaken  at  European,  national  and  regional  level,  formal  education  and  training  systems 
have  not  systematically  integrated  innovative  pedagogical  strategies  supported  by  new 
technologies14.  At  the  same  time,  ICT  companies  are  increasingly  providing  education  and 
training  through  commercial  or  not-for  profit  initiatives.  Recently,  some  efforts  have  been 
made to build bridges between formal education, training and accreditation systems and these 
new ICT industry led initiatives. 

In  addition,  we  have  to  deal  with  a  gender  issue  related  to  the  ICT  career.  Among  ICT 
specialists in the OECD, women still account for a relatively low share of the total workforce 
and  only  represent  20%15  of  the  overall  figure.  One  of  the  reasons  is  that  the  already  small 
number of women choosing ICT related careers is further reduced by them leaving the sector. 

Reorientation of mid-career jobseekers - problem of mobility and cost of the training  

A  major  alternative  source  of  skilled  ICT  workers  has  always  been  unemployed  mid-career 
workers  from  related  fields  such  as  engineering,  mathematics  or  sciences,  with  adequate 
retraining,  as  they  usually  share  the  same  basic  bodies  of  knowledge.  Moreover,  for  more 
basic  digital  technology  jobs  (such  as  web  site  designers,  call  centre  or  network 
administrators) skills can be acquired by those who have a certain aptitude but lack previous 
formal  education  in  this  field.  Such  courses  are  often  available  through  informal  training 

10 
11 

12 
13 

14 

15 

http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/digital-agenda/scoreboard/docs/pillar/usage_content.pdf 
See also "Eurostat, Survey on ICT usage in households and by individuals, 2011" data on skills related 
to using office applications, e.g. using excel, presentation software, creating a web page etc. 
CompTIA survey 
Digital  competence  is  one  of  the  8  Key  Competences  identified  under  the  "European  Reference 
Framework  on  Key  Competences"  (2008);  OECD,  PISA  results  on  Digital  reading,  2011.  IPTS, 
Mapping Digital Competence: Towards a Conceptual Understanding, Sevilla, European Commission, 
and JRC 67075, 2011. http://ipts.jrc.ec.europa.eu/publications/pub.cfm?id=4699. 
Key Data on Learning and Innovation through ICT at School in Europe: Eurydice, 2011; Pisa Digital 
reading (2011); STEPS survey (2010). Ferrari, A., Cachia, R., & Punie, Y. (2011). Educational Change 
through  Technology:  A  Challenge  for  Obligatory  Schooling  in  Europe.  Lecture  Notes  in  Computer 
Science, 6964, 97-110. 
OECD IT Outlook 2010; http://www.redstor.com/downloads/cloud-dividend-report.pdf 

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centres16 and non-formal community groups17. However, this is not happening as much as it 
could  be,  as  is  shown  by  the  simultaneous  existence  of  ICT  vacancies  and  persistent 
unemployment among workers in related fields. This can be explained partly by a problem of 
geographical  mobility, as job vacancies  and  unemployed  workers may  be  in different  areas, 
and  partly  by  reluctance  on  the  part  of  either  workers  or  companies  to  invest  the  necessary 
retraining resources in terms of training cost and adaptation period. Finally, there is also the 
question  of  whether  the  wage  premium  for  ICT  skills  is  sufficiently  high  to  make  such 
retraining profitable. 

3.3. 

The labour market for ICT users 

ICT skills as precondition for employability in all fields 

It is difficult to think of a job in the present day economy that does not require some degree of 
ICT knowledge. As stated above, 18.5% of workers in the EU can be regarded as advanced 
ICT users18. At the same time as routine jobs are being displaced by ICTs, other jobs become 
more complex and require more ICT knowledge. The emphasis of the demand from European 
enterprises is increasingly focusing on higher level problem-solving and entrepreneurial skills 
to address the needs emerging from cloud computing, cyber-security, green technologies and 
eHealth applications. Yet, despite the many efforts over the last years, ICT training as part of 
other (either university or vocational) training programmes is lagging behind the fast-moving 
development of technology. 

Moreover,  it  is  necessary  to  ensure  that  workers  already  in  the  workforce  adapt  new  ICT 
applications to their work as they emerge. However, basic ICT knowledge by workers aged 
over 25, as measured by regular Internet usage, depends much more on educational attainment 
than is the case for young people. Among 25-54 year olds, 94% of highly educated people are 
regular users, whereas among the low educated the figure is less than 50%. Among the over 
55  year  olds,  even  a  quarter  of  the  highly  educated  do  not  regularly  use  the  Internet;  the 
corresponding figure for the low-educated is a staggering 80%. 

16 
17 

18 

EN 

www.interface3.be 
IPTS study on ICT supporting 3rd sector organisations and social innovation ePractice Digital Literacy 
Workshop  on  Digital  Competences 
Intermediaries, 
for  Social 
http://ipts.jrc.ec.europa.eu/publications/pub.cfm?id=4340  and  Under  the  Radar:  The  Contribution  of 
Civil 
eInclusion, 
Sector 
and 
http://ipts.jrc.ec.europa.eu/publications/pub.cfm?id=4339 
Digital  Agenda  Scoreboard  (Commission  services  on  the  basis  of  Eurostat  European  Labour  Force 
Survey). 

Inclusion  Actors  and 

Organisations 

Society 

Third 

to 

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Regular Internet use in the EU27 in 2010 – breakdown by age-education groups 

Sector chart: the amplitude of each sector represents the demographic weight of each age-education group in 
total EU27 population while its height represents the percentage of regular Internet use for that group. 
Source: Digital Agenda Scoreboard (Commission services on the basis of Eurostat Community Survey on ICT 
Usage in Households and by Individuals). 

ICT skills can lower the risk of unemployment… 

Yet,  ICT  skills  are  increasingly  important  in  order  to  lower  unemployment  prospects  even 
among  senior  workers.  For  example,  one  econometric  study  of  the  Italian  labour  market, 
monitoring  for  age  and  education  and  following  individuals  over  time,  found  that  low-
educated workers aged between 35 and 49 with no digital skills have a 5% higher probability 
of being unemployed than those with digital skills; and highly-educated 50-64 workers with 
no digital skills have a 20% higher probability of being unemployed than those with digital 
skills19.  

ICTs can also be used to improve one's skills, whether ICT or otherwise. In the EU, jobs held 
by highly-qualified people in all sectors are expected to rise by 16 million between now and 
2020,  while  those  held  by  low-skilled  workers  will  decline  by  around  12  million20.  This 
enormous  task  of  increasing  high  level  skills  and  up  skilling  existing  skills,  including  the 
digital competences of users can be facilitated by ICTs. For example, by enabling education 
and training through open and easily available learning resources, open educational practices 
or the use of open networks.  

19 

20 

The  dataset  used  provides  four  different  waves  of  data  (2000,  2002,  2004,  and  2006).  For  the 
illustration of the dataset see Main Report (Codagnone et al 2009), § 8.2. 
"An  agenda  for  new  skills  and  jobs:  A  European  contribution  towards  full  employment" 
http://europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=IP/10/1541&format=HTML&aged=0&langua
ge=EN&guiLanguage=fr 

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New educational practices like virtual mobility can support collaborative methods preparing 
for new forms of work and at the same time support the development of eLearning, as well as 
open  educational  resources.  Moreover,  eLearning  can  also  provide  an  avenue  for  lifelong 
learning (re-skilling and up skilling), which is recognised as a necessity in today's fast-moving 
economies.21

…and have positive impact on young people at risk of exclusion 

Another study on the role of ICT for young people at risk of exclusion22, relying on a survey 
of  sixty-one  ICT  based  initiatives  for  the  inclusion  of  youth  at  risk,  shows  that  the  positive 
short term outcomes reported by these initiatives refer inter alia to re-engagement in education 
and training and re-insertion into employment. The impacts of ICTs stem from the skilling, 
empowerment and social capital effects of their use, which are all relevant for employability. 
A  third  study  found  that  people  who  have  ICT  skills  on  their  curriculum  vitae  increase  the 
probability of receiving a call-back by 1% or more23. 

The importance of ICT for employment aspects is increasingly understood by workers, too – 
only  40%  of  unemployed  people  consider  their ICT  skills  sufficient  for  finding  a  job.  Even 
among employed persons, only 53% believe that their ICT skills would be sufficient if they 
had to look for another job24. 

3.4. 

ICT as an enabling work and social tool  

ICTs  are  a  key  enabling  tool  in  the  development  of  new  forms  of  work.  Thanks  to  their 
pervasiveness people can work remotely, on the go from virtual work stations and indeed also 
according  to  their  own  rhythm.  This  flexibility  allows  workers  to  take  up  employment 
positions  which  otherwise  would  have  been  too  far  away  or  not  compatible  with  other 
personal obligations such as child or elderly care or with limitations in activities imposed by a 
disability. 

ICT is a key enabler of social innovation, indeed digital social innovation exists thanks to ICT 
tools  and  networks.  Two  broad  categories  can  be  distinguished:  on  the  one  hand,  activities 
where  ICTs  increase  the  effectiveness  of  existing  processes  (e.g.  Living  labs,  Web 
entrepreneurs, Young entrepreneurs, Digital champions, etc.) and, on the other hand, activities 
aimed at exploiting the enormous potential of the "network effect" ("collective intelligence") 
to the full in order to find effective solutions to societal challenges. 

3.5. 

ICT as a tool for better functioning of labour markets 

ICTs also play a role in improving labour market matching processes. To start with, 46% of 
unemployed people use the Internet to look for a job or submit a job application25. Moreover, 
ICTs  help  employment  services  to  deal  with  the  bulk  of  their  routine  requests,  freeing  up 
human resources to deal with more complex or sensitive cases in a face-to-face manner. ICTs 
also allow employment services to complement a traditional repository of job vacancies with 

21 

22 

23 

24 
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IPTS, The Future of Learning: Preparing for Change, Sevilla, European Commission, EUR 24960 EN, 
2011. http://ipts.jrc.ec.europa.eu/publications/pub.cfm?id=4719 
See  IPTS  study  ICTs  for  disadvantaged  youth:  Opportunities  and  challenges,  Policy  Report, 
Forthcoming 2012, http://is.jrc.ec.europa.eu/pages/EAP/eInclusion/youth.html 
ICT Skills and Employment: A randomized experiment, Mariana Blanco (Universidad del Rosario) and 
Florencia Lopez Boo (Inter-American Development Bank) (November 2010). 
Eurostat Community survey on ICT usage in households and by individuals 2011 
Eurostat Community survey on ICT usage in households and by individuals 2011 

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additional  services,  such  as  online  career  guidance,  self-assessment  tools,  and  databases  of 
training  opportunities,  e-recruitment  and  sophisticated  real-time  labour  market  information 
systems.  

Moreover,  ICT  enables  better  job  matching  by  taking  more  parameters  into  account.  Skills-
based job matching is the most prominent example. By analysing the individual skills profiles 
of  job  seekers  and  the  skills  required  for  each  job,  computer  systems  can  compare  how  an 
individual  fulfils  the  necessary  requirements  of  a  vacancy.  Also,  with  automated  job 
matching, jobseekers can immediately receive notifications once new job vacancies meet their 
personal  profile.  Results  of  job  matching  can  be  presented  in  a  user-friendly  way,  e.g.  by 
showing job vacancies on a map or by adding information from other data sources.  

Concerning recruitment across borders, employers and jobseekers are often separated by large 
distances.  ICT  systems  are  an  efficient  means  to  bring  jobseekers  and  employers  together. 
Nowadays,  most  employers  prefer  online  applications  over  paper  applications.  The  use  of 
social  media  for  recruitment,  virtual  job  interviews  and  virtual  job  fairs  are  other  examples 
how e-recruitment facilitates communication between employers and jobseekers. 

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