Afeka College survey asked for insights into the skills required today by engineers, hiring in the COVID period, and salary as more employees work remotely.

TEL AVIV, ISRAEL, July 20, 2020 /EINPresswire.com/ -- Contact: Dan Cohen, Dan@FCPCommunications.com
+972-052-674-3720 / +1-510-465-8294

Afeka College of Engineering in Tel Aviv releases new survey of Israel’s high-tech employers and employees during COVID
Survey finds large gap in skills, expectations, and even salary

As a part of the 5th annual Afeka College Conference for the Development of a National Human Capital in engineering, the college conducted a survey that asked identical questions among employers and employees in the high-tech industry. The survey asked for insights into the skills required today by engineers, the hiring and recruitment policy in the COVID period, and the issue of salary as more employees work remotely.

“High-Tech and engineering employers have made it clear that the skills that will make employees successful in work are teamwork, creativity and communications. We found that employers know these are important, but that employees have not yet gotten the message. That’s why we have reworked our curriculum to emphasize these ‘Soft Skills’ – to ensure our graduates get hired and industry has the expertise it needs,” said Afeka College of Engineering President Ami Moyal.

The findings of the survey were:

• Skills Needed: Both employers and employees attribute great importance to a wider range of skills and believe that an engineer who has these skills will succeed in the high-tech industry. Employers and employees have noted skills such as teamwork (77% of employers, 55% of employees) and creativity (51% of the employers, 48% of the employees) among the three most important skills of the engineer's success. Seeing this trend years ago, Afeka College made major changes to its curriculum to train and empower its students with these “soft skills” that are now essential in the high-tech workplace.

President of Afeka College Ami Moyal added, “Today, engineers must bring with them a broad range of teamwork capabilities, creative thinking, rapid adaptation to changes, etc. These are the skills the industry itself defines as essential for every engineer in the workplace today. This is especially true during the Corona crisis where staff have been working remotely.”

• Misperceptions: There was a significant gap between employers and employees of the importance of these “Soft Skills” and professional knowledge.

o Employees attribute great importance to professional engineering knowledge (definition and resolution of engineering problems, component or system planning), and their rank in high places.
o Employers attribute crucial importance to vital skills and rated them in the first five places.

“What we see here is that employees in the high-tech industry do not necessarily understand the importance of vital skills and their impact on their personal success, their employment status and their eventual progress in the industry,” Moyal added.

• Salaries: 97% of employers believe that there is no need to change the level of salary to employees who work from home on the backdrop of the corona crisis. However, nearly one-quarter of tech employees believe their salaries should be raised as they work remotely, while three-quarters do not.

• Who is Getting Hired: Employers said that despite the COVID crisis, younger engineers continue to be recruited to join high-tech firms for junior positions. 60% of the companies did not change their recruitment policy on the background of the virus.

* Survey performed by Roshinek Research Institute on 245 employees and employers

The President of Afeka College of Engineering in Tel Aviv, Prof. Ami Moyal added “The global crisis in the wake of the virus further sharpens the need to build an educational pathway from the earliest years of life through college and beyond that emphasizes those skills found in an engineering education – play, exploration, and collaboration. Today’s employment market emphasizes the acquisition of vital “soft skills,” as an essential element in educating the next generation of national human capital in the field. This unique conference, which is a meeting place for senior industrial, academia, the education and government system, enables the implementation of the important national mission and dealing with the issue that becomes relevant and important from year to year.”


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The 5th Afeka Conference for the Development of a National Human Capital Strategy in Engineering took place 20 July 2020. A full website and list of speakers can be found at: https://camp.mini-sites.net/human_capital20/

dan cohen
Full Court Press Communications
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