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Having a master's degree is no guarantee of the right skills.
And that's not just the opinion of progressive start-ups. It's also the view of companies such as IBM, Siemens and Deutsche Telekom. In recent years, they have all begun to move away from formal qualification requirements and focus instead on specific skills (FT 2024; Business Insider 2025).
Around 70% of companies complain about relevant skills gaps in their teams. And one in four positions remains unfilled, not because there are no applicants, but because the right skills are lacking (Calibr 2024).
If you measure the wrong criteria, you end up with people with the wrong skills. And you are left with gaps that prevent innovation. This is exactly where skill gap analysis comes in. It identifies which skills are missing today, which will be needed tomorrow and where they already exist within the company. It's about more than HR optimisation: it's about securing the future.
But how do you carry out such an analysis strategically? And which tools help you make critical decisions based on data? Find out in today's PALTRON Insight.
Skill gaps as a risk factor: What companies should know about their hidden gaps
Skills shortages are no longer just an HR challenge. They are a business risk. However, what many companies fail to realise is that it is not only a matter of finding too few applicants, but also of failing to recognise the right skills within their own ranks.
According to a survey by Calibr, 69% of companies say they see significant skill gaps in their workforce with direct consequences for productivity, innovation and competitiveness (Calibr 2024). McKinsey even says that companies lose billions every year because they don't know what skills they're missing – and what skills they actually need (McKinsey 2023).
The real bottleneck often lies within. Existing teams increasingly lack digital, analytical or adaptive skills. At the same time, there is little systematic recording of what talents are already available or could be developed quickly. Without transparency about where gaps are and which skills have future potential, strategic personnel planning remains a guessing game.
These ‘invisible gaps’ are particularly evident where transformation is needed: in IT departments, data science, cloud architectures and AI projects. Skills are not only missing from job advertisements – they are missing from projects, roadmaps and, ultimately, from value creation.
To change this, the first step is brutally honest: What skills does our company really need? Which of these are available – and which are missing? Skill gap analysis provides answers to precisely these questions. It is not an HR trend, but a reality check for businesses. And it determines whether companies grow, stagnate or are overtaken in the long term.
Skill gap analysis as a lever for strategic personnel planning
Many companies invest in recruiting without knowing what they should actually be looking for. The classic approach: a position becomes vacant, the job description is copied, and the recruiting process begins. What's missing? A clear connection between the company's needs and the skill set of the person they are looking for.
Skill gap analysis turns this process on its head. It does not start with the vacancy, but with the company strategy. Which skills will be critical to success in six, twelve or 24 months – and where do we stand today? This is precisely where its greatest leverage lies: it brings planning security in times when role models, technologies and market requirements are transforming faster than organisational charts.
According to Deloitte, 45% of employers already actively use skill data on platforms such as LinkedIn to find and develop talent (Deloitte 2023). Companies that systematically work with skill profiles report greater predictability, more effective talent matching and shorter time-to-productivity times for new hires (Calibr 2024; Accenture 2023).
However, this only works if skill data does not disappear in isolation in Excel spreadsheets or application documents. It must be integrated into strategic HR planning – using tools such as the Workday Skills Cloud, HRIS systems or internal talent databases (Accenture 2023). Only when skills appear as a strategic variable in the planning process does gut feeling become a real decision-making tool.
And a recruiting strategy that doesn't recognise skill gaps is expensive, plus usually unsuccessful. Making data-driven decisions: which tools provide the necessary overview? And a recruitment strategy that is unaware of skill gaps is expensive and usually unsuccessful.
Making data-driven decisions: Which tools provide the necessary overview
Many HR decisions are still made based on gut feeling, even though the technology has long been available to ask better questions and provide more accurate answers. The key question is: Where are the skills missing and how visible are they?
Skill gap analysis tools deliver exactly that: visibility. They capture, structure and visualise the skills within the company and make skill gaps transparent at team, departmental and organisational level. Without this foundation, any personnel planning remains speculative.
Skill analysis systems are particularly effective when they combine data from different sources: job profiles, development plans, project participation. This creates the basis for strategic decisions and for the targeted closure of relevant skills gaps (Accenture 2023).
But even smaller tools, often integrated into existing HRIS systems in a modular way, can make a huge difference. More important than the range of functions is:
- Can skill data be continuously updated?
- Is it used across teams , or does it remain isolated in the HR department?
- And do they support not only recruiting, but also personnel development and succession planning?
After all, skill gap analyses are not a one-off project. They thrive on being carried out regularly and on the results being used strategically. Only when skills are visible, up to date and strategically networked can they become a real management tool.
A company that does not know its capabilities does not know its possibilities.
New roles, new structures: how skill gaps also transform team dynamics
Skill gaps are not an abstract HR problem. They have a direct impact on teamwork. When certain skills are lacking, tasks are either compensated for, postponed or not completed. This not only affects productivity, but also the distribution of roles, responsibilities and the culture within the team.
This leads to informal structures in many companies: individual employees permanently take on tasks outside their actual area of expertise because no one else can cover them. This leads to overload, demotivation and, in the long term, to a creeping shift in role profiles that no longer match the original expectations.
This is where a transparent skill gap analysis provides clarity. It not only shows where gaps exist, but also where people are currently unable to contribute their potential because tasks are incorrectly distributed. According to McKinsey, companies that work with skills-first approaches report more agile teams, a greater willingness to take responsibility and better project allocation (McKinsey 2023).
However, this requires that roles are not rigidly defined. Instead of rigid job titles, dynamic competence landscapes are needed: Who can do what? Who wants to develop in which direction? Which tasks require new profiles and which can be rethought?
Skill gaps are forcing companies to rethink their team structures. Not as an organisational chart, but as a living structure of skills, development paths and ambitions. Recognising and supporting this dynamic not only creates a stronger organisation. It also creates a working environment in which people grow – and with them, the company.
Targeted use of upskilling: from insight to action
A skill gap analysis is only as good as the measures that follow.
After all, transparency is not an end in itself. It should enable decisions to be made and lead to the development of solutions. Those who identify skills gaps today must be prepared to invest in them tomorrow: in learning formats, in new ways of gaining qualifications and, of course, in people who can enrich the company.
Many companies react reflexively to skill gaps by hiring new people. But competition for top talent is fierce, and recruiting alone rarely solves the problem in the long term. It is much more effective to promote internal potential through targeted upskilling, cross-skilling and project-based development formats.
Deloitte points out that companies with a structured skills strategy not only fill open roles faster, but also significantly increase employee retention (Deloitte 2023). The prerequisite: the right people have access to the right learning opportunities at the right time – and the results flow back into strategic human resources planning.
This ensures that learning becomes a control variable.
Strategic skill development does not begin with the measure itself, but with insight. What is missing? What is available? And what is possible if we are prepared to invest?Strategic skill development therefore does not begin with the measure, but with the insight. What is missing? What is available? And: What is possible if we are willing to invest?
Organisations that identify and close skill gaps in a targeted manner not only gain professionals. They gain the ability to act.
Conclusion: Skill gap analyses are a strategic must
Strategic planners today must think in terms of skills. Not abstractly, not at some point in the future, but now, concretely and based on data. Because in every project, every innovation and every customer relationship, there is ultimately one crucial question: Do we have the right skills on board? Skill gap analyses provide the basis for this answer. They show where organisations stand and where they can develop. Those who take them seriously make themselves independent of lucky finds in recruiting.
Instead, they build in a targeted manner: with clear development goals, transparent role profiles and a corporate culture that not only recognises skills but also promotes them in a targeted manner.
This is not an HR playground. It is entrepreneurial risk management and at the same time an opportunity to strengthen employees before skills shortages become a brake on growth. Strategic personnel planning does not start with the budget.
It starts with the honest question: Do we really know what we can do?
Do you want to not only identify what you are missing, but also how you can systematically supplement and utilise it?
Then we can bring clarity to your skill architecture: data-driven, industry-experienced & people-centred – that's how we think about talent architecture today.
Get in touch with us now! We look forward to hearing from you.
Plus: To help you take the next step in finally getting skills-based hiring off the ground, we have created a checklist to get you started. Get the ‘Skills-Based Hiring: Your Ultimate Checklist’ from PALTRON now:
👉 Download checklist – The anatomy of a skills-based job advertisement
List of sources
- Business Insider (2025): No factory experience? No problem. Siemens trains new workers for manufacturing careers.
- Financial Times (2024): No degree, no problem: US employers look beyond college credentials
- Accenture (2023): Accenture and Workday collaborate to help organisations move to a skills-based approach to succeed in the future of work
- Calibr (2024): How To Conduct a Skills Gap Analysis
- Deloitte (2023): Skills-based hiring for a stronger government workforce
- McKinsey (2023): Right skills, right person, right role
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