New research says company bosses value digital skills just as highly as a university degree. Nearly four in 10 UK CEOs and senior decision-makers said basic digital skills are the asset that makes a young person most employable, compared to non-vocational university degrees.

Nearly three quarters of UK business leaders said a person with digital skills has as good a career prospect as someone holding a degree, while 67% said basic digital literacy is the single most important skill their business seeks in young employees. 65% of business leaders say 16-24 year-olds struggle when it comes to basic digital skills.

Over half (56%) of the businesses BT Group spoke with find young people often struggle with simple computer-based workplace tasks, such as creating a spreadsheet, writing a professional email, or operating workplace software.

Anthony Ogbanufe, 25, chose to skip university and instead enrolled on BT Group’s apprenticeship scheme. He said: “Being a big gamer helped me because I could understand how things should work well for users and it gave me intuitive design insights, which was useful when I helped redesign the BT gaming page."

BT Group’s Work Ready events and its partnership with FastFutures is helping to tackle the UK’s digital skills gap by helping young people build on their experience and confidence of using tech to learn new skills that will see them succeed in the workplace.

Laura Jenkinson, a 22-year-old trainee accountant from Stroud, decided to skip university to start her career. She said: “It took me a while to get to grips with things but I was glad I had stuck to my guns. Being tech savvy helped me in my first position a lot – it was something I could bring to the job when I hadn’t had any experience yet."

Victoria Johnson, Digital Impact and Sustainability Campaigns and Engagement Director, BT Group, said: “Young people may feel they don’t have the skills they need to thrive in the world of work, but the jump from being tech-savvy to business-ready isn’t as big as they might think. With such a wide digital skills gap in the UK, loads of firms are seeking people with basic digital skills that can be trained to develop into roles that would traditionally have required a degree.

“At BT Group we’re proud to be supporting young people who want to build upon what they already know about tech to learn business-relevant digital skills. Armed with digital skills, brilliant careers across a huge range of industries await the smart, ambitious, talented people who will build the diverse, inclusive internet of tomorrow.”

For 18-24-year olds looking to get a job in data, head to FastFutures.com and apply for the data bootcamp funded by BT Group to learn in-demand digital and data skills while getting career guidance.