Innovate UK is co-funding Filtered's algorithm development work to build the skills that will close the UK's productivity deficit.
We're excited to have started work on an ambitious project to close the UK's productivity deficit by building skills. The UK's innovation agency, Innovate UK, is co-funding our algorithm development work to help personalise training precisely to optimise the productivity of today's knowledge workers.
National and firm-level productivity in the UK has worried policy makers and business leaders for decades. But now flat growth, a debt overhang from the 2008 crisis, and post-Brexit political and economic uncertainty threaten long-term depression.
So far, so depressing.
But we believe the solution to the problem is not macro-economic or high finance, but highly personal and highly practical.
Something we can all engage with.
We plan to harness technology to change the way we build skills. If we can:
- understand how skills support productivity
- diagnose where those skills are deficient, and
- use algorithmic techniques to identify learning opportunities that will best close those gaps
We will have a golden thread of understanding that connects individual learning decisions with organisational impact.
We will build this understanding into our magpie product, and use it to drive better recommendations.
There are two strands to the project. Economic research, conducted by Gavan Conlon and team at London Economics, a leading specialist economics consultancy with expertise in labour markets and education sectors. And algorithmic research and development, conducted by Filtered’s science and development teams, building candidate algorithms and testing the quality of their training recommendations.
If this sounds interesting, and in particular if you would like to help, please get in touch with me. We're keen on views on what makes a good (and bad!) recommendation, volunteers we can bounce ideas off, critical beta-testers, in fact on any enthusiastic input. You can read a little more about the project, Innovate UK, and London Economics here in our press release. We'll be blogging and sharing our experience and findings as we go.
Wishing you a productive day,
