France Travail, Numeum, Diversidays and Social Builder join forces to meet the challenge of recruitment needs in the digital sector

As a sector with a bright future, the digital sector offers strong recruitment potential, creating thousands of jobs every year. The results of the “Besoins en main-d’œuvre (BMO)” (manpower needs) survey carried out by companies indicate that there are numerous hiring intentions for 2023 in the digital professions, with 80,170 recruitment projects. What’s more, according to Numeum, the leading professional organization for the digital ecosystem in France, 85% of digital companies have seen stable or rising recruitment in 2023.

With almost 870,000 employees on December 31, 2022, spread across nearly 58,000 establishments, the sector is experiencing significant employment and skills needs. In 2023, over the first 3 quarters of the year, nearly 505,000 job offers were posted on pole-emploi.fr (up 11.7% on the first 3 quarters of 2022) and over 34,746 people entered training.

Over the next few years, the need for skills will remain at a high level, in particular to meet the requirements linked to the development of artificial intelligence, augmented reality, digital learning and cybersecurity technologies. What’s more, whatever the sector of activity, companies’ day-to-day tools are becoming “digitized” in response to new uses: 75% of jobs now require mastery of basic digital skills. Mastery of digital tools is one of the cross-disciplinary skills required for many professions.

To meet these challenges, France Travail and Numeum are committed to stepping up their involvement with companies in the digital sector, focusing on three main areas:

1. Make digital professions more attractive to jobseekers:

In a tight recruitment climate, promoting our professions is one way of facilitating recruitment.

Communication and awareness-raising initiatives and tools (job cards, webinars, etc.) as well as joint recruitment initiatives will be developed at national and regional level.

With the help of Numeum and other companies, France Travail will be organizing events all over France to present the jobs and training available to facilitate recruitment. Participants will benefit from interviews with a recruiter from a digital company, as well as with France Travail or Réseau pour l’emploi advisors, to help them find the right training and job opportunities in the sector.

2. Encourage more candidates to enter these professions:

Numeum is committed to encouraging companies in the sector to open their doors to candidates wishing to undertake a professional immersion. Thanks to the mobilization of these companies, France Travail will offer jobseekers interested in digital professions 2,000 immersions in companies in the sector to confirm their project, using the “digital marketplace” in Immersion Facilitée.

In addition, in order to broaden the search for candidates and develop new recruitment methods, particularly for young people, people with disabilities and seniors, France Travail will be working with federations of digital companies to organize potential detection workshops and simulation recruitment sessions to identify several hundred motivated candidates with the skills needed to work in the digital sector.

3. Improve digital skills training to meet business needs:

From 2024, France Travail is committed to financing 15,000 “Preparations opérationnelles à l’emploi” (POE) in the digital sector, including on-the-job training.

Starting in the first quarter of this year, France Travail and Numeum will be experimenting in territories in three regions: Grand Est, Normandie and Occitanie, with methods that will enable candidates to benefit from interviews with a recruiter from a digital company, as well as with France Travail advisors to guide them towards the right training courses and suitable job offers (an adaptation of the Numeric’Emploi scheme).

In addition, Diversidays, France’s leading association for equal opportunities, and France Travail will be consolidating their collaboration with the signing today of a 3-year partnership agreement.

This partnership aims to promote and facilitate the professional retraining of jobseekers in digital professions by deploying Déclics Numériques, Diversidays’ free coaching program accessible to all, with the objective of doubling the number of people coached by 2026.

Déclics Numériques is a fast-paced, 100% online program that introduces participants to a range of digital professions and the training courses that lead to them, introduces them to digital tools that can help them in their next job or job search, and provides them with job and training advice.

Since its inception, Déclics Numériques, alongside Pôle emploi (now France Travail), has guided over 10,000 people through 15 regional stages (in 9 regions of France). Among the beneficiaries, 25% go on to training and 33% find a job within 6 months of taking part. In this way, the program is helping to address the talent shortage in the digital sector.

Thanks to this new agreement, more than 20,000 jobseekers, under-represented because of their particular circumstances (people with disabilities, people living in working-class neighborhoods and rural areas, older people in employment or long-term jobseekers), will be supported by the Déclics Numériques program. One of the flagship initiatives of this partnership is the integration of a reinforced impact measurement to continue assessing the effectiveness of the scheme, in conjunction with France Travail.

Finally, in partnership with the Social Builder association and Apec, France Travail is running the FEMA project – Féminisons les Métiers d’Avenir – which aims to help 15,000 female jobseekers retrain for jobs with a strong digital and technical dimension in the sustainable city and construction, industry of the future and cybersecurity sectors.

Over the past 12 years, Social Builder has helped 50,000 women enter the digital professions and nearly 1,000 women entrepreneurs master key digital skills. In 2023, thanks to a strong collaboration with France Travail teams in 3 regions (Ile de France, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, Nouvelle-Aquitaine) more than 1,500 women have taken part in job discovery and training courses for successful retraining in digital professions.

The FEMA project, in consortium with the Campus des métiers et des qualifications d’excellence (CMQe) and companies, capitalizes on the expertise of each player to co-construct and amplify actions in favor of professional equality.

The FEMA project is based on 3 pillars:

1. Reaching out to women: attractiveness through events and targeted communication campaigns (30,000 active women reached);
2. Supporting women: a holistic approach to training – awareness-raising, orientation, project development and support during training (15,000 women supported);
3. Support for organizations: awareness-raising initiatives, support and training for more gender-friendly teaching and working practices (5000 trained professionals).

The FEMA program includes a dozen national events, including a large-scale event in Paris for 12,000 women in 2025, training to build a career transition project, and mentoring for jobseekers in transition to technical and digital professions. In parallel, 5 training modules will be developed and shared with organizations.

This large-scale project involves the entire ecosystem. Medef, UIMM, the Cyber campus and various professional federations and companies are partners.