At Big Village, we’re committed to providing the right resources to onboard our talent, as well as addressing diversity challenges that exist within the AdTech industry.
EMX is excited to announce that we will be one of the first companies to partner with the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), the digital media and marketing trade association, to be part of the first-ever digital media apprenticeship program in the U.S.
The “IAB Accelerate: Digital Media Apprenticeship” program has been created in partnership with American Apprenticeships Work (AAW) to address the digital skills gap and industry-wide diversity challenges. EMX will be our first business to hire Data Analyst Apprentices to join our growing team and to be a part of this apprenticeship program. We are thrilled about our partnership with AWW and the IAB to onboard two great apprentices to help kickstart their careers in AdTech and watch them grow with us over the next 12 months.
This January, Salesforce released its 2022 Global Digital Skills Index which highlighted the growth of the digital skills gap within the industry. The pandemic has put additional pressure on this growing gap as there currently are not enough skilled workers on the job market to fill all required roles, and this is not just a generational concern either. In the survey of 23,000 global workers, only 31% of Gen Z respondents, the first truly digital native generation, feel “very equipped” for a digital-first job.
Addressing this skill gap is an essential task for any digital company. We believe this also goes hand-in-hand with addressing the industry-wide diversity challenge. Transparency is an important first step in addressing this challenge. Here at EMX, transparency is not just important to our clients, but it is a value we internalize culturally. With that in mind, we are working hard to be more transparent about how we’re tackling our diversity challenge.
At Big Village, we have a commitment to increase diversity by 22% by 2023, and we post our progress on our Career Pages to keep our employees informed. Currently, 24% of our population identify as a race other than white and we are projected to be at 30% by Q4 2023. That being said, diversity is more than just numbers. We want our workplace at Big Village to be better reflective of the communities we live and work in, and a great place to kickstart a digital career.
We continue to challenge ourselves to really dig deep and ask, “What’s needed for someone to be successful here?” And that does not always need to include a college degree. To succeed as an apprentice at EMX, you will need to love numbers and big data, be curious about technology and be excited to learn. Does this sound like you or someone you know? Apply here.
We’re looking forward to growing together.
Written by Rachael Brockman, VP of Global HR, Big Village.