Emsi Releases Major Skills Data Improvement Within Job Posting Analytics

The newly released September job postings data brings several important updates to Emsi’s skills data that are now live in Analyst and Developer. These updates include changes to the underlying data as well as a simplified interface. As a result, users can expect to find more robust skills data to use in their work.

Changes in Skills Data

Here’s what’s changing in the underlying data:

• Skills that are too generic, like “best practices,” have been removed from our taxonomy.

• We’ve improved the tagging of skills to various occupations and job titles so that results are more accurate and relevant.

• We are introducing a new skill category known as “common skills” that combines the current “soft skills” category and common skills, like “management,” that were previously tagged as hard skills or certifications.

• This new category, “common skills,” will replace the current “soft skills” category.

What’s Changing in Analyst and Developer (and Why)

What additional changes you’ll notice in Analyst and Developer:

• The category “certifications” is now named “qualifications” as it encompasses more than just traditional certifications. For example, “MBA (Master of Business Administration)” falls into the category of “qualifications.”

• As mentioned above, the “soft skills” category is being removed and replaced by “common skills,” which encompasses both soft skills and commonly occurring hard skills and qualifications.

• All “most relevant” skills packets, which includes “most relevant hard skills,” “most relevant soft skills,” and “most relevant certifications,” are being removed in light of the data improvements. In short, the “top” skill packets will be more actionable, rendering the “most relevant” packets unnecessary.

We hope this improvement strengthens your experience in Analyst and Developer and provides you with richer insight into the labor market.

If you have questions about these updates, or are interested in getting access to our Job Posting Analytics, please contact matthew.hyndman@economicmodeling.com.