Advice for Irish students!

IDA Ireland CEO Barry O’Leary has advised those students who will complete their CAO applications in the coming days, on where the greatest job opportunities will lie in FDI (Foreign Direct Investment) companies in the future. Ireland’s availability of skilled labour is one of the primary reasons cited by IDA clients for establishing their operations in Ireland. The recently published IMD World Competitiveness Yearbook 2011 ranks Ireland 1st in the world for the availability of skilled labour and 3rd in the world for availability of financial skills.

The MSD Pharma plant in the Suir Valley!

The Irish Management Institute/National Irish Bank Survey of Multinational Companies in Ireland 2011 recently revealed that nearly half of all multinationals based in Ireland expect to grow employment in the next 12 months.

Mr O'Leary said, ‘‘There is a strong trend for FDI companies in Ireland winning new mandates which will require an increase in their employment levels in the future. Students planning now for their future careers need to take this growth into account and consider in which sectors the greatest FDI job opportunities will be in the coming years.’’

In the last 12 months there has been a strong performance in job creation by multinational companies with export-led growth creating in excess of 13,000 new foreign direct investment jobs. A large number of FDI companies seek graduates with backgrounds in science, technology, engineering and maths. In addition many FDI jobs also require multi-lingual skills.

Ireland’s academic institutions provide a wide variety of courses which qualify graduates to meet industry needs to match with employment opportunities. These include technology programmes in computer science, software engineering and computer applications and support. Universities and Institutes of Technology in Ireland offer, for example, computer science courses with a foreign language, accounting, finance and international business courses with languages, supply chain/logistics programmes, science qualifications and chemical, electronic and mechanical engineering degree courses.

IDA works closely with industry and academia, facilitating collaboration between both to ensure the skills requirements of multinational companies are met. By looking at the future skills requirements of these FDI companies, which continue to locate and expand in Ireland, students making their CEO applications can advance their career prospects while maximizing their opportunities for diversity within innovative global corporations.