Did you know pharmacy technicians and medical assistants have very similar skillsets? Or that printing press operators, an occupation in decline, share many of the same characteristics as fast-growing machinists?
These are just two examples from EMSI’s proprietary workforce compatibility index, which is part of Analyst, our web-based labor market data tool. The compatibility index has valuable applications for workforce development boards seeking to help jobseekers find employment, higher education institutions guiding students in their career choices, economic development organizations looking to show the available talent pool in their region — and private companies on the hunt for candidates.
An Example: Pharmacy Techs to Medical Assistants
Step 1: Setting Up Our Search
In the Workforce tab of Analyst, we can type in any O*NET occupation in the search bar. For our example, we search for “pharmacy technicians.”
Once we’re on the pharmacy technicians page, we see medical assistants — along with pharmacy aides — as the top compatible occupation based on the compatibility index; both are ranked 97 on a scale of 1-100. Median hourly earnings are also very similar ($14.07 for pharmacy techs; $14.17 for med assistants), and both are large occupations that have added between 5,000 and 15,000 jobs apiece since 2010.
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Step 2: Occupation Comparison
The next step is to click on the right arrow icon under the “Compat. Index” column on the medical assistants row. This brings us to the occupation comparison page.
Here we see a side-by-side breakdown of the education levels, wages, and competency requirements for the source occupation (pharmacy techs) and the target occupation (medical assistants).
Education Levels
Among current workers in these professions at the national level, a higher percentage of medical assistants have associate’s degrees (22% to 1%), while a lot more pharmacy techs have a postsecondary certificate (39% to 23%).
Wages
The percentile wages for medical assistants and pharmacy techs are very similar. The entry-level earners (10th percentile) earn around $10 per hour in each, and the top earners in both occupations make just under $20 per hour (or roughly $40,000 per year).
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Knowledge and Skills
We can also view the shape of each occupation and how their competencies (knowledge, skills, abilities) match up on automatically generated radar charts.
Among important O*NET knowledge categories, medical assistants have slightly higher levels of customer and personal services, clerical, medicine and dentistry — and particularly psychology.
For skill categories, medical assistants have slightly higher levels of active listening, speaking, reading comprehension, etc.
These comparisons can be done for hundreds of occupations, and they’re valuable not just for companies in the hiring process but also for a broad range of education, workforce, and economic development professionals.
Data for this post comes from Analyst, EMSI’s web-based labor market data and analysis tool. For more information, contact Josh Wright (jwright@economicmodeling.com). Follow us on Twitter @DesktopEcon.
Illustration by Bekah Rust.
