Cities in California and Minnesota both have growing medical technology manufacturing industries, but job seekers in those states need different skills to be competitive in the industry.

In California, the jobs focus more on programming and life science skills, while the jobs in Minnesota focus more on product development and industrial engineering.

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This may be the furthest a firm has gotten in accurately assessing the gap between supply and demand for jobs and skills, according to Jim Fong, lead consultant at the University Professional and Continuing Education Association.

“Their ability to link labor … and education data, apply their forecasts, and link the external databases is impressive, and the job analytics they are producing are very good,” Fong said. “They’ve taken these external databases and organized them in a way that allows them to cross-reference so much data, including skills asked of employers for specific jobs, by occupation, industry and various levels of geography.”

Continuing education programs could use these data to find areas to explore further, he said. For instance, Fong said he would want to convene area businesses to discuss the demand for certain skills, which would differ based on whether he was in Minnesota or in California.

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