I dare to guess that these days every other quantum conference features a panel discussion about “tackling the shortage of quantum skills” or “building the quantum industry workforce”. I was pretty interested the first time I heard one, but quickly lost interest since due to excessive fluff-to-ideas ratio (bring back the Big Talk!)

If you’re also frustrated about panelists who use very much time to say very little, and are looking for a bunch of straight-up shooters for your panel, I’m happy to volunteer my services. If I were invited, here is what I’d say about the quantum workforce of the future:

  1. For better of worse, the hardcore quantum industry of today needs a lot of smart PhDs to make real progress. However, many countries actively discourage smart people from doing PhDs by offering them laughably sub-market wages. Stop that.

  2. If you’re launching a quantum engineering masters, talk to the industry to understand their needs. Perhaps you think they need people who understand hamiltonians and louvilians, but they actually need people who understand material science or control theory.

  3. Most of quantum technology development is just classical engineering, perhaps in an unusual or novel domain. A great engineer can learn “this is how we build qubits, and this is how we do quantum gates on them” on day 1, and start contributing to the quantum industry on day 2, learning the rest on the go. No need to overcomplicate the upskilling process.

  4. We absolutely should get K-12 and university students excited about quantum technologies. However, we should not entice them with a promise of high-paying jobs in an industry facing worker shortage. This is unethical, as we don’t know what quantum industry will need and look like in 10-15 years (assuming it still exists!). If you want to dedicate your career to building crazy near-impossible technology of the future, quantum computing is for you. Bit if your main motivation is a good secure job, join an industry which is not evolving as quickly.

That’s it - thank you, and I look forward to any questions.