The Community of Madrid, together with the Basque Country and Navarra, and to a lesser extent, Catalonia and Aragon, concentrate the ability to create, attract and retain talent in Spain. This is reflected in the 2023 Talent Map, prepared by Cotec and the Ivie (Valencian Institute of Economic Research), which has been presented in Valladolid.
The report analyzes the talent available in each territory based on fifty indicators. In addition, it has an interactive visualization tool, now available at cotec.es. As a novelty, this year each regional result can be compared with the equivalent of Germany, one of the main talent hubs in Europe.
The index measures the capacity of territories to create, attract and retain talent. Of the five autonomous communities highlighted at the beginning, only Madrid surpasses the German record.
The work analyzes, first of all, the migratory flows of Spain, that is, the professional profiles of migrants, as well as their origins and destinations. Germany, the third favorite destination for Spanish migrants, has been the country chosen to compare the results. The work shows that Spain exports much more qualified profiles than it imports.
In 2019, 43% of Spanish workers who emigrated did so to occupy a highly qualified position, while only 11.3% of foreigners who came to work in Spain occupied that profile.
Similarly, only 39.9% of Spanish emigrants ended up working in elementary or manual occupations, compared to 84.9% of foreigners who arrived in Spain. According to various sources cited in the study, more than half of the mass of emigrants who left had higher education, compared to almost a quarter of the immigrants who arrived.
The Cotec-IVIE Talent Index is made up of 55 socioeconomic indicators, organized into six pillars: Facilitate, Attract, Grow, Retain, Technical capabilities and vocations, as well as Knowledge. To establish the ranking, an average of these pillars has been taken, which range between 100 points as the maximum value achievable by the best positioned territory and 0 points as a minimum.
The Community of Madrid manages to lead three of the pillars (Facilitate, Attract and Impact of Knowledge), while the Basque Country, Navarra and Catalonia lead one (Grow, Retain and Capacities and technical vocations, respectively). Madrid surpasses Germany in four of the six pillars. Eight of the 17 autonomous communities do not surpass Germany in any pillar.
