The survey found that many companies are being forced to recruit individuals with fewer skills than they need despite record rates of A-level pass rates, which hit 97% last week.
Phil Orford, the FPB's chief executive, said: "There is a clear gap between what businesses need and what businesses get when it comes to the ability of the education system to produce viable employees for small businesses.
"The research proves that our members have problems when it comes to finding staff with basic attributes such as communication, numeracy and literacy, as well as more developed and specific skills that are required by individual businesses."
Darrin Stevens, group training director at Polestar, said: "There is a real problem with skills throughout the industry. Around 10% of our staff are below level 1 and 63% have no formal qualification. When redundancies happen, people must have the qualifications to fall back on.
"There needs to be a model akin to what the government did with the Olympics. The infrastructure needs to be laid down and the money needs to be readily available, but business and the unions must also play their part in attracting and encouraging skilled people."
Britain's workforce 'is poorly skilled', companies tell FPB survey
Labour's educational standards have come under fire after one in five businesses told the Forum of Private Businesses (FPB) that Britain's workforce is poorly skilled, with half saying the situation is hitting their bottom line.
