Nurturing talents for a world headed towards digitization is pertinent at the moment. Pandemic or not, we have been adopting technology in every aspect of our lives, and it is clear that we as a nation have to acclimate ourselves in the workforce to a certain level of digital resilience to keep up with the rapidly-evolving job market too. Before we delve deeper, we think it is vital to breakdown some of the terms we keep seeing everywhere in the light of a digital world.
Skill development, upskilling, and reskilling initiatives have been set up in a lot of corporate companies, and even in partnership with other organizations in the region. Simply put, these initiatives are made possible by advances in learning methods and analytics. It uses shared data about skills, tasks, and employment prospects to match people who would otherwise be laid off with new digitally oriented jobs and the training needed to fill them. This is a sigh of relief especially for millions of young people around the world who are coming of age and finding themselves unemployed and unemployable, while many older, long-established employees are discovering their jobs are becoming obsolete. As reported here, it is estimated that 540,000 jobs would be made available in this year alone, with a 15% increase of estimated growth of talent requirement by 2020. How do we counter this? For one, taking existing members of your organization and training them up is an effective way to stay ahead of the curve. This is what skilling is called.
As jobs evolve, so will the skills needed to perform them. According to the World Economic Forum, at least 54% of all employees will require significant reskilling and upskilling by 2022. Upskilling is a great possibility for those who need additional training to remain relevant or to advance in their existing company or industry. Equipping the workforce with the right skills is a global top priority across all industries and sectors. Also, governments making workforce transitions and job creation a more urgent priority, in partnership with businesses and individuals both playing their role. If done right, upskilling at-scale has the potential to make a powerful impact.
Regular development initiatives and programs can prevent workplace idleness and employee complacency. Offering programs within employment contracts establish an employee’s sense of value within the company, and fosters loyalty and ultimately staff retention. This is where reskilling programs can be implemented. Reskilling is effective to help the existing workforce to transition into an entirely new type of job and career trajectory. Of course, this is rooted in their willingness to transition to a field of opportunities to best suit the revolving doors of the job market. It is also important to reiterate that all these initiatives should and is not a lonely battle of companies to keep their workforce afloat with the trends. In fact, it is perfect timing to set an exemplary collaboration between the public and private sectors to advance a new agenda that empowers people with the resources and tools they need to improve their lives.
The top benefit for driving employee development is to shape a more efficient, competitive, and engaged workforce. However, it is not solely your employers’ responsibility to keep this skill-development wheel rolling. Individuals should partake in the responsibility to keep their skills up-to-date in order to gain a competitive edge. This can easily be done by participating in government-sponsored training development programs, signing up for online courses using mobile apps or online platforms, and even attending industry-relevant conferences.
The future of work will be disrupted by tech time and again, so having a workforce that can adapt to these changes fast can be a great upper-hand to hold over competitors. However, acquiring a competitive edge is not necessarily the end-all-be-all matter. In our next piece, we will discuss the how-tos’ and whys’ of skill development and why is it absolutely necessary for everyone to get on board.
