These are the skills you will need in the future world of work – McKinsey
Digital and AI technologies are transforming the world of work and today’s workforce will need to learn new skills and be able to adapt more quickly as new occupations emerge. But which are the specific skills tomorrow’s workers will require?
A research by the McKinsey Global Institute – on 18,000 people in 15 countries – has looked at the kind of jobs that will be lost, as well as those that will be created, as automation, AI, and robotics take hold. The research has inferred the type of high-level skills that will become increasingly important as a result.
Researchers predict that the need for manual and physical skills, as well as basic cognitive ones, will decline, but demand for technological, social and emotional, and higher cognitive skills will grow.
The research identified 56 foundational skills – called DELTAs (distinct elements of talent) that will benefit all citizens and showed that higher proficiency in them is already associated with a higher likelihood of employment, higher incomes, and job satisfaction.
Research shows that demand for technological, social and emotional, and higher cognitive skills will grow.
56 Skills that Will Help Citizens Thrive in the Future of Work
Researchers started from four broad skill categories – cognitive, digital, interpersonal, and self-leadership – then identified 13 separate skill groups belonging to those categories.
Interesting Findings
Researchers also examined whether proficiency was linked to education. Overall, survey participants with a university degree had higher average DELTA proficiency scores than those without, suggesting that participants with higher levels of education are better prepared for changes in the workplace.
However, a higher level of education is not associated with higher proficiency in all DELTAs. For some DELTAs, more education was associated with lower proficiency, “humility” being an example.
The results showed that survey respondents with higher DELTA proficiencies were, on average, more likely to be those that were employed, with higher incomes, and higher job satisfaction.
Overall, survey participants with a university degree had higher average proficiency scores across 56 distinct elements of talent.
Digital proficiency seems to be particularly associated with higher incomes: a respondent with higher digital proficiency across all digital DELTAs was 41% more likely to earn a top-quintile income than respondents with lower digital proficiency, according to the study.
Job satisfaction is also associated with certain DELTAs, especially those in the self-leadership category. Holding all variables, including income, constant, “self-motivation and wellness,” “coping with uncertainty,” and “self-confidence,” had the highest impact on respondents’ job satisfaction.
Three Actions Governments Could Take
- Reform education systems: Governments could consider reviewing and updating curricula to focus more strongly on the DELTAs, and they could also consider leading further research. In addition, governments could consider setting up institutions for research and innovation in education to fund the research, facilitate researchers’ access to schools to test innovative solutions, and establish which methods work for which DELTAs.
- Reform adult-training systems: Raising proficiency in the DELTAs would require continuous adult training. Specific actions that might encourage relevant adult learning include the following: Establish an AI aggregator of training programs to attract adult learners and encourage lifelong learning, introduce a skill-based certification system, and fund schemes that encourage a higher focus on DELTAs.
- Ensure affordability of lifelong education: Today’s technological revolution should drive further expansion to ensure universal, high-quality, affordable access to education from early childhood to retirement and to ensure that curricula include the DELTAs that will future-proof citizens’ skills in the world of work.
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