TalentGuard Upskilling and Reskilling Initiatives
As the demand for new skills grows rapidly, reskilling and upskilling offer critical solutions for organizations to maintain competitiveness.
By 2025, the Forum predicts that up to 85 million jobs could shift due to changes in the division of labor between machines and humans.
Moreover, there is an expectation of creating 97 million new roles driven by technological advances and ongoing digital transformation.
Even for those remaining in their current roles, around 40% of essential skills are expected to change.
This underscores the urgent need for reskilling and upskilling across all employment levels, departments, and companies. With significant changes projected by 2025, the time to act is now.
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Let’s differentiate between reskilling and upskilling and explore how these strategies can better prepare your organization for upcoming shifts in the industry.
Upskilling involves acquiring new skills or teaching workers additional capabilities to enhance their current roles.
Reskilling, on the other hand, involves acquiring new skills to transition into a different job role or preparing individuals for alternative roles.
Both approaches are crucial for employers to effectively tackle the anticipated skills shortage.
Reskilling targets individuals with “adjacent skills,” closely related to the new skills required by the company.
This provides a lateral learning experience that is essential for meeting the extensive reskilling demands of today’s workforce.
The World Economic Forum estimates that by 2025, half of all employees will require reskilling due to technological advancements.
On the other hand, cultivating a culture of upskilling involves equipping employees with advanced skills to bridge talent gaps.
This approach emphasizes continuous education, enabling employees to advance within their current career paths.
Employee development through gamification platforms is just one of several strategies companies use to enhance their workforce’s skills.
Investing in employees’ careers not only promotes loyalty but also improves retention rates. According to LinkedIn Learning, 94% of workers would prefer to stay longer with companies that actively invest in their career development.
While many organizations acknowledge the importance of workforce development programs in addressing the skills gap, implementation is hampered by financial constraints and inadequate technology.
However, delaying action risks compromising your company’s ability to achieve long-term goals if access to necessary skills remains inadequate.
Solution: Career Pathing
Implementing structured career pathing is one of the most effective ways to integrate reskilling and upskilling into your organization. Career pathing is the process employees use to plan their personal career development.
Successful career pathing strategies use a competency-based approach. This involves assessing the specific competencies needed for each role and identifying the skills development necessary for employees moving into new positions.
Career paths are tailored for each employee, detailing the steps required to achieve long-term career goals through lateral moves or promotions.
They specify the knowledge, skills, and personal traits needed, helping to identify specialized skills and additional training required to fulfill career aspirations.
By embracing reskilling, upskilling, and structured career planning, organizations can proactively address the evolving needs of the workforce, ensuring they remain competitive and agile in an ever-changing business landscape.
The benefits of career planning to Support:
Reskilling and Upskilling
Introducing career planning into your organization offers numerous benefits, including:
Meeting Future Demand: By identifying existing capabilities, you can focus on developing key skills within your current workforce to effectively meet future demand.
Identifying Hidden Skills: Career planning empowers employees to assess and articulate their own skills, uncovering potential talents that the business may not have been aware of.
Creating a Culture of Talent Mobility: In today’s competitive talent market, employees are looking for employers who are dedicated to their career advancement.
A career path strategy not only attracts talent to your company but also enhances motivation and employee retention rates.
As digital transformation progresses rapidly, it is crucial to implement a successful career path strategy that includes reskilling and upskilling.
This approach benefits both employees and HR and is essential for keeping your organization competitive in the changing skills landscape.
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Businesses require skilled talent to meet market demands, a necessity that is unlikely to change. However, as market conditions, technologies, and organizational needs evolve, the demand for in-demand skills will also evolve.
Throughout history, forces like globalization have transformed the nature of most jobs for employees. Technology, including AI, has the potential to further revolutionize these roles.
In the near future, some jobs may disappear entirely, while many others will undergo significant transformations.
Additionally, new roles that companies have not yet envisioned will become essential. These factors underline why businesses cannot afford to become complacent.
Fortunately, leaders have two powerful tools at their disposal for talent development: upskilling and reskilling.
Upskilling and reskilling employees not only prepare companies for current changes but also equip them to handle upcoming developments that may demand greater agility.
As businesses strategize for shifts in talent requirements, several factors underscore the essential nature of upskilling and reskilling in 2023.
Key Differences Between Upskilling and Reskilling
While there are similarities between the two approaches, upskilling and reskilling have distinct purposes.
Upskilling focuses on enhancing an employee’s current abilities by teaching them new skills within their existing role. For instance, an IT technician might take certification courses to learn about newly released software that their job now requires.
On the other hand, reskilling is geared towards preparing employees for entirely different roles. This typically happens when the skills they currently possess are no longer in demand in the market, but the company wants to retain and transition them into new positions.
For example, with the advent of artificial intelligence potentially phasing out receptionist roles, HR departments could identify receptionists and train them for customer service specialist roles instead. Reskilling not only involves building new skills but also adapting existing ones to new roles.
The Benefits of Upskilling
While many managers attribute talent departure to salary issues, they’re not entirely mistaken. However, inadequate compensation isn’t the sole contributing factor.
A significant driver of turnover across industries is the lack of career advancement opportunities. Employees are unwilling to remain in stagnant roles; they seek challenges, stretch assignments, and opportunities for career progression.
Career advancement doesn’t always entail moving into management. Elevating an employee to a senior specialist role with added responsibilities can foster their loyalty to the organization.
Upskilling provides employees with the learning opportunities they desire and establishes an internal talent pool, reducing the need to recruit external candidates for senior positions.
When employees witness a company investing in their professional development, it often enhances productivity.
Learning opportunities typically elevate job satisfaction, resulting in improved outcomes. Moreover, the enhanced skill sets themselves contribute to more favorable business results.
The Benefits of Reskilling
The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development predicts that technology will transform 1.1 billion jobs over the next decade.
AI and machine learning will drive many of these changes. The shift to green technology and the aftermath of the pandemic will also play significant roles.
Business leaders are likely to encounter widening skill gaps unless they implement reskilling programs.
The concern extends beyond just shortages between available workers and open positions. Disparities between the skills roles demand and the knowledge employees possess could create additional problems.
Staff members may lack proficiency needed for transitioning into critical roles that businesses require. Moreover, finding skilled talent externally will become more expensive than it is today.
Reskilling demonstrates that leaders are forward-thinking. Once a role becomes irrelevant or redundant, keeping it is an unnecessary expense.
Employees who hear rumors of downsizing are more likely to leave the company. Those who stay may become increasingly dissatisfied as their roles lose relevance, posing challenges for the business to stay competitive.
When companies prepare employees for upcoming changes, they can avoid layoffs, voluntary departures, and declines in morale and productivity among remaining employees.
Enabling Adaptability
The ability to adapt to change is crucial for a company’s survival. Moreover, staying ahead of the curve increases the chances of a business thriving.
While not every leader excels at innovation, nearly everyone can analyze trends and developments.
Without adapting resources, pivoting business models to meet emerging realities becomes nearly impossible.
Upskilling and reskilling programs enhance the versatility of human resources. For instance, someone skilled in routine client support can expand those abilities to handle a growing backlog of complex requests.
Similarly, companies in declining industries can transform themselves to align with emerging sectors, such as green energy.
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When a business is agile, the risk of fading into obscurity decreases. With staff members possessing updated skills, companies can confidently meet market demands.
Businesses also gain cost-saving opportunities through various work models, like remote collaboration. Furthermore, employees with diverse capabilities can quickly transition into new or expanded roles.
