Which are the best future skills to learn for the future workplace? And how can you enjoy upskilling and learning new skills for the future of work?
The WEF Future Of Jobs 2020 Report mapped the jobs and future skills for all. It also listed the new skills to learn to prepare for the future of work based on the accelerated pace of change after the COVID-19 pandemic.
According to the report, 50% of all employees will need to upskill and reskill by 2025 as the economic impacts of the pandemic, the use of automation in jobs, and the requirement to learn new technology skills and digital skills for the future take hold.
Critical thinking and problem-solving are some of the most valuable skills for the future. Self-management, active learning, resilience, stress tolerance and flexibility are also some of the new things to learn as skills for the future workforce.
According to the World Economic Forum skills report, these 10 future work skills will be in demand in the future workplace:
1. Analytical thinking & innovation
2. Active learning & learning strategies
3. Complex problem solving
4. Critical thinking & analysis
5. Creativity, originality & initiative
6. Leadership & social influence
7. Technology use, monitoring & control
8. Technology design & programming
9. Resilience, stress tolerance & flexibility
10. Reasoning, problem-solving & ideation
You may notice that none of these skills has to do with a specific job. That is because the job for life model is dead. Today, organisations want employees who are willing to keep learning and stay relevant in their field of expertise.
Millennials understand this trend for reskilling (meaning learning new skills) as 93% of them see learning future competencies as important and are willing to invest their own time and money in learning a skill.
Because of the growth of online education during the pandemic, there are a huge number of future skills courses that offer new skills to learn at home.
Today, learning a skill is as simple as logging in to an online portal or website. So it is possible for organisations to scale up their process to upskill and reskill employees in the thousands.
Many older people may be serious about reskilling and upskilling but don’t know how to learn new skills online. But regardless of your age or current skills, now is the best time to find new things to learn.
Of course, learning new skills and knowledge takes some time and commitment towards your goal. But learning is an ability that all humans have and there is no better time to learn a new skill at home.
Although online courses have a lower retention rate than traditional classroom environments, there are a number of online learning tips and tricks that will help you learn new skills online.
Here are some of the active learning skills that have helped me learn new skills for free and stay at the top of my profession.
The biggest way to stay motivated in your journey of learning new skills is to know your WHY – the reason you are learning a skill. The threat of losing your job is not a good enough reason. But the joy of learning something you enjoy is.
If you have a new skill you want to learn to stay relevant in your profession or make a career transition, you must find some joy in the learning process or you won’t be motivated to complete it.
For a lot of people, the time when they decide to change careers is the best time to find their passion and live a life with purpose and meaning. Having a vision for your new life is usually enough to motivate us to start learning new skills.
If you like making lists, you can start by listing out all the ways that learning this particular skill will improve your life and get you closer to your goal.
The first step to learning new skills and knowledge is to be clear about what skills you already have. Make a list of the skills you already possess and a separate list of the skills you need to learn to reach your career goals.
If you plan to make a career change, you can also get clarity on your career aptitude by doing a free career assessment that will help you learn about the best career for your personality.
If you need career guidance from experts, you can join the Glow & Lovely Career community where you can take a free career test to learn about careers that match your interests, try a free online course to learn a new skill or create a resume with the easy resume builder.
Once you’ve decided on which future proof skills you want to learn, you need to find the best way to acquire them. There are many ways to learn new skills, but only you know your capacity for learning and your preferred mode of learning.
You can choose the type of online course that works best for you based on your preferred learning style, whether you prefer to learn with text, audio or video, interactive modes of learning, or require some hand-holding and mentoring to achieve your goals.
You should also calculate how much time you will need to spend to start learning a skill and complete the courses you need to learn it. Some future skills courses will require more time and effort than others.
You need to ensure that you can set aside a few hours in the day for any projects or assignments required to complete the course.
Today, there are a large number of low-cost and free online courses with certification that will help you learn new skills online free without investing a lot of money in them.
The reason I recommend starting with a free course is that you can change your mind at any point if you do not enjoy the subject and decide that you don’t want to build a career in it.
This is harder to do when you’ve invested a good deal of money in it and feel compelled to complete the course even when you’re not interested in the subject.
If you decide to learn new skills online for free, it gives you the flexibility to change your mind and pivot to a new subject or study a related topic that you’re more interested in.
Many online learning platforms allow you to curate their courses free and pay a small amount if you decide that you want a certificate in that topic to add to your resume or display on your LinkedIn profile.
Once you’ve completed the online course you want to study, you can decide whether you want to pay for the certificate or not.
As Leo Buscaglia said, “Change is the end result of all true learning.” When you learn something new, it will change you and help you see the world differently.
For example, doing a free online personality development course on the Glow & Lovely Career website can help you learn soft skills that will transform your personality in visible ways.
Once you’ve absorbed the ideas and information in the online course you need to start putting them into practice, either in your workplace or as a side project.
For instance, if you just completed a free digital marketing course in building your Instagram presence, you need to put those ideas into practice and start creating the kind of content that will grow your followers and engagement on Instagram.
If you’re a student, you can apply for an online internship where you can put your newly-acquired skills into practise and hone them for your future job.
One of the best ways to learn everything about a new skill is to share your knowledge with others. Most online course platforms also have an online forum for learners to connect and help each other out.
You can help out by answering questions from other learners on the topics you’re studying or even start a blog where you answer frequently asked questions by others.
Mentoring others will also help you build your expertise and brand you as an expert in your subject. This can lead to new job opportunities and offers in the area of your expertise and help you build a personal brand.
As Heraclitus said, "Change is the only constant," and the most in-demand skills in future are bound to change with advancements in technology and robotic process automation.
Along with the future of skills, the list of the best things to learn online will surely change as will the most important skills for the future. What will not change, however, is the fact that acquiring new skills will become a necessity for all age groups and demographics.
However, we can be sure that the future will also bring improvements in online education and learning technology, making it easier to acquire any new skill you want to learn.
For those who love learning, there will be many new things to learn every day, and those who need to learn to keep up with change will have access to many new skills to learn while at home.
Also read: