Tip 4: Upskill Your Workers to Future-Proof Your Workforce

If you want your business to stay up-to-date and prepared for the future, you need a plan. Workforce trends and expectations are constantly changing. There are steps you as an employer need to take to future-proof your workforce and ensure you’ve got the right resources and skills at all times.

We’ve discussed three tips so far in this series.

1. Employers should nurture their employees’ work-life balance.
2. Don’t let your employees burn out.
3. Adjust your company for remote work.

Your workforce expects you to care about them. They want to know that they can work and spend time on personal commitments. They need to have realistic tasks and deadlines that don’t drive them to exhaustion. Their benefits need to include flexibility and autonomy built on trust. They also need to know that when they commit themselves to a role or company, they’ll be making career developments.

This brings us to our fourth tip. You need to constantly upskill your employees to future-proof your workforce. This is for your benefit and theirs.

How the Skills Shortage Affects Your Workforce

We are currently experiencing a severe skills shortage. According to Forbes, 54% of companies across the world have reported this issue. If you need a particular talent, you’re going to need to be offering competitive compensation.

The industries hardest hit include technology, telecommunications, manufacturing, healthcare, and retail. But why? For one, a lot more people are retiring. The pandemic only accelerated this with the older workforce either being forced to retire or choosing to go into early retirement. Many companies weren’t prepared for the gap in skills they suddenly had.

Another reason is the shift in the millennial mentality. They expect flexibility and aren’t compromising their personal lives for work so easily anymore. Burnout awareness is also increasing, meaning many people are being pickier about where they work.

Another leading cause of the skills shortage is technology. While people believe that artificial intelligence (AI) is taking their jobs, the reality is that more jobs are being created – they just don’t have the skills for them. As technology evolves, upskilling becomes the key to growth.

Why Upskilling Is So Beneficial for Future-Proofing Your Workforce

To stay relevant and prepared for the future, you need to upskill your employees. This will save you the time and money that goes into recruiting and training new hires. Your company gets to evolve as a team and is better prepared for future uncertainties.

As mentioned, technology is something we need to advance with. Finding new staff each time something in the industry changes isn’t a viable solution. Your employees should be learning new innovations and AI advancements as they emerge. Your company, therefore, stays relevant and competitive in the industry.

Upskilling is, in fact, a good hiring strategy. You as an employer can look for a combination of recently skilled talent (graduates) that requires workforce guidance, and experienced talent that requires training in new skills. Together, they can learn and grow to develop their skills.

The other major benefit is that you’ll attract top talent. When a dedicated and serious job seeker sees that your company offers career development opportunities – they’ll want to work with you. Your team will be more likely to stick around when they feel valued enough to be trained in new skills for the sake of retention. You’re left with committed, productive workers that want to grow with you.

How to Upskill Your Employees for Now and the Future

So how do you upskill your team? Even if upskilling is a new concept to you, you most likely already had to do it during the pandemic. The way we provide products and services completely altered during this period. Even the way we communicated meant everyone gained some technical skills.

You can offer in-house training, reimburse workers for certificates or courses done in their own time or as part of their contract, and have online team training where everyone can learn from each other. Here are some steps to upskilling your workforce.

1. Identify your gaps – assess your available skill sets and get an idea of where you need training. Some of your team members will already have ideas of what they’d like to learn while others will need your guidance.

2. Do your research – conduct an analysis of current industry trends and predictions for the future. Stay in the loop with discussions online so you’re familiar with what your competition is doing.

3. Communicate with your team – have a conversation with your employees to inform them that you’re investing in their growth. Get to know your team’s career goals so you know who’s willing to take on what positions. As an employer, you can lead by example and learn new skills alongside your employees.

4. Make a plan – figure out the best way to conduct this training. Look at your in-house mentorship opportunities, identify online tools and calculate how your employees can complete their work and their upskilling.

5. Do it again – upskilling isn’t something you check off after doing it once. You’ll need to constantly adapt your workforce to industry trends and emerging technology.

Read more in our whitepaper Transform Your Talent Management with Skills & Competency Alignment.

Take Home Message on Future-Proofing

Upskilling your employees is an investment in your company. Your employees will grow with industry advancements and you won’t need to waste resources constantly finding new talent. You can also avoid the issue of skills gaps that interfere with your performance.

Combine upskilling with our tips on work-life balance, burnout, and remote work, and you’re on the right track to future-proof your workforce.