Future-proof your employability

Make sure you have the skills for the digital revolution, writes

There will be so much noise around technology that it’s going to be important that the knowledge workforce can provide consultancy advice and expertise.

Walker says: “When we did our survey among 951 employers, 77 per cent said communication will still be important or essential. Adaptability, digital efficiency, innovation, critical thinking — all these things are about being flexible and engaging change.

He says, having a good communication style, with some emotional intelligence is vital. “This is because we’re moving to the knowledge workforce. We’re going to have all these products that the organisation is going to be promoting — you’ll still need to connect, engage, communicate, network and influence. That’s where the ability to engage and persuade about what these products can do will be important.

“The Fourth Industrial Revolution means a lot of roles are taken over by technology. There still will be a need for people, a workforce, to engage with people, train people, convince them about the technology, network and influence others. It’s about developing relationships and generating opportunities for whoever they’re working for or with.

“Soft skills become significantly more important. Creativity is part of the skill set employers are looking for too. Although technology can do a lot of things — it’s about the information you put into products. Creativity, innovation and critical thinking are still going to be the skill sets that will enable an organisation to maximise those technologies and maximise what they have.”

Walker says: “I told my son who has just become a hairdresser that I can’t see that anyone will want to put their head into a machine and get their hair done — there still will be jobs that humans will be best at.

“Also when the technology fails, there’s still going to be a need for a human who can go in and fix it.”

He says: “There’s still a lot of tactile, kinesthetic roles that will demand creativity — those roles will still be there. The squeeze will be more in the middle, around things that are data-related. Where we get people to put things into a system, that will be done automatically. Customer service will become more and more about checking boxes.”

Walker agrees there will be a group who will be disenfranchised by all of this. “This comes into what Government will need to do around social policy to help these people.”

Government regulation can also have an effect on the impact of the new technology as is being seen in Europe around privacy laws. Automation can only be learned from the amount of data that’s been put in. If the data is being restricted, through privacy laws, this can be limited.

So there are still some unknowns around what the Fourth Industrial Revolution will bring.

There’s still a lot of tactile, kinesthetic roles that will demand creativity. Jason Walker, Hays