10 Job skills employers of the future will be looking for, do you have them?
With the fourth industrial revolution underway, a winning CV is no longer based only on degrees and previous work experience. To prove that we are good candidates and ace the interview we must demonstrate that we also have certain job skills.
The world of work is innovative and thinking as if it were static is a big, unforgivable, mistake. Suffice it to say that in the last century we have seen three industrial revolutions, each of which has changed the working methodology that preceded them.
According to McKinsey, an international management consulting firm, by 2030, between 75 and 375 million people will be at risk of losing their jobs due to automation. This process got a boost during the Covid 19 pandemic as it was fostered by social distancing. Are we talking about the end of the world or a great opportunity?
Quiet, do not worry. Also according to a McKinsey poll, thanks to this epochal change, there will be more jobs than those that will disappear.
One thing is certain. New jobs will be born and new job skills will be needed inf the future. It is right to prepare for change before it even happens so let’s see what job skills will be required in the workplace for this new world.
The 10 most important job skills for the future
1. Emotional intelligence
Emotional intelligence is the ability to recognize, identify and understand one’s own emotions and those of other people. Emotions have a very strong impact on our life and can make it difficult to reach a goal if we lose lucidity due to emotionality. On the contrary, if you govern correctly, they can be the fundamental aspect that helps you communicate efficiently, that encourages you to motivate yourself, that pushes you towards the realization of your goal.
Emotional intelligence is a component that will allow you to be part of a work team. Empathy, integrity and collaboration will be requirements that will have to be part of your arsenal to keep up with the change.
PS: A great book on this subject is Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman’s.
2. Leadership skills
Teamwork makes the difference between victory and defeat. Leadership, or the ability to guide and inspire others, will be part of the job skills you will need the most. People will take on this role to work with other employees, tackle problems, find solutions and make the team more efficient.
3. Analytical thinking skills
We have seen how important it is to manage emotions and how they can affect the future of work.
Analytical thinking follows this principle, analyzing information in a logical, rational way and minimizing emotion, eliminating one’s own prejudices and those of others in order to make the most of the situation and extrapolate the best solution from it.
4. Creativity skills
This is a topic that may make you turn up your nose but think about it. Some years ago, who would have imagined the existence of jobs as food bloggers, influencers, social media marketing or the like?
Creativity is also this: developing new ideas, new needs, new answers to obsolete questions, it is not about changing but about transforming.
“There is no work, the market is at a standstill and the economy is not running, I will not find a job”
This is a good way to feel sorry for yourself but it won’t get you anywhere. Don’t sit in the comfortable chair of mediocrity, stand up and learn to ask yourself why someone who has gone through the same experiences gets more results. It’s not about luck, that lasts as long as a coffee and brings more harm than good if you don’t know how to manage it.
We are talking about skills, innovation, change of thinking, know that being creative will be more and more vital to continue being in this great and exciting game.
5. Growth mentality
To value your work, you must first value yourself. How is it possible that someone earns double, triple or 100 times more in the same time than others?
Jim Rohn, one of the most important figures in the motivational field, explains how you need to change to make things improve.
“We are paid for the value we place on the market. It takes time, but we are not paid for our time, we are paid for our worth. What you need to do to make more money in the same amount of time is to become more valuable. “ Jim Rohn
But how to be more precious? Invest in yourself and your training, you are the only person who can change your destiny. Nobody else.
6. Communication skills
The ability to communicate will be fundamental. It will be a necessary skill during this change and one of those winning weapons that you cannot do without. Clear and effective communication will make the difference in success between a great job and a failed job. When the communication is not clear, we run into unpleasant misunderstandings. Personal interpretation, at times, can lead to the wrong path. Hence, it is important to be clear. This leads to constructive comparisons rather than boring monologues or time-wasters.
When we talk about communication, we are referring to the broadest sense of the word: all ways of communicating, verbal and otherwise.
We talk about facial expressions. A person does not need to show that he is happy because his expressions speak for him. A pronounced smile speaks for itself.
We talk about gestures: a tenacious handshake with direct eye contact characterizes a strong and determined personality, nail-biting indicates nervousness.
Many times our body says more than we would like other people to know.
Did you know that Disney is creating a humanoid robot that can mimic human facial movements, blinking, and head movements? The same company explains that it is proven that the gaze is a key social signal and that it has the ability to transmit social and emotional states as well.
7. Open–mindedness
There will be no room for people with a closed mind that still stops dividing human beings by race, culture, sex, religion. Globalization has allowed different cultures to amalgamate, work together for a better future.
Being able to understand different cultures will change your vision of the world and will allow you to work more effectively, more openly, without mental limits that hinder the breadth of your ideas and will take your work to a higher level.
Think big and take a step forward. Labelling people is useless. The only colour you need to worry about is the one you will choose for your pen when you sign your new contract.
It is true that we are all the same. However, we do not all have the same skills or, better yet, we do not exploit them all in the same way. For this reason, there are people who earn millions of euros and others who struggle to manage even a few hundred but this certainly does not depend on skin colour someone’s race, religion, sex, culture.
8. Flexibility to change
Covid 19 has cornered a large part of the world’s population and highlighted how important it is to be flexible to changes and how important and vital it is to transform a bad event into an opportunity.
We are only at the beginning of this change and many other aspects of our life will be changed in the future, so it becomes essential to have a flexible mind that accepts change and takes advantage of it.
In this period, think about how many start-ups have been born or how many companies have revolutionized their way of operating, drawing a profit from all this. So, it’s up to you to choose whether to see this critical moment and those that will come as an opportunity or a threat.
9. Technology skills
Everything is changing. As this industrial revolution will be driven by technology, we should all acquire technical skills to exploit it to our advantage. We can no longer afford to think about doing without it.
Just look at the percentage of people who, especially after the pandemic, working from home.
Technology is the future. We cannot oppose it. Indeed it would be like taking a step back. Using it to our advantage can bring huge gains. We have everything at our service. We only have to choose which button to press.
10. Decision making process
Machines have computing capabilities that are impossible for humans. What differentiates us from them is the ability to make decisions about their calculations, verify the impact they could have on other areas of work, for example on the consequences they could have on the people we work with.
Technology will replace us in the procedure. However, human beings will still be the ones who make decisions on how to exploit the work. Imagine being a soccer coach whose team is competing for the title. Would you take your best striker off the pitch as he missed two penalties on his last three shots? I don’t think so. He’s your best striker! Robots may be the arm but the human being will still remain the mind.
The skills you need for future employment to ace the interview
The world of work and beyond is changing and our life prospects with it. It is normal for the unknown to be frightening but remember that every change has helped humanity to progress. Change is needed, it’s up to you how. Get trained, value yourself, remember what Jim Rohn said?
“We are not paid for the time we dedicate to work, but for the value, we give to the market”. Jim Rohn
And you? How much are you worth? What is your worth? How much can you make a difference now and in the future?
You already know. Who you are, what you want, does not depend on what is happening around you but on what is happening inside you! Listen to yourself, you have so much to say but above all, the time has come to act.
Now that you know the job skills you need to develop in the next years, don’t fear the change. Focus on who you will become rather than who you were.
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