Technology research and consulting company Gartner recently did a survey with HR leaders across all major industries to understand their priorities.

Building Critical Skills and Competencies tops the list.

Skills is the new currency and Organisations today are increasingly thinking of translating knowledge of the employees into skills to improve efficiency, productivity and profitability. Gartner report indicates that one in three skills needed for a job in 2018 will not be required in 2022. The new imperatives are that skill based Organisations need to structure their talent strategies around skills, not just roles, resulting in a more adaptable workforce.

As skill needs shift more rapidly due to digitalization and the resulting ongoing organizational changes, CEOs and CHROs overwhelmingly ask learning and development (L&D) to upskill and reskill employees as quickly and effectively as possible. Yet today, 70% of employees report that they do not have mastery of the skills they need for their jobs.

Research from the McKinsey Global Institute finds that no matter the sector, occupation, or geographical region, every employee needs a foundational set of power skills that allow them to : (i) Add value beyond what can be done by automated systems and intelligent machines; (ii) Operate in a digital environment; (iii) Continuously adapt to new ways of working and new technologies.

Reid Hoffman, the founder of LinkedIn, shared that when assessing founders of potential investments, he looks for individuals who have an “infinite learning curve”: someone who is constantly learning, and quickly. Satya Nadella, the CEO of Microsoft, echoed the importance of learning when he said, “The learn-it-all will always do better than the know-it all.”

Today there is a deeper realisation that developing skills is the ownership of the entire Organisation. Managers and Leaders play an important role in crafting and cultivating the continuous learning opportunities for their team. In addition to this we now know that learning from peers is a rich source of acquiring skills. However, before the effective ways are learned, the ineffective ways need to be unlearned.

The fundamental questions is that do Organisations have the structures, systems, processes and people practices that facilitate :

• Managers & Leaders offer their insights to the team
• Employees to unlearn the ineffective routines and practices
• Employees to learn from each other.

At Exponentia Learning Solutions Pvt Ltd, a Learning & Development company, we assist Organisations in building or enhancing L&D strategy, establish learning systems, processes and practices that helps in facilitating the talent development journey of the Organisation.