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Report: New industrial revolution to bring major workforce disruption

One issue being discussed by world business leaders at this year’s World Economic Forum is the so-called fourth industrial revolution in which connected machines will take over many manual labor jobs. Many are concerned this will be disruptive to the workforce as humans are put out of work and left with little applicable skills in the changing industrial environment.

To address this issue, the Forum put out a report called “The Future of Jobs.” According to respondents of the survey “on average, by 2020, more than a third of the desired core skill sets of most occupations will be comprised of skills that are not yet considered crucial to the job today.“ The reports also finds “current trends could lead to a net employment impact of more than 5.1 million jobs lost to disruptive labor market changes over the period 2015–2020, with a total loss of 7.1 million jobs.”

During this same period of time, mathematical and architecture and engineering related fields are expected to add 2 million jobs, according to the report.  This shows a significant need to get ahead of the rapidly changing workforce and train workers for the jobs of the future.

Manufacturing and production workers are expected to be some of the most effected by this new technological revolution. While the report finds these industries will be highly disruptive with a significant initial “bottoming out,” it also asserts these workers have a “good potential for “upskilling,” redeployment and productivity enhancement through technology rather than pure substitution. The report adds, “business leaders are aware of these looming challenges but have been slow to act decisively.”

The 371 global employers polled for the report have other suggestions about what types of jobs have a potential for future growth. Two jobs came to the forefront of the report. The first was data analysts, “which companies expect will help them make sense and derive insights from the torrent of data generated by technological disruptions.”

Specialized sales representatives make up the other category “as practically every industry will need to become skilled in commercializing and explaining their offerings to business or government clients and consumers, either due to the innovative technical nature of the products themselves or due to new client targets with which the company is not yet familiar, or both,” the report said.

The report offers suggestions for employers to keep up with the rapidly evolving technology. There are two schools of thought: “Those who foresee limitless opportunities in newly emerging job categories and prospects that improve workers’ productivity and liberate them from routine work, and those that foresee massive labour substitution and displacement of jobs.”

Businesses and governments will have to work together to train employees for the jobs of the future. “Businesses will need to put talent development and future workforce strategy front and center to their growth,” the report concluded. “Firms can no longer be passive consumers of ready-made human capital. They require a new mindset to meet their talent needs and to optimize social outcomes. Governments will need to re-consider fundamentally the education models of today.”

In the short term, the report suggests companies should focus on goals such as reinventing the HR function to be more strategic in spotting talent trends and skills gaps, using analytics “to build a new approach to workforce planning and talent management,” talent diversity to seek out and train employees to have a wide-ranging skill set, as well as  leveraging flexible working arrangements and online talent platforms to “collaborate remotely with freelancers and independent professionals through digital talent platforms.”

Long-term focuses should include rethinking education to “imagine what a true 21st century curriculum might look like,” incentivize life-long learning,  as well as cross-industry and public-private collaboration “including partnerships with public institutions and the education sector,” according to the report.

ABOUT AUTHOR

Joey Jackson
Joey Jacksonhttp://www.RCRWireless.com
[email protected] Joey Jackson is an editor and production manager at RCRWireless.com and RCRtv based in Austin, Texas. Before coming to RCR, Joey was a multimedia journalist for multiple TV news affiliates around the country. He is in charge of custom video production as well as the production of the "Digs," "Gigs," "How it works" and "Tower Stories" segments for RCRtv. He also writes daily about the latest developments in telecom and ICT news. An Oregon native, Joey graduated from the University of Oregon with a degree in journalism and communications. He enjoys telling the stories of the people and companies that are shaping the landscape of the mobile world. Follow him on Twitter at @duck_jackson.