Demanded Skills in the Workforce



As society continues to grow off of technology, industries and companies must also adapt to such changes. As a result, the demands for what companies want in potential workers is always changing. This has become a relevant topic and ranges from a multitude of different related discussions such as school curriculum, increased competition for top colleges, and more. The issue of ensuring that current and future students will be able to keep up with changing demands in the workforce is one that is constantly being addressed by teachers and other people related to the workforce.

One major discussion point is the increasing demand for technical skills. There is a common assumption that a quick and easy solution is to give more attention in school curriculum, both primary and secondary school as well as college. However, this ignores the increased costs of providing opportunities to develop such skills, such as paying for more technology/devices, the need for increased Wi-Fi, etc. This also assumes that everyone will want to pursue a job in a more technical field, and going even further would need a relatively clear idea of their desired career in the future. Ultimately, while developing technical skills in school is important, progress for pursuing this will come slowly.

So then, what else can or should be done in order to tackle this issue? In a research study, LinkedIn and Human Capital Report attempted to research the supply and demand of over 50,000 skills that come up in the workforce. Of such skills, they determined that there are 2 skills every worker should try to develop: basic technology skills and interpersonal skills. As aforementioned, technical skills are becoming ever more important. However, something that potentially goes overlook are interpersonal skills - skills that tend to span across all fields. Regardless of occupation, having interpersonal skills will always be important because they are not something that one can learn on the fly. This is relevant because it is something that schools may wish to consider, as evidenced by schools' already changing curriculums (SBAC, Common Core).


Image result for tech skills

https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2017/09/linkedin-job-skills-human-capital-report-2017/
https://blogs.wsj.com/cio/2018/10/12/automation-and-the-changing-demand-for-workforce-skills/

Comments

  1. AnonymousApril 21, 2019 at 11:38 AM

    Nice post!! This stuff is crazy to think about! I read that about 60% of jobs could be automated. And although that's a pretty scary stat, the transitions are said to be hard. This might mean that although many jobs may seem to go away, there is still time to figure things out.
    https://www.mckinsey.com/featured-insights/future-of-work/jobs-lost-jobs-gained-what-the-future-of-work-will-mean-for-jobs-skills-and-wages

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousApril 21, 2019 at 3:59 PM

    Interesting stuff! I remember when I was younger, I watched the newer version of Charlie and the Chocolate factory and distinctly remember Charlie's dad, along with many other factory workers losing their jobs the factory decided to implement machines that were more efficient.

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousApril 25, 2019 at 2:19 AM

    Interesting post! As technology improves and many jobs become automated, I think that we will see many workers become unemployed, especially those involved in manual labor and low-skilled jobs. Although new jobs will be created in fields such as data science, those who lost in jobs may not be able to learn all of these new skills required.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Cost of Inelastic Goods

Image
Many goods that are inelastic in terms of demand are ones that are essential or, in other words, necessary to one's self. There are several examples: basic foods, gasoline, or even medicine. I was interested in how producers can manipulate the prices of these goods and how the total revenue can change over time because those goods are inelastic. The first example I thought of was insulin. Considered inelastic because, without it, those who are diabetic might physically suffer, I looked at the price trends in the past couple of years. Just as I predicted, the price has been rising dramatically in the past decade or so as producers are taking advantage of the consumers' essential need for this good. There are about 7.4 million Americans that use insulin and many struggle to pay the costs of this increasingly expensive drug. So, while rising prices benefit insulin manufacturers, those same prices come at a serious cost for patients as the demand for insulin is inelastic. Other...
Read more

The Economics and Psychology of Gambling

Image
As gambling around the world continues to increase, governments are starting to see these often self-destructive habits as a way to get money from their residents. Gambling has been seen as immoral and manipulative on the part of casinos, as well as pitiful on the parts of the people that gamble all their money away. It is seen as immoral and a “lazy way” to make money that isn’t even assured to get you anything. So what keeps bringing people back to the card table or slot machine? There are many theories about why someone would continuously gamble any money that they make to the point of landing themselves in debt. In many cases, the gamiling becomes an addiction, though many professionals have reservations on calling it that, that gets increasingly hard to kick. It is irrational for someone to continuously lose money and keep going back only to lose more. Or is it? The utility that some get out of gambling may feel like spending the money is worth it. As far as recreational ...
Read more

The Hidden Monopolies of the World

 Monopolies are all around us in the world, and not all of them are  obvious on the surface level like Google and Facebook. For example, you might be searching for hotel rooms and browse multiple "competing" sites like Travelocity, Trivago, or Hotel.com. What you most likely do not know however, is that all three websites are actually all owned by the same company; Expedia group. This illusion of free choice is used to hide the fact that Expedia essentially hold a monopoly over the industry and all hotel bookings actually go through them. These fake competitors which are all owned by Expedia Group controls 75% of the US online travel agency industry, Similarly, apple fans and Microsoft fans stubbornly stick to their respective brands of computers; not knowing that the laptops all come from the same Chinese manufacturer. Throughout all types of industries such as the ones listed earlier and others such as smartphones, supermarkets, beer, and even sunglasses, hidden parent co...
Read more