The State of Skills report, published by The Burning Glass Institute and Business Higher Education Forum, and Wiley has highlighted the growing demand for upskilling and reskilling in the job market. This report is an important resource for both employers and educational institutions. Its data can be used as a basis for creating large-scale collaborations and initiatives that will equip the workforce with the skills needed to mitigate the anticipated labor shortage in 2030.

Collaborative Strategies for Building a Future-Ready Workforce

This blog series will emphasize the need for emergent action across the educational ecosystem to prepare a workforce equipped to meet the demands of the changing job market. Building a workforce equipped with emerging skills requires a clear understanding of which jobs have the most intensive demand for these skills and which specific skills they require. Collaborations are essential to ensure the future success of both the educational and business sectors. By pooling resources, colleges and employers can create effective programs that will provide students and employees with the necessary skills to remain competitive in the job market and build successful careers.

Redefining Education for the Changing Job Market

Companies must develop strategies for supporting incumbent workers to reskill. But more importantly, companies need educational providers to restructure curriculums to align with the fastest growing, high-demand programs needed in the regional/national labor market. In today’s economic constraints, we need to work together to prioritize the programs requiring revamping. All trends suggest that post-secondary education after high school will look like climbing a ladder to accrue a set of skills that build on one another over time.

Communication and teaming skills are essential for leaders in nonprofit workforce training organizations and accredited educational providers to succeed. It is essential for these leaders to be able to find common ground, as it is a shared responsibility to create the future assembly line of curriculums and credentials.

Building an Effective Talent Pipeline: Interoperable Credentials and Collaborative Approaches

To ensure businesses have an effective talent pipeline, there is a need to make sure credentials are interoperable across siloed systems. Siloed thinking has to be done away with, as it creates further complexity and gaps that need to be filled. To do this, educators need to build coursework for a full portfolio of skills across a variety of pathways and opportunities for BOTH students (with or without an identified career pathway) and incumbent workers. Students and incumbent workers are not the only ones being challenged. Faculty and instructional leaders face skill acquisition challenges of their own. College professors and other instructors are being disrupted by the rapid pace of digital transformation. It is hard to teach a skill you do not possess yourself.

Data-Driven Planning for a Future-Ready Workforce: The Importance of Collaborative Approaches

By leveraging data-driven analyses, all players can anticipate the skills that their workforce requires in the future and plan accordingly. This requires a collaborative approach across silos and departments so that everyone understands the importance of having of increasing the supply of the most in-demand skills.
All groups need a mutual understanding of career pathways, to share specifications as they change, share the ability to shape curriculum and share the ability to build bridges for learners of all ages, interns, recent graduates, and incumbent workers.

Will your organization lead, join or follow these rapid changes? Stay tuned for our next blog in this series.