Education and development managers find themselves in a difficult situation during this period. Demand for skills development remains but there are not enough resources to cover it. For this reason, companies need to focus on learning opportunities that create the best results for their organisations and make the best use of resources.

The first step depends on the data. Data on the skills of the workforce (existing employees and candidates that the company needs) will help managers prioritise their opportunities based on what skills are necessary to fulfil the business strategy and what skills are at risk.

The data is very variable and influenced by the role of individuals, industry and the country where the company operates. In general, the following 10 skills can be classified globally; these will become critical this year and in the years to follow:

• advanced IT skills
• leadership
• communication and negotiation
• entrepreneurship and initiative
• project management
• creativity
• advanced data analysis and mathematics
• critical thinking and decision making
• adaptability and continuous learning
• technology design and engineering

In the UK, for example, the ability to manage projects is emphasised over communication. In France, creativity is the third most endangered skill, while in the US, the ability to analyse data is more important.

At the same time, different industries differentiate between various educational needs. Healthcare favours people management skills, while financial services require more critical thinking, and retailers are looking for more creativity in engaging customers and improving their customer experience.

Data on a country's education system can also be helpful depending on which fields are of most interest to students.

Adapting your learning opportunities to different learning styles and current needs can help prevent a waste of valuable resources. The next step is to link learning opportunities with business strategy. This helps L&D programmes add value to the business. It also makes it easier to obtain top management support in the future.

A key part is to ensure learning is usable. It does not have to be directly part of the classic course; it can take place through section assignments, transfers, volunteering and teaching others. Workers must have the opportunity to apply their learning to real-world situations. The opportunities outlined will make it much easier to inject new skills.

Adaptation to change

Your development and education strategy will have to evolve constantly this year in response to changing economic, market, social and individual needs. The annual review is not enough to navigate in this ever-changing time. You will need to find processes and tools so you can immediately assess what skills staff need today and what tomorrow.

Some of these tactics will be a long-term effort, such as collecting and analysing skills data. However, there are immediate steps you can start to implement right away, such as considering the content of your education system: what works and what can be limited. Communicate with people so as to understand their desires to improve their skills and how the organisation can support them. This will give you a much better understanding of the differences between what skills people want to learn and what skills a company needs to operate in the long run.

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