How Companies Can Use Upskilling and Reskilling for Today’s Workforce

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By Emily Courtney

Prior to COVID-19, emerging technologies were already changing the skills employees needed to succeed in the workplace. Pre-pandemic, as many as 87% of surveyed executives said their organizations were either currently experiencing skills gaps or anticipating them within the next few years. And 74% of CEOs reported being worried about a lack of essential skills among employees.

Then, everything changed. The rise of COVID-19 fast-tracked businesses to embrace digital platforms and remote work models they weren’t necessarily ready for. Employees and employers had to adapt on the fly to rapidly changing conditions and roles that required a whole new set of skills. And for many, the discrepancy between necessary skills and actual skills was more apparent.

The post-pandemic future of work is one that must emphasize preparation and proactivity over reactivity. No one knows what lies ahead, but focusing on identifying and developing the skills of the future—before they’re an absolute necessity—is a sure bet. And it begins with upskilling and reskilling your employees.

Three Types of Skilling

Estimates suggest that 375 million workers worldwide (that’s 14% of the global workforce) will have to switch occupations or learn new skills by 2030 due to artificial intelligence and automation. And, according to the World Economic Forum’s 2018 “The Future of Jobs Report,” at least 54% of all employees will need significant reskilling and upskilling by 2022.

It’s clear that investing in your staff’s skills development is crucial. Upskilling and reskilling your workforce can help your teams maximize their current potential, as well as enable them to take on new tasks wherever (and whenever) the company needs additional support.

Here are the three main ways companies can approach skills development in the workplace.

Reskilling: Definition and Examples

Reskilling provides employees with a job pivot by training them on a completely different set of skills in order to take on a new position. This may be necessary in the face of reduced staff due to layoffs or furloughs, or when jobs become obsolete with technology advancements. If you have dedicated staff you just don’t want to lose—reskilling may be the solution.

COVID-19 has provided ample opportunities for reskilling as organizations scramble to keep workers employed, despite waning needs in some industries.

For example, Scandinavian Airlines offered hundreds of cabin staff members who had basic medical training a three-and-a-half-day training course to be reskilled as assistant nurses. These employees were able to quickly join Sweden’s healthcare sector—an improbable task without reskilling. Other employers have offered out-of-work employees three-day courses on lesson planning and pedagogy to work as administrative support staff in Sweden’s schools.

Many organizations have also developed reskilling resources to provide support during the pandemic. In response to the increased demand for ventilator management, the American Red Cross created a COVID-19 Ventilator Reskilling eLearning course for healthcare providers who may need to switch their focus to care for the extremely ill.

While reskilling focuses on providing training for new skills, upskilling helps workers advance in their current career.

Upskilling: Definition and Examples

When workers expand their knowledge and improve and deepen their current skill set, it’s called upskilling. By building on existing knowledge and skills, upskilling allows staff to take on additional responsibilities or move into higher-level positions in their same career track.

Not only are ongoing, long-term upskilling opportunities important for employee retention and career development, but the pandemic taught organizations all over the world that upskilling can meet immediate, urgent needs as well.

For instance, workers at bedding company MyPillow, spent three days transforming their factory and learning how to sew face masks for healthcare workers—ultimately converting 75% of their manufacturing to mask-making.

When companies invest in upskilling their employees, they are not only able to respond to emergency needs, they can also keep up with current technology trends and close skills gaps.

What Is New Skilling?

As technology continues to advance and the pandemic shapes the new world of work in ways we aren’t even aware of yet, companies will have to continue to hone their workers’ skills to stay relevant and agile.

New skilling is a growth mindset that encompasses all types of continuous learning that help a company stay flexible and adaptable through any challenge. Companies can commit to new skilling by regularly identifying which skills are most needed in the future, evaluating any gaps in skills across their workforce, and building skilling programs for long-term success.

Benefits of Upskilling and Reskilling

In the short-term, using targeted upskilling and reskilling to safeguard and create jobs is crucial for a company’s success and resilience. For some time to come, employers may need to quickly fill skills gaps to keep businesses afloat by upskilling existing staff or reskilling workers to join other areas of the business.

Providing upskilling and reskilling opportunities also has a variety of long-term benefits for employers:

Improves Retention

Investing in your workers’ skills development makes staff feel valued and supported—and less likely to leave. Improving retention is invaluable for preserving institutional knowledge and saves companies the cost of hiring and training new employees.

Boosts Morale

Training and development opportunities help employees envision their career path and future with their company, so they feel like they’re working toward something.

Promotes Adaptability

If you develop and maintain a skilled workforce and proactively work to close skills gaps that could hamper success, your company is more able to adapt to and confront any challenges that come its way. As workers gain new skills, they become an adaptable workforce that can shift with changes in your market.

Increases Productivity

Upskilling employees gives them the tools they need to complete work faster and more accurately than if they are spending time trying to figure out how to get something done. A deeper understanding of the job also opens up space for creativity and ideas that can benefit the company as a whole.

Increases Diversity and Inclusion

Upskilling gives employees at all levels of a company—from entry-level to executive—the ability to develop a career path and access higher-paying jobs. This often diversifies a workforce, enabling people from different backgrounds and perspectives to move into jobs traditionally reserved for candidates with the “right” skills and experience from the outset.

Companies Leading the Way

Fortunately, many companies have been investing in upskilling and reskilling for a while now, and are leading the way in adopting a new skilling mindset. Here’s what some of them are doing:

Amazon. The world’s largest online retailer has committed $700 million to ready 100,000 of their workers for jobs that will be in demand in 2025. Employees will have access to six different training programs that expand their current skill sets or prepare them for new roles.
PricewaterhouseCoopers. PwC has invested $3 billion in skills training for 275,000 employees, including digital upskilling training for all 50,000 of its U.S. employees.
AT&T. When telecommunications giant AT&T realized that only half of their employees had the science, technology, engineering, and math skills to keep up with future changes, they invested $1 billion in online courses, a career center, and other skills training.
JPMorgan Chase. JPMorgan Chase set aside $600 million to train workers for in-demand tech jobs and to upskill and reskill employees who historically have been held back.

Some states and cities even offer incentives for businesses willing to upskill their employees. Through its TechCred program, Ohio will reimburse employers up to $2,000 for workers who earn technology-focused credentials. And Louisville, KY recently kicked off a 30-day Data Upskilling Challenge to encourage residents to access free, online data skills training.

How to Create a Skills Strategy

Although every company will have its own unique path to developing a new skilling strategy, these five key steps form the foundation of skilling, no matter your circumstances.

Identify Gaps in Skills

Look at current and future business requirements and determine what a future workforce may need for your particular industry. Assess the capabilities of your current workforce and identify gaps in skills or mismatched roles.

Build a Skills Strategy

Build a plan to deal with the skills gaps by reviewing current upskilling strategies and improving the effectiveness of your learning systems.

Make It a Part of Your Culture

Create a cultural shift around upskilling and reskilling that makes learning, career development, and hiring from within a priority.

Develop an Upskilling and Reskilling Plan

Create individualized learning plans and make sure your training is effective and engaging. Ensure that employees have dedicated learning and training time and set up a reward and incentive program for completion.

Evaluate Your ROI

There’s no doubt about it—upskilling and reskilling are investments. But, tracking your employees’ engagement and measuring how improved skill sets have impacted your bottom line can make clear how worthwhile the investment is.

Building Skills for the Future

By investing in the upskilling and reskilling of your workforce, you’ll be reinforcing to your staff that even in these challenging times, their development is a priority to you. And once your company has figured out its new normal post-pandemic, you’ll be able to quickly scale up with a strong, resilient, adaptable team.

FlexJobs has been a remote work advocate for over 13 years. We work with companies of every size to provide support and advice for businesses that want to integrate remote work. Connect with us today for expert guidance on building an agile remote team, and discover a better way to recruit remote talent!

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How Companies Can Use Upskilling and Reskilling for Today’s Workforce