Creating a Future-Ready Workforce

Capabilities for the future

Future Skills, Future-Ready, etc, are words that we hear a lot nowadays. But what

does it really mean to create a Future-Ready Workforce? If we want to build a

roadmap to get a future-ready workforce, what is it that we should be doing? Here is my attempt to put together some broad steps in your ‘future-ready roadmap’- having spoken to many leaders who have done this.

First, have an idea of what capabilities at the organisation level are going to be

important for your business in the next 5 years. It is difficult to pin down, but can be put together from your organisation’s long-term strategy. For instance, as a

consumer goods organisation, you will believe that more personalised digital

marketing using AI and analytics could be a capability you need to invest in. For tech companies, there is a lot happening on the skills front with AI playing a big role, and one needs to have a very detailed perspective of what skills are trending. Second, as you look at the changing business environment, the impact of technology and disruptions in your own industry, identify what kind of behaviours/skills will be relevant for your people to be successful in the future. There are some that cut across industries- for instance, more agile collaboration across functions, as well as with the external ecosystem. Ability to work with agentic AI systems, take quick decisions, and work with smaller teams and a flatter hierarchy could be another. A fast-changing world also calls for a significant amount of big-picture thinking. And so on! But do prioritise a few that are relevant for your industry. These become your canvas of what specific skills, behaviours, and mindset (thus overall capability) that you need to hire for and build in your teams. This is the first step in building your roadmap! The 2 by 2 matrix above should give you the idea.

But that in itself may not be enough- these skills are dynamic, and what is needed in a few years could change. Your workforce will have to learn on the go. Therefore, you need to institutionalise a very strong learning mindset, or a learning culture. This calls for leveraging all the elements of the social architecture of the company–learning systems which need to be comprehensive and engaging, right incentives driving appropriate behaviour, ensuring that a learning mindset is evaluated when you promote people, removing friction to learning using technology etc.

So how do we build this learning culture- not easy, but here a few must haves. It

needs to start from the leadership- they should talk about the future, the skills

needed, provide psychological safety as people learn and make some mistakes,

show some vulnerability on their own capabilities, and be a role model. A strong drive for excellence combined with a sense of humility are I feel two key elements for leaders to demonstrate to help build a learning culture. From my experience,

mandates or a rigorous learning curriculum with lots of rules don’t always work, but we need to try and make learning exciting. Get people to share what they learn and give them opportunities to apply them. One of the CEOs I worked with used to do monthly townhalls on key technical problems/projects using design thinking which created a buzz for learning new technologies. We should go back to what Carol Dweck outlines in ‘Mindset’- having a ‘growth mindset’, where effort & practice are valued over a ‘fixed mindset’ where innate intelligence or ‘talent’ is valued, makes the difference in learning.

Lastly, a big area to consider is your leadership. What kind of leaders would you

need in the future? Do you have a pipeline of leaders who can be right for the future? Can they inspire change and mobilise the workforce? Having that picture of your future leadership and building towards it is critical. What kind of mentoring or development actions do we need to build the right leaders? Our lead time to develop our leaders is shrinking- we don’t have the luxury of time as we had in the past. Therefore, we have to deploy many levers for development.

To sum it up, the first step in being future-ready is to start thinking in a more granular way about it. Like how companies do a long-term strategic plan, I feel we need to have a 3-year ‘Capabilities plan’ which you refresh every couple of years. This will help us have a clear vision and roadmap of the skills needed in the future. That will help you put together appropriate talent development actions now, as well as the culture and leadership needed to constantly nurture it. Voila, this will help you build your future-ready workforce! (Well, wish it were this simple ��!)

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