Skills development is the cornerstone of an agile and efficient organization.
A company that encourages a culture of learning gains a decisive competitive advantage.
What is more, in a competitive, changing and rapidly changing labor market: distancing from work encouraged by Covid-19, automation due to the impact of emerging technologies which generates a renewal of professions...
According to a study published by Dell and the 'Institute for the future, 85% of the jobs of 2030 do not yet exist.
Finding the right levers to promote skills development is therefore a necessity for companies as well as for employees who wish to prepare for the future.
The world of work has experienced unprecedented social and cultural upheavals in recent years under the impetus of globalization, crises and technological revolutions. Organizations must become aware of the challenges of developing the skills of their employees in order to continue to attract and retain talent. Their ability to innovate, to renew themselves and therefore to perform depends on it.
We live in a VUCA world. American military term resulting from the collapse of the societal bloc, the acronym VUCA (Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, Ambiguity) appeared in the 90s. It designates a now multilateral, volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous world. This has a strong impact on management, corporate culture and the world of work. In a globalized and technologically accelerating economy, markets and customer behavior are more volatile… just like skills. A skill would thus lose 50% of its value in 5 years according to the 2020 HRD Barometer published by Gras Savoy.
The old model of staying with the same company for 20 years is now over. Employees will change jobs many times during a career and will have to regularly renew their skills to optimize their employability. This phenomenon has also been accentuated with the increase in retraining and the creation of micro-enterprises, accentuating the drain of talent. Flexibility is now a choice and not a constraint suffered like the baby boomer generations. It completes the list of deep aspirations of generations Y and Z: autonomy, recognition, pleasure and personal development.
It is now a truth. With the development of digital, robotics and AI, new needs are emerging and accelerating the transformation of professions. With automation, many professions (and therefore skills) will disappear and others still unknown will emerge. With the key to new needs in terms of learning and know-how. For example, the automotive sector has also lost 120,000 jobs in fifteen years, the bank 50,000 traders... At the same time, thedigital sector is the one that recruits the most in France with 80,000 unfilled positions each year due to a skills deficit according to the Observatory of the professions of the future.
Unexpected, the recent Covid-19 crisis has forced organizations to work from home in order to continue to operate normally. A real upheaval in work habits that has led employees to adapt to remote work. They learned to use new collaborative tools and to work more independently. Whatever the trades, the crisis has challenged individuals. She pushed them to find distance learning solutions and build skills. Sales reps, like buyers, found themselves making more appointments on Zoom. This forced adoption of unconventional sales channels has led them to reconsider their customer and prospect approach and their sales techniques. Just as it has led managers to change practices to manage their teams and to work more closely with marketing to exploit leads.
Why do we still need to learn? The challenges of skills development concern both employees and companies.
Employability is an important vector for skills development. Increasing one's skills capital (hard skills and soft skills) in an evolving and changing labor market makes it possible to gain agility and adapt in the event of evolution or change of profession.
According to the 2021 Training Barometer, the opinion of the French remains very positive on professional training :
Especially since the use of digital technology on a daily basis has changed their habits and allows them to access knowledge in 1 click from any device, which gives them greater autonomy and flexibility in their learning. Consuming information has never been so easy whether you are in the office, on public transport or in your living room. Thanks to mobile, the ability to “learn on the fly” is therefore increased tenfold and allows you to consume training (tips or advice) when you need it most and in record time.
Over the past two years, the will to develop and flourish has never been so strong among employees. Mastering certain know-how and interpersonal skills becomes a powerful vector of pleasure at work and recognition.
Since January 1, 2019, the skills development plan, created by the Professional Future Law of September 5, 2018, requires companies to develop the skills of their employees. With which goes in the direction of progress. The possibility of training them remotely. Good news to help recruit younger generations for whom training at a distance via e-learning is a real lever of commitment.
For companies, there are many issues involved in increasing the skills of employees (reskilling and upskilling):
To successfully develop skills, organizations can rely on several levers.
Given the context described above, the HR function must adopt a strategic role in business transformation. Retaining talent and helping them grow is now a priority that leads to aligning the HR strategy with business concerns. This strategy must be based on clear objectives which involve, among other things, questioning:
The answers to these many questions will guide your decision-making and priority actions to be taken.
The inventory of skills makes it possible to build the foundations of a skills development strategy. This is the role of a skills repository which lists knowledge, know-how and interpersonal skills. A real management tool, it lists all the skills needed to exercise a profession or function. A founding inventory for GEPEC.
A skills database is useful but insufficient. Then you have to be able to bring it to life. To do this, each individual in the company must instill their own dynamics of growth and development.
The Growth Mindset is a skill common to entrepreneurs who often share common ideas:
Encourage employees to actively participate in the development of their skills will encourage to more easily share their desire to improve, to evolve and to project themselves in the organization but also to express their difficulties.
Establishing a culture of feedback in your company is a key lever for promoting the growth of all employees.
It's about allowing everyone to ask for or give feedback. To alleviate the well-known anxiety of being criticized or speaking out in a pervasive culture of kindness.
Recent research in neuroscience has in fact underlined that this authorization would place both parties in a favorable psychological state to receive negative remarks.
Each employee becomes an actor in his development in a dynamic of continuous improvement. He can thus better identify his strong points but also his points of improvement.
Flashbrand is a platform that facilitates skills development based on 360° feedback.
The application connects all employees and allows them to manage their growth, performance and career. In a few clicks and from their mobile they can easily:
On the manager and HR side, the tool makes it possible to collect data and update it constantly. Data to manage performance with greater finesse
Thanks to Flashbrand, you put your employees in control of their development, performance and career.