Published Thu, Nov 21 2019 2:14 PM EST
A Facebook iconA Twitter iconA LinkedIn iconAn email icon
If you want to get ahead in your career in 2020, adopting a growth mindset should be at the top of your priority list.
According to Udemy's 2020 Workplace Learning Trends Report, a having a growth mindset — or the ability to continue learning in order to adapt to change — was ranked as the most important soft skill for career success.
The online learning platform analyzed user data from its Udemy for Business service, which offers several course packages and is used by more than 4,000 companies as a resource for employee training.
One McKinsey & Company report indicated that by 2030, as many as 800 million global workers could lose their jobs to robots. So as emerging technology threatens to eliminate jobs that can easily be completed through automation and machines, employees and job seekers are increasingly focused on developing a growth mindset.
This is where the importance of having a growth mindset comes into place: People who are motivated to reach higher levels of achievement (instead of sticking to a set of fixed skills) by learning new skills that can't be replicated by future technology are much more likely to succeed in the face of setbacks.
Shelley Osborne, vice president of learning at Udemy, told CNBC Make It that another trend she's noticed among users is an increased interest in skills that require a human element, like critical thinking and emotional intelligence. These are the skills that make us "innately human," she explained.
"People are more aware of the fact that soft skills are becoming more relevant, and that they can't be replaced by technology," Osborne added. "Creativity and innovation, for instance, are things a machine can't do for us."
Even industry leaders like Elon Musk have pointed out that there will come a time when machines become so advanced that they'll be able to program themselves — and when that happens, in some cases, only businesses and jobs that focus on human interaction will continue to thrive.
Additionally, an IBM study reported that even though an estimated 120 million workers worldwide will need to be retrained as a result of AI and automation in the next three years, executives named adaptability, time management and collaboration as some of the most important skills to hire for in today's workforce.
The Udemy report also noted the importance of building a company culture that encourages and provides tools for employees to improve these skills. Popular learning platforms like LinkedIn Learning, Degreed, Coursera, edX, FutureLearn and Udacity can help with this.
Here are the soft skills workers are practicing the most, according to Udemy:
- Growth mindset: An ability to learn continuously and willingness to adapt to change
- Creativity: Developing new ideas, applying new solutions to address existing problems
- Focus mastery: Harnessing concentration to make better short- and long-term decisions
- Innovation: Improving upon an existing idea, concept, process or method to achieve a desired outcome
- Communication skills: Interpreting information though speaking, listening and observing
- Storytelling: Organizing thoughts and data points into a comprehensive, holistic narrative
- Culture awareness: Ability to effectively interact, work and develop meaningful relationships with those of various cultural backgrounds within the organization
- Critical thinking: Objective analysis and evaluation in order to form a judgment on a topic
- Leadership: Providing guidance within an organization
- Emotional intelligence: Practicing control, expression and observation of interpersonal relationships among people in a workplace
Like this story? Subscribe to CNBC Make It on YouTube!
Don't miss: These will be the top 10 most popular tech skills of 2020
Future Skills You’ll Need In Your Career By 2030 main image
Sponsored by the University of the Witwatersrand
In 11 years’ time, the year 2030, it’s highly likely you’ll be working in a job that doesn’t even exist yet – and no, we’re not talking about building flying cars or developing the world’s first time machine. The world of work is evolving quickly, which means you have to figure out how to prepare for a future job role that’s impossible to predict.
Of course, there isn’t a crystal ball that can tell us exactly what skills will be needed and what won’t be needed. However, with the help of the University of the Witwatersrand, we’ve come up with five skills we believe you’ll need to succeed in your future career, whatever it ends up being.
Cognitive flexibility
The rise of digital technologies means you’re going to need to be able to handle the plethora of opportunities and challenges that come with it.
Do you have the ability to adapt to change and conceptualize complex multiple ideas all at once? If so, you’re showing qualities that reside in advanced multi-taskers and which are highly valued by employers and recruiters.
Digital literacy and computational thinking
As the world continues to rely on highly technical and continuously evolving technologies, the need for those with the digital skills to match also increases.
You’ve most definitely heard of STEM, but have you heard of SMAC (social, mobile, analytics and cloud)? Although it may seem like we’re being bombarded with digital buzzwords, being digitally literate offers capabilities beyond what was once thought possible when it comes to emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning, Internet of Things (IoT), and data science.
“We need to train scholars to deal with the challenges of the 21st century, some which we may not yet have encountered,” says Professor Adam Habib, Vice-Chancellor and Principal of the University of the Witwatersrand.
“We need to work across sectors to develop the technology required for us to leapfrog across eons of poverty, unemployment and inequality, and in so doing to create a new world order that prioritizes humanity before profits and power.”
A master’s degree in artificial intelligence or e-Science can help advance your digital skillset and accelerate your technical acumen in these emerging fields, from learning about data visualization and exploration, to computational intelligence, and natural language technology.
Judgement and decision-making
Although robots and automation technology may be better than humans in other ways such as calculations and diagnostic solving, it’s still going to be humans that deal with the subjective side of data analytics.
Considering we’re on the cusp of the fourth industrial revolution, we’re still going to need to have somebody who is able to show the world what numbers mean and their significance.
Emotional and social intelligence
For everything that can be replaced by digital technologies and artificial intelligence, emotional and social intelligence remain uniquely human capabilities.
In some sectors, these qualities are absolutely crucial. The demand for jobs in healthcare, for example, are on the increase – demonstrating how some roles will always require a human element. Your future job is more than likely going to include working closely with others, so having empathy, the ability to collaborate, as well as excellent communication skills is something you’re most definitely going to need.
Creative and innovative mindset
Despite a report by the World Economic Forum in 2018 suggesting robot automation will create more jobs than they displace, you’ll still do well to keep on top of your creativity skills and maintain an innovative mindset.
Much like having an excellent sense of social intelligence, natural creativity is something which can’t be easily replicated by the latest digital technologies. As long as you can think outside the box, you’ll be just fine.
This article was originally published in July 2019 . It was last updated in February 2022
+ 20
others
saved this article
+ 21 others saved this article