The demand for skilled professionals has dramatically increased over the past few years, while the skills gap challenge has been making it more difficult for employers to find the talent they need. With IT and data-related professions leading the top of the most sought-after skilled professionals — followed by sales and marketing, operations and logistics, manufacturing and production, and customer-facing and front office — there’s no question that universities and training institutes worldwide need to level up their curricula to meet the demands of today’s workforce.
Integrating Edtech With a Skills-Based Approach and Enhancing Lifelong Learning
The World Economic Forum’s 2020 Future of Jobs report finds that employers should take the lead to reskill employees. On average, they found a demand for employers to offer reskilling and upskilling to over 70% of their employees by 2025. On top of the skills gap challenge, you must continuously monitor your employees’ training and development needs while finding solutions to hiring the right people to fill your company’s vacancies. One possible solution employers and training institutes could explore is integrating Educational Technology (Edtech) with the skills-based model or partnering with Edtech startups to solve the skills gap problem.
With Edtech leading the transformation of education and learning experiences and Edtech evolving rapidly over the last few years, integrating it with a skills-based approach could also enhance lifelong learning. On top of that, you can reap the benefits of using the skills-based learning model in today’s digital era.
Promotes Independent Learning
You can achieve the outcomes of your training and development programs more efficiently through a skills-based approach. By using this model, you teach your trainees or employees to become responsible for their learning. This also limits the gap for misunderstanding since they will develop Higher-Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) and learn to solve problems more independently. Once you give your employees a chance to understand the situation, whether there is a need for reskilling or upskilling, and you involve them as a part of the solution, they become critical thinkers and even more enthusiastic about their work.
Improves Learning Speed and Encourages Growth Mindset
When you give learners multiple ways to absorb information, their learning speed dramatically increases. When you use a skills-based approach for your training and development programs, you encourage them to enhance previously-learned knowledge and help them learn concepts much faster. On top of this benefit, you encourage them to shift into a growth-oriented mindset. This means your trainees will be more solution-oriented, continuously seeking more opportunities for personal growth and development. One advantage to this mindset is that your employees will start viewing their shortcomings and weaknesses as opportunities for improvement instead of limitations.
Helps Learners Acquire Real-World Experiences
When you implement learning modules that allow your employees to apply their skills, whether to solve the skills gap or the need for upskilling and reskilling, you are helping them acquire experiences that help them retain information. The more experiences they gain, the more engaged they will be with their professions. This further motivates them to apply their skills and keep improving, enhancing their natural desire for lifelong learning.
The Link Between Skills-Based Learning and Digital Learning
When the recent pandemic showed us how Edtech and digital learning could become one of the most effective tools in removing the barriers in education, we also learned that there is still a lot more untapped potential to explore. Integrating the skills-based model with digital learning is only one possible solution that universities and training institutes can tap into.
Ultimately, no one-size-fits-all solution can solve the skills gap challenge facing employers. It’s still important to continually assess the effectiveness of your chosen educational, training, and development programs by tracking completion rates, satisfaction and grades, employability, and potentially career advancement. Learn how to use skills-based and digital learning in your company or university to achieve lifelong learning.
