These are the skills employers are looking for now… right up till 2030

It’s 2025, and the global labour market is undergoing profound transformation. Trends such as technological advancements, economic uncertainty, demographic shifts, geoeconomic fragmentation, and the green transition are predicted to create 170 million jobs while displacing 92 million roles, resulting in a net increase of 78 million jobs by 2030, according to the Future of Jobs 2025 report released in January by the World Economic Forum (WEF).

Amid this churn, among the top skills and skills groups global employers view as crucial for the run-up to 2030 are AI and big data, networks and cybersecurity, technological literacy, creative thinking, resilience, flexibility, agility, curiosity, and lifelong learning, the report highlights.

Spanning 290 pages, the report offers detailed insights into the trends and skills shaping the workforce from 2025 to 2030. Here’s a quick look at its key findings.

Key drivers of workforce transformation

According to the report, the most transformative trends affecting business and the labour market include:

1. ‍Broadening Digital Access: Broadening digital access is anticipated to be the most transformative trend, with 60% of employers expecting it to reshape their business by 2030. Key technological advancements – including AI and information processing, robotics and automation, and energy generation, storage, and distribution – are also projected to drive significant transformation. This trend is expected to drive demand for the following skills: Technology-related skills such as AI and big data, networks and cybersecurity, and technological literacy, which are predicted to be the top three fastest-growing skills.‍
2. Increasing cost of living: The increasing cost of living ranks as the second-most transformative trend, with 50% of employers expecting it to have an impact on their business by 2030, despite forecasts of reduced global inflation. Additionally, 42% of businesses anticipate that a general economic slowdown will drive operational changes.
   This trend is expected to drive demand for the following skills: Creative thinking, resilience, flexibility, and agility.‍
3. Climate-change mitigation: Ranked as the third-most transformative trend overall – and the top trend within the green transition – 47% of employers expect climate-change mitigation to reshape their business within the next five years. Climate-change adaptation, ranked sixth, is anticipated to impact 41% of businesses.
   This trend is expected to drive demand for the following skills: Renewable energy engineers, environmental engineers, and electric and autonomous vehicle specialists, which are among the 15 fastest-growing roles. Climate trends are also driving a heightened focus on environmental stewardship, which has entered the Future of Jobs Report’s list of top 10 fastest-growing skills for the first time.
4. ‍Demographic shifts: Shifts in demographics – including aging and declining working-age populations in higher-income economies and expanding working-age populations in lower-income economies – are expected to reshape global economies and labour markets.
   This trend is expected to drive demand for the following skills: Talent management, teaching and mentoring, and motivation and self-awareness. Healthcare roles, such as nursing professionals, are likely to grow in economies with aging populations, while education-related roles, such as higher education teachers, will rise in economies with expanding working-age populations.‍
5. Geoeconomic fragmentation and geopolitical tensions: Geoeconomic fragmentation and geopolitical tensions are expected to drive business model transformation in 34% of organisations over the next five years. Key factors include increased trade and investment restrictions, as well as subsidies and industrial policies, particularly affecting economies with significant trade ties to the US or China. Businesses anticipating these impacts are more likely to offshore or re-shore operations.
   This trend is expected to drive demand for the following skills: Security-related roles, along with increased demand for network and cybersecurity expertise. Additionally, essential human skills such as resilience, flexibility, agility, leadership, and social influence are expected to become more critical.

Skill gaps: A concern 

The report predicts that over the next five years, the creation of new jobs and the elimination of outdated ones due to structural labour-market transformations will result in a net growth of 78 million jobs. But by 2030, an estimated 39% of workers' current skill sets will either become outdated or require transformation and 59% of the workforce would need upskilling or reskilling, the report said.

Skills gaps are therefore a major cause of concern for employers, with 63% viewing them as a significant barrier to business transformation. To tackle this, the report says employers are increasingly prioritising upskilling their workforce with 85% planning to focus on workforce upskilling, 70% expecting to hire staff with new skills, 40% intending to reduce staff as their skills become less relevant, and 50% aiming to transition staff from declining to growing roles.

Interestingly, 64% of employers surveyed indicated that supporting employee health and well-being will be a key focus to attract talent.

Additionally, effective reskilling and upskilling initiatives, along with improvements in talent progression and promotion, are considered high-potential strategies for talent attraction. The respondents indicated that public policies that provide funding and support for reskilling and upskilling are some of the most welcomed measures to boost talent availability.

The 2020 edition of this report, looking forward to 2025, had predicted a “double disruption” of job losses due to automation and the economic impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, potentially displacing 85 million jobs while creating 97 million – a net gain of 12 million. It also highlighted significant skills gaps, estimating that 40% of workers would require reskilling of six months or less to address these challenges.

Read our blog on the 2020 report here: These are the skills employers are looking for now…right up till 2025

To sum up, the skills predicted to be in demand between 2025 and 2030 are:

1. AI and big data
2. Networks and cybersecurity
3. Technological literacy
4. Creative thinking
5. Resilience, flexibility and agility
6. Curiosity and lifelong learning
7. Leadership and social influence
8. Talent management
9. Analytical thinking
10. Environmental stewardship
11. Systems thinking
12. Motivation and self-awareness
13. Empathy and active listening
14. Design and user experience
15. Service orientation and customer service

Source: World Economic Forum, Future of Jobs Survey, 2024.

In the 2020 report, these were the top skills for 2025

1. ‍Analytical thinking and innovation
2. Active learning and learning strategies
3. Complex problem-solving
4. Critical thinking and analysis
5. Creativity, originality and initiative
6. Leadership and social influence
7. Technology use, monitoring and control
8. Technology design and programming
9. Resilience, stress tolerance and flexibility
10. Reasoning, problem-solving and ideation
11. Emotional intelligence
12. Troubleshooting and user experience
13. Service orientation
14. Systems analysis and evaluation
15. Persuasion and negotiation

The Future of Jobs 2025 report is based on the World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs Survey, conducted in late 2024, which surveyed more than 1,000 global employers, collectively employing more than 14.1 million workers across 22 industry clusters and 55 economies. To read the complete 290-page report click here: World Economic Forum, Future of Jobs Report 2025