Ready, set, upskill: Effective training for the jobs of tomorrow

Economists, politicians and futurists have been talking about “the future of work” for the better part of a decade. And yet, change has been slow.

Flash forward to 2020, and COVID-19 has catapulted businesses and individuals into the future of work. One of the biggest emerging skill needs for the Australian economy is digital skills. Australia will need 156,000 more digital technology workers by 2025, representing one in four jobs created during that period.

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The digital skills gap shows that few Australians are ready for the jobs of tomorrow

If Australia can address the digital skills gap, it will turbocharge the economy, helping businesses in the Technology, Media and Communications industry alone grow by $10 billion by 2025.

During COVID-19, jobs with programming skills, mathematics, technology design and data analysis were among the fastest growing.
Employees themselves identify web app and software development, data science, data analysis and coding/programming as some of the most in demand skills in the economy.
Overall, 87% of jobs in Australia require digital literacy skills.
Already, 50,600 Australians reported lacking necessary skills or education as their main difficulty in finding work.

Are you ready for the next set of workforce challenges in 2022?

See our full 2022 report

Many Australians used the pandemic to learn new skills, although very few focused on upskilling in technical or digital literacy fields.

How prepared do Australians feel for the future workplace?

1 in 3Australians said their day-to-day tasks are different to what they were before the pandemic.
1 in 4Australians said they were worried about being made redundant.
1 in 4Australians felt they didn’t have the skills they need.

*This report takes into account 1078 respondents from across the Australian workforce.

Myth debunking - people care about a learning culture at work

56% of respondents prefer dedicated training over free lunches at work
52% of respondents prefer a learning culture over a fun culture at work

88% of organisations find it difficult to hire employees with the skills they need.

See our full 2020 report

Other reports

Ready, Set, Upskill: Maximising the ROI of skills and training

Australian businesses are expecting to spend approximately $8 billion on learning and development in 2024. And yet, nearly half of businesses we surveyed admit they aren’t prioritising training budgets to adequately address skills gaps. While spend is on the rise, one in eight Australian businesses are planning on halving their L&D budgets, leaving them at risk of a serious skills gap.

Ready, Set, Upskill: Prioritising skills for a resilient workforce

In the post-pandemic economy, digital skills are crucial for Australia's labour market as the pace of digitisation accelerates. This report is the third in a series that looks into what skills are growing the quickest across the job market, the cost business stands to lose by not addressing these gaps and the role of training to bridge the divide.

The salary trap

In a moment of change in the job market amidst economic uncertainty, this report aims to understand how these transformations impact workers and companies, in a phenomenon we call the ‘Salary Trap'.