Have you started your corporate reskilling program?

Reskilling is the process of learning new skills so you can do a different job, or of training people to do a different job. In the aftermath of the Great Resignation, you may find yourself facing vacancies in specific roles, and needing to quickly train existing employees to move into those jobs. This is a classic example of a situation where reskilling drives efficiency.

However, while reskilling is a major trend for 2022, it was driving conversations even earlier. The WEF Future of Jobs Report 2018 found that while 75 million jobs would be displaced in 20 major economies by 2022, new ways of working would, in-parallel, create 133 million new roles. Reskilling newly redundant employees to prepare them for newly created roles reduces the recruitment burden and increases employee satisfaction and loyalty.

Getting started with reskilling: Skills analysis

First, identify the roles for which you need to create a reskilling program, especially those where vacancies already exist. Each role demands certain core competencies. Assess and chart them, based on input from current incumbents in similar roles, superiors and subordinates. 

Based on this list, identify the base skills required for the role. For example, if you are looking to fill a Python developer role, you will find it easier to reskill someone who already has some experience with coding in any language, or at the very least is computer literate. 

Selecting candidates for reskilling

At the same time, create a skills chart for the employees who are available to move to new roles. What are their skillsets and interests? If the skills chart for the employee matches the base skills of the role, the employee is a good fit for reskilling.

Empower the employees on their career path by allowing them to opt in for the roles they feel they are best suited to. Allow them to participate in multiple reskilling modules based on their interests, if possible. This also creates a larger pool of talent for management to select from. By helping employees plan their own career progression based on their existing skills, interests and job vacancies, you increase employee satisfaction and loyalty.

Creating an e-learning program

While it is possible to plan one-on-one, instructor-led reskilling training, typically, you are likely to need to quickly get a large number of employees trained on hard skills, while having very few experts available to train them. This means that e-learning is a much more practical solution than instructor-led training (ILT), as it allows for asynchronous learning and easy scalability.

Since reskilling involves your employees needing to learn skills that they are not familiar with, consider approaches that increase engagement and interest to ensure positive outcomes. This could include gamified delivery of courses, simulations, AR or VR based training, and so on, depending on the type of skills you need to impart.

You could also consider ways in which you need not create all the required e-learning content from scratch. For instance, you may already have entry-level training content prepared for the same subject matter. Sit with e-learning content creation experts (such as our team at Hornbill) to discuss and determine the best way to repurpose this material to serve your needs.

Reskilling is an effective and efficient HR strategy, as loyal employees can constitute a significant competitive advantage. Rather than executing mass layoffs and investing in recruitment of new talent, reskilling existing talent is often better for productivity as well as organization culture and cohesion. Work with the e-learning experts to deliver fast, effective results. Contact our team at Hornbill FX today.