If possible, companies must increase L&D outlays while committing to reskilling programs. Developing skilling initiatives will prepare them in managing future disruptions better and avoiding the severe impact felt during the present pandemic.

Photo Credit : Shutterstock,

During the past few years, as automation and AI keep making inroads into one sector after another, industry analysts have been highlighting the significance of upskilling and reskilling initiatives for employees to retain relevance.

As the pandemic upturns prevailing operating models, enterprises need to revise overall strategies and focus on skilling programs for employees so their roles retain relevance. As the pandemic upturns prevailing operating models, enterprises need to revise overall strategies and focus on skilling programs for employees so their roles retain relevance.

The COVID-19 outbreak simply accelerated that requirement. Worldwide, most industries have taken drastic blows from the pandemic. Consequently, companies have been forced to lay off workers, freeze hiring, introduce salary cuts and put some employees on furloughs.

Challenges and Changes

Like automation and AI, COVID-19 presents some unprecedented challenges. What’s worse, unlike the former, the pandemic has spawned volatility and uncertainty. This is partly because the new normal and pandemic-related restrictions keep changing almost every day.

Moreover, an overload of data abounds about coronavirus do’s and don’ts. All of the new information emanating daily makes the task more daunting in creating actionable initiatives or driving coherent business continuity plans. For both employers and employees, the pandemic presents a series of hurdles that will require updated or new skill-sets in combatting the current crisis in the long run.

Meanwhile, as uncertainty continues in many aspects, individuals and institutions can ride out the storm by optimizing their prospective opportunities. It is in this context that upskilling and/or reskilling will help set them up for success as and when the situation returns to normal in 2021 or thereafter.

In multiple ways, the pandemic is triggering cataclysmic changes in the employment landscape. Remote working and the work-from-home regimes are some manifestations. A few changes will be long-lasting and irreversible. This makes the largescale reskilling of new and working employees imperative.

Driven by pandemic pressures, businesses have had to reorient their working strategies and operating models. Therefore, the traditional skills and way of doing business may no longer pay dividends or be as viable as before. To maximize potential and retain relevance in an evolving scenario, enterprises must relook at the skills of employees in managing new challenges or tasks that promote their business objectives.

Learning New Skills

If HR heads and the management can pinpoint roles requiring similar skillsets, they could then identify how to upskill the existing workforce. Such flexibility or malleability of skill-sets will help in promoting business needs while helping augment revival and growth prospects.

Besides, collaborative learning environments will enable upskilling and reskilling programs that remain more seamless and intuitive for learners. As a result, it would permit peers to help in educating each other in their journey towards learning new skills.

Adapting employees’ skills and roles to the post-pandemic ways of working will be crucial to building operating-model resilience in enterprises. In meeting the ongoing challenges, companies should craft a talent strategy that develops employees’ critical digital and cognitive capabilities as well as social and emotional skills and their adaptability and resilience.

Although discretionary spends are being temporarily suspended, organisations would do well to leave their learning and development budgets untouched. If possible, companies must increase L&D outlays while committing to reskilling programs. Developing skilling initiatives will prepare them in managing future disruptions better and avoiding the severe impact felt during the present pandemic.

The need of learning new skills for employees is no longer just a recommendation. Rather, it is a crucial step towards economic recovery. As employees also look ahead, there will be a clear shift in their perception of reskilling. From just a valued opportunity to an essential step in retaining relevance and employability.

The more employees learn and relearn, the faster will the company be able to bridge the technology gap. In this way, they can overcome pandemic-linked challenges much faster and emerge from the current COVID-19 crisis stronger than before.

(The given article include the inputs from Sushmita Majumdar,  Human Resource Lead , mPokket.)