The Importance of Reskilling in a Post-COVID-19 World

The recent pandemic has changed the way organisations and businesses work. The industry impact of current events has made one thing clear — you need to add to your skills and resilience to continue flourishing in your career.

Reskilling is vital for adapting to the constant trend changes in your field, not only as an employee, but also an employer. LinkedIn’s 2020 Workplace Learning Report revealed that 99% of learning executives believe in a gradual erosion of growth in a company if employees did not reskill.

Another report by McKinsey Global Institute in 2017 estimated that almost 40% of the global workforce needed to partially reskill to continue in their current occupations. Reskilling can help you overcome any knowledge gaps in your current position and help you advance to senior positions.

Read on to explore some common skills that you can gain to become more relevant in the post-COVID-19 business field.

Cloud Computing

While some industries were understandably affected by the pandemic, cloud computing has only emerged stronger. The sector has experienced accelerated growth due to a surge in demand for digital business technologies.

Cloud computing can overhaul your company’s infrastructure and can support your accounting team by conducting finance evaluations digitally and seamlessly connecting different departments, even when employees work from home.

With more workspaces becoming automated or digital, cloud computing is expected to expand across the business field. Therefore, a qualification in this area can make you an attractive asset for companies looking to establish a flebile work policy for their employees.

Business Management

If the pandemic has taught us one thing, it’s that you must make your business sustainable to insulate itself from volatility in market conditions. You must ensure that your company data matches the strategies and decisions taken in your board meetings.

There are many aspects of business management, such as project or strategic administration that need to be monitored in order to maintain a successful company. While it’s ideal that you familiarise yourself with all these aspects, specialising in one can give you an edge over your competition.

There are plenty of ways you can become a management expert. Many academic institutes, including the London School of Business and Finance (LSBF) in Singapore, offer certifications in Lean Six Sigma and strategy coordination. These qualifications can help you to update your adaptability skills.

Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence

Machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) have outdone themselves as supportive technologies during the pandemic. Both have enabled computers to process vast volumes of patient data to identify infection patterns. Machine learning is also being used to calculate the protein structure stability for the development of a vaccine for COVID-19.

We’ve just begun to scratch the surface in terms of using these in different areas. As both tools continue to find critical applications in vital industries like healthcare and logistics, gaining expertise in them can be a very profitable and strategic career move.

You can enhance your potential by coupling your knowledge of AI with the requisite understanding of the industry you want to join. For instance, it can be a good idea to pursue a logistics course if you are interested in AI applications in the industry. LSBF in Singapore offers undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in logistics that will allow you to apply this in our fast-changing world.

Sales and Marketing

The pandemic has affected the purchasing power of people across the world as many stick to buying essentials for the time being, which in turn has impacted the once-thriving retail industry.

Upgrading yourself within the areas of sales and marketing can be a great way to persuade retail businesses to hire you to improve their sales. You should be able to design effective marketing campaigns that keep in mind the pandemic, yet convince the public to invest in your products.

Acquiring expertise in sales and marketing is reasonably straightforward - you can pursue online courses, paid or unpaid internships in marketing agencies, or attend events and webinars.

You need to build your self-reliance and confidence and pick up collaboration and communication techniques to supplement your newly-updated knowledge. Developing these personality traits will allow you to make the most of your reskilling in uncertain times.

LSBF in Singapore offers a ‘Personal Effectiveness Boot Camp’ that has different time management and organisational methods customised according to your strengths and skills; this course will be beneficial if you want to increase your work efficiency and productivity. Click here to read more about the programme.