Upskilling Strategy: What to Do and What to Avoid
Tags: HR, Upskilling, Strategy

With the rapid advancement of AI and technology, the workplace in the 21st century has become an unpredictable environment. The techniques, methodology, and strategies behind work practices are continually evolving into more complex mechanisms.

What does this mean for the modern worker? It means there is a continuous obligation for them to learn and re-learn. This involves adding new skills to them with processes as often as possible — and this practice is known as “upskilling.”

Not sure what we’re talking about? Well then, keep reading as we teach you how to master the ultimate upskilling strategy.

What is Upskilling?

If you’re an active part of the corporate environment, the word “upskilling” is no alien to you. Upskilling has become a crucial component of work practices in recent years — and for a good reason. But before we get into that, let’s help you understand the essence of upskilling.

Upskilling is the work practice that encourages and facilitates continuous learning for employees. It is executed through training programs and development opportunities. The crux of this trend is to extend and expand an employee’s capabilities by minimizing or entirely eradicating skill gaps.

In the process of upskilling, the firm’s core priority becomes to improve the employees’ skill sets, not just for the company’s sake but also for each employee’s personal and individual growth.

A handful of upskilling techniques are as follows:

The Significance of Upskilling

As technology continues to advance and evolve, organizations are always on the grind to keep up. Without upskilling, this would mean having to find new talent for every single role in the company. That is not a sustainable route, due to which upskilling is the only option for companies looking to adapt to the modern corporate environment.

With upskilling, the need to find new talent is minimized, and instead, the employer can focus on strengthening and developing existing talent to fit more contemporary, advanced roles.

This enables companies to save money by; instead of concentrating their time and budget on the search for new people, you utilize it to expand the abilities of current employees. It also promotes internal mobility — employees are enabled to take on new roles and projects within the same organization.

Moreover, the current workforce is different because it expects perks that stretch beyond comfortable pay and convenient job roles. It wants all the prospects of individual development, career growth, and skill expansion. Training and development that focuses on upskilling employees, therefore, results in more excellent employee retention.

In short, the overview of why upskilling is absolutely crucial for firms to implement would look something like this:

Upskilling tackles job roles and their requirements that are always changing.

Upskilling provides the extra opportunities employees are looking for these days.

Upskilling enables an organization to operate more competitively by closing skill gaps.

Upskilling minimizes the need to recruit new talent outside the company to fill skill gaps.

Upskilling boosts and increases employee satisfaction and results in an increase in motivation, performance, and morale.

Upskilling significantly increases employee retention.

Upskilling allows companies to save money and time by reducing the need for hiring, onboarding, and training processes.

Upskilling Strategy — Dos and Don’ts

Now that we understand the importance of upskilling, let’s move on to more serious things, such as developing the ultimate strategy. Your strategy’s primary purpose should be to promote internal mobility and deliver all the other advantages of upskilling.

To make this process of creating an adequate and functional upskilling strategy more understandable for you, we have split it into two parts; what you should do and what you shouldn’t.

What to Do

To create and implement a successful upskilling strategy that promotes internal mobility, you should keep the below-listed tips in mind.

Identify present and future skills.

You must identify existing skills within your company and future skills that your employees may need to perform better. So, always stay in touch with your workers’ critical capabilities or will need in the next one to three years.

Set upskilling goals.

In accordance with the current atmosphere of your organization, set realistic and achievable upskilling goals. Everything else will then be considering these! Essentially, look for skill gaps in the company and then set goals that fill those skill gaps.

Carefully pick methods.

Discover the best learning methods for your organization. You can choose between multiple types such as online, team-based, peer-to-peer, or on-the-job. Additionally, you can also blend various techniques to maximize learning.

Peer coaching

Peer coaching is another method you should be implementing into your upskilling strategy. Two or more colleagues can work together to expand, refine, and build new skills, teach one another, and solve workplace problems.

Peer coaching ultimately enables employees to an expansive range of workplace skills. Essentially, this has an informal side to it as people can talk to each other directly, ask questions to clear confusions, and learn by watching and observing each other.

Regularly measure progress.

It is not enough to install an upskilling strategy in place and then forget about it. You must create a useful dashboard to continually track progress and spot areas of improvement in your strategy.

Match skills to opportunities.

Connect employees with new projects regularly. This would also involve stretching assignments or even jobs through a dynamic career marketplace.

Communicate success.

Any positive results you get and that are specifically relevant to your business priorities and important to senior leaders should also be shared with individual employees. In short, the communication of success that you acquire from upskilling is of utmost importance.

What to Avoid

Despite upskilling being a seemingly straightforward trend to latch onto, there is still a lot of space where things could go wrong. Here’s everything that you should be avoiding if you want a seamless upskilling strategy.

Misunderstanding what you’ve got

Being unable to understand the current position of your workforce is one of the biggest mistakes that you can make. If you fail to realize this, your upskilling strategy will fail to cater to the discrepancies that you have in the organization.

For this reason, it is significant to establish a strong baseline of your firm’s existing capabilities. Then, weigh these according to the desired critical skills that you want to see in your workforce.

Uninteresting learning processes

Another way you can adversely impact your strategy is by employing learning processes that are boring and unattractive for the employees. Upskilling can only be successful if the learning and development taking place are creative, personalized, and fun for the workforce.

Remember: the most advanced upskilling strategies include integrating learning experiences that assist people in building their skill set through thorough practice, feedback, and reflection. It is memorable and engaging!

Mistaking learning about the skills for mastering them

Don’t put an obligation on your employees to instantly be good at something they are only supposed to learn. Knowing sufficient information about something does not mean that they can be masters at it!

Therefore, at least the upskilling process’s initial stages will always be entirely focused upon the learning aspect and not practical application. Application of skills always comes later and with regular practice.

Little to no focus on individual employee growth

If your employees don’t get the opportunities to apply their newly acquired skills to a real project, the efficacy of your upskilling strategy won’t matter much. Keeping your employees tuck in old roles is quite possibly the most dangerous thing you do for your strategy. You need to offer your workforce tangible work opportunities that will harness their career and personal growth.

Focusing on knowledge-based skills

Don’t just concentrate on knowledge-based skills! Soft skills are just as critical, in fact, maybe even more since they are essential for the development and growth of individual employees and the team. Knowledge is only the first part of the equation; soft skills are the second important part.

Final Thoughts

In the 21st century, upskilling is quite possibly the most significant work trend that you can integrate into your organization. It is one of the most potent ways for companies to equip their people with the essential skills and competencies needed for future-proof.

The best practices discussed above will give you the right space to start your upskilling journey. However, keep in mind that the way you go about the upskilling of employees depends entirely on your specific needs, both from an organizational as well as an individual employee perspective. You can always opt to combine one or more of the upskilling techniques above to create a perfect strategy.

Originally published at lurnii on December 23, 2020.