Top 10 Most Essential Job Skills Right Now to Help You Stand Out and Succeed

Jobs and work are going through a significant change right now — with a large number of roles possibly being eliminated or made in the coming years, as per the non-governmental organization the World Economic Forum.

This is due to a wide variety of factors, including climate change and technological advancements. But there is one certainty: Many employees will need to change.

Therefore, it is essential to possess the skills necessary to navigate this change and possibly even the new job requirements.

The WEF’s most recent “Future of Jobs” report identifies the skills that are essential now and will become even more so in the coming years. A survey of 803 companies in 27 industry clusters across 45 economies serves as the foundation for the report.

The most important qualities that employers are currently looking for in employees are analytical and creative thinking skills. The remaining five self-efficacy skills are being resilient, flexible, and agile, being motivated and self-aware, being curious, and being committed to lifelong learning.

This is “in recognition of the importance of workers’ ability to adapt to disrupted workplaces,” the report said.

Only technological literacy, which ranks sixth, makes it into the top ten skills. The ability to comprehend AI and big data and work with it currently ranks 15th.

The newest ranking shows some changes from the previous survey, which was published in 2020.

The report stated, “Comparisons to previous surveys suggest that creative thinking is increasing in importance relative to analytical thinking as work tasks become increasingly automated.”

“In 2018 and 2020, the number of surveyed companies that considered analytical thinking to be a core skill outnumbered those considering creative thinking to be a core skill by a margin of 35% and 38%, respectively. That gap has now decreased to 21% and may continue to close.”

Emerging skills

Further moves to which abilities are expected to be most in demand are expected, as per WEF. ” According to the report, “employers estimate that 44% of workers’ skills will be disrupted in the next five years.”

The skill that is expected to gain the most important is creative thinking, followed by analytical thinking and technological literacy. The WEF report also discusses the latter, which is especially significant because technological advancements will be a major factor in the creation of new jobs and the elimination of existing ones.

Knowledge of AI and big data comes in at number seven because the industry has been booming recently, raising concerns about how artificial intelligence will affect employment. Fourth and fifth, respectively, are soft skills like curiosity and lifelong learning as well as resilience, adaptability, and agility that are expected to become increasingly important for workers.

Physical skills, on the other hand, may lose some of their significance in the future.

“While respondents judged no skills to be in net decline, sizable minorities of companies judge reading, writing and mathematics; global citizenship; sensory-processing abilities; and manual dexterity, endurance and precision to be of declining importance for their workers,” the report said.

The top 10 most important skills

According to the Future of Jobs report from the World Economic Forum, these are the 10 skills that workers will need most this year.

1. Analytical thinking
2. Creative thinking
3. Resilience, flexibility, and agility
4. Motivation and self-awareness
5. Curiosity and lifelong learning
6. Technological literacy
7. Dependability and attention to detail
8. Empathy and active listening
9. Leadership and social influence
10. Quality control