Part 1 of this 2 part series scrutinizes the emergence of new jobs in the next five years, and what it means for our world.
Post pandemic, industries across the world are voraciously embracing contact-less technology to facilitate maximum business with minimum contact. Technologies like robotics and AI are proving to be more efficient than humans at many jobs. This transition from man to machine will displace many current jobs increasing unemployment, but also create new jobs that would require fresh skills.
To curb unemployment and leverage technology in order to ascertain optimum economic growth in the pandemic struck world, the skills and unemployment gap must be addressed urgently. Over 1000 leaders from business, government and civil society convened at the World Economic Forum Jobs Reset Summit, to shape a roadmap for the world to close the skill-gap and ready the workforce for new job roles.
The Future of Jobs Report 2020 sheds light on emergence of new jobs and skills in the next five years in the context of the pandemic and accelerated tech adoption. The report covers 15 industries and 26 economies and also draws from World Economic Forum’s Jobs of Tomorrow report that was authored in partnership with data scientists at partner companies LinkedIn and Coursera. Here are some key findings regarding the rise of new jobs drawn from both the reports.
Emerging and declining jobs
Due to a shift in the division of labor between machines and humans, employers expect redundant jobs to decline from being 15.4% of the workforce to 9% and the emerging professions to grow from 7.8% to 13.5% of the total employee base, by 2025. As a result, 85 million jobs are expected to be displaced, while 97 million new roles would emerge in the future of work, where jobs would be divided between humans, machines and algorithms.
The report also reveals striking similarities across industries between strategic and redundant job roles. The jobs that are witnessing high growth in demand include roles such as AI and Machine Learning Specialists, Data Analysts and Scientists, Robotics Engineers, Digital Transformation Specialists, etc.
Job roles like Information Security Analysts, Process Automation Specialists and Internet of Things Specialists are some of the groupings that are experiencing a surge in demand from employers. The rise in demand for these roles clearly reflect industries’ growing reliance on automation and resurgence of cybersecurity risks.
As the chart depicts, the roles that are increasingly being displaced by technology are basically clerical, accounting and assembly line workers jobs as well as administrative managers and business service roles. However, such job disruption is being counter-balanced by creation of jobs in new fields.
Jobs of the future
In the course of the next ten years, the lion share of newly created jobs would be completely new occupations or a new avatar of existing occupations that would require new content and skills. The resultant set of emerging professions would reflect adoption of new technologies and rising demand for novel products and services that would drive a higher demand for green economy jobs, positions related to data and AI economy, and new roles in cloud computing, engineering and product development.
In addition, the study found that in the new economy, the emerging set of professions displayed increasing importance to human interaction through roles in marketing and sales; in the care economy as well as positions where the aptitude for understanding and working comfortably with people from different backgrounds is crucial.
In the care economy, a distinct set of roles would emerge corresponding to professional clusters around Cloud Computing, Content Production, Data and AI, and Engineering; while in the green economy, new roles would cluster around Marketing, People and Culture, Product Development, and Sales.
To fulfill the requirement of the new job roles, new skills would be required. Read on as we delve further into emerging and declining skills in this two-part series.
