Upskilling and Reskilling your People

What are your goals for the remaining nine months of 2024? Whatever your organisation aspires to accomplish, you won’t achieve any of your objectives without the support and skills of your team. People make your organisation tick.

Investing in the development of your people equips them with the vital tools they need to achieve personal and professional success. It’s a sign of a growth mindset and a future-focused organisation, which can be a pull factor for existing and prospective employees.    

In this post we’ll dig into the reasons why investing in continuous learning empowers individuals and organisations to thrive in a rapidly changing world, and what this means in practical terms.

How skills contribute to competitiveness

Developing skills allows employees to keep up with, and adapt to, changes in technology, work and employment. When employers look to upskill and re-skill their people, they encourage them to learn and develop, increasing resilience and fostering a culture of innovation. Skills development helps individuals and organisations to prepare for the future of work.

Employers often promise learning and development opportunities during recruitment as a way of attracting new talent. It’s important to keep the promises you make as new employees arrive with high expectations to learn and develop. Those who aren’t learning are more likely to leave. Delivering on skills development will develop a pipeline of internal talent to fill future vacancies. It also gives you a competitive edge in serving your customers and attracting a higher calibre of employee.

Preparing your workforce for the future

According to the 2023 LinkedIn Workplace Learning report, 93% of organisations are concerned about employee retention. The number one way that organisations are working to improve retention is by providing learning opportunities, including skills development.

We talk a lot about the need to adapt our skills for the workplace of tomorrow, but what does the workplace of tomorrow look like? Right now, the three areas creating the highest skills demand are AI, changing ways of working, and managing employee health and wellbeing. Let’s look at these in more detail.

• Embracing AI technology is essential if you don’t want to risk being left behind by the competition. Demand for specialist skills in this area is increasing, so looking to re-skill or upskill existing employees could be a more efficient and cost-effective means of closing the AI skills gap.

• Following the shift to flexible and hybrid working models, managers and colleagues need to feel equipped to work in a new way. Colleagues require soft skills development to build resilience and effectiveness when working remotely. They also need to have the right collaboration tools and equipment and understand how to use them effectively. As working patterns change, leaders require upskilling to feel confident and competent managing remote teams.

• Mental, physical, emotional, and financial wellbeing are key themes in the workplaces of today and tomorrow. Colleagues and leaders need to feel comfortable discussing these topics openly in order to bring their best self to work. Education and upskilling are both key to making this happen.

What’s the difference between upskilling and re-skilling?

• Upskilling is understanding where the skills gaps are and identifying training and development that builds on existing hard and soft skills to bridge those gaps. Manager feedback, performance reviews and goal setting all inform a skills gap analysis, making training in these areas equally as crucial.

• Re-skilling is learning new skills in a different area to your current work, usually either in response to demand for specialist skills or to explore a different career direction. Employers may look to re-skilling as a way of supporting and retaining colleagues who want to move or develop their career in a new area of the business.

Empower your people through continuous learning

When you invest in your people and provide them with opportunities to develop, your business will experience greater productivity, higher engagement levels, increased morale, and an improved retention rate. Investing in learning and development empowers colleagues to thrive and flourish. It inspires employee loyalty, increased profits, and gives you a competitive edge in your marketplace.

HR teams have an active listening role to play 

HR teams have a key role in helping organisations keep up with the pace of change. It all starts with understanding and identifying where the skills gaps are. Listening to leaders and employees will help you to create the workplace of tomorrow by: 

1. Aligning skills development plans with business goals.

2. Understanding the skills managers and employees require to get the job done.

3. Identifying the hard and soft skills development that is lacking.

4. Observing personal development plans and supporting employees to make them a reality.

5. Creating a realistic, accurate learning and development budget.

What does upskilling and re-skilling mean in practical terms?

Upskilling and re-skilling comes in many forms. Here are some of the most common:

• Soft skills - developing attitude, mindset and behaviours

• Hard skills - learning facts and theory, practical tools, systems, processes

• Flexible learning, such as podcasts, online learning/workshops, webinars

• In-person workshops and training sessions

• Mentoring and coaching to support knowledge sharing knowledge and skills transfer. See The importance of mentors in today’s workplace.

• Career progression and personal development plans.

Ask us about our Learning and Development Framework

The seven segments of our L&D framework have been developed to equip every member of your organisation with the skills, mindset, behaviours, tools and techniques to unlock their full potential and the potential of those around them.

To complement this, we have launched a brand new series of learning and development open workshops, the first one, ‘Engaging in Change’, takes place on 23^rd April and is available to book now. You can also sign up to our newsletter to for the latest updates.

Further reading

If you enjoyed this blog, take a look at our free eBook People planning for 2024 and our blogs on Flexible working in 2024 and beyond and Upskilling your workforce.

How we can help you

If you’d like to discuss any of the issues covered in this blog, get in touch with us today on 0161 941 2426. We’re here to help.