Digital skills – crucial for the future of work

Peter du ToitI'm the founder of FutureWork IQ where I spend my time assisting businesses to improve their climate literacy so as to understand the projected impacts from the expanding climate crisis and how to adapt their workplaces in the face of these impacts.

A recent United Nations report on digital competencies required for the future highlighted that “estimates indicate that 85–90% of future jobs will require ICT skills by 2020.”

There is no question that digital literacy is becoming a crucial skill for anyone who wishes to remain relevant in a rapidly changing work environment. Very closely linked to that is digital fluency, which speaks to the ability an individual has in understanding which technology to use where, in order to create a desired result.

The UN report continues:

“More than a third of the labour force in OECD countries, however, is reported to have an extremely low capacity to use digital technologies productively, while 56 percent of the population has no ICT skills.”

LinkedIn also released data that supports this finding as mentioned in their recent economic graph presentation (You can see that here.)

It is our view, in light of the above, that individuals taking responsibility to upskill themselves or improve their digital literacy will be making a good investment in their future. A progressive company would be doing the same for its workforce if they invested in upskilling.

From our experience there are six competencies that make up the term “Digital Literacy” and they are:

1. The ability to communicate and collaborate in technology rich environments
2. The ability to manage your online identity and reputation
3. The ability to learn in technology rich environments
4. The ability to adopt and adapt to information communication technology (ICT)
5. The ability to find, interpret and store information
6. The ability to produce professional media for consumption in digital environments.

How would you score yourself on a scale of 1 to 10 on each of these? If you would be interested in finding out how we could help you upskill yourself or your team in each of these six digital competencies then do reach out to us at team[at]futureworkiq[dot]com.