In April 2023, the World Economic Forum (WEF) released its report on the future of jobs. The report indicates that companies are expected to create 69 million new jobs by 2027 and eliminate 83 million job positions resulting in the loss of 14 million jobs cut altogether. The world has entered into a revolutionary transformation in the recent decade. With the upending of politics, economy and technology under the umbrella of fast-growing globalisation, the earning sector has also gone through a rapid regeneration. With the arrival of Corona pandemic, the sector of jobs changed from overtly sitting at offices to sitting at home work culture. If this was not enough, the introduction of Artificial Intelligence-based solutions including but not limited to Chat-GPT has pushed the corporate culture towards a climate of paced change. Many a job has been either eliminated from the sector or its importance has been quite diminished in the eyes of the corporate moguls. I would like to personally present an example of how this has impacted the job values. A few months ago, one of my friends started a business of selling plants and pots in the UAE. He had to spend at least AED 8000 only on taking professional photographs of his products. Had he opted for Artificial Intelligence-prompted realistic images, his cost would have been merely AED 50. It means that the work which was previously undertaken by a professional person has been replaced with software. It has also changed the behaviour of customers as well when it comes to seeking specific services.
After going through various research and think tanks’ analyses, I have listed down ten (10) jobs/ works that will be newly emerging and highest earning job sectors till 2030 and beyond.
Al and Machine Learning Specialists
It is expected that around 42 per cent of jobs will be automated by 2025. Therefore, AI and machine learning specialists will be at the front to make this happen.
Sustainability Specialists
As climate change creates havoc in developed and developed countries alike, the need for climate change specialists is increasing day by day. The recent floods in Pakistan register a loss of USD 40 billion to its exchequer and the countries like Pakistan need the assistance of sustainability specialist to develop strategies and plans of action to mitigate climate-induced tragedies.
Business Intelligence Analysts
Since data is becoming new oil (a precious commodity), it is becoming pertinent for businesses all around the world to hire analysts to dig deep into data and find out actionable facts and figures. Some estimates indicate that almost all businesses of the world from agriculture to space agencies will be looking for business intelligence analysis to smooth their way into an ever-changing corporate culture.
Information Security Analysts
With the coming of age of large data comes the threat of sabotage. We already have seen its devastating impact when Russia successfully manipulated social media data and changed the voting preference of at least 150 million United States voters. As every company is connected to the internet, the need for security experts is growing.
Fintech Engineers
With the riding of every firm in the world on the back of technology, the need for fintech engineers is growing by at least 47 per cent per year. This will reach about 74 per cent in the year 2025.
Data Analysts and Scientists
The world is flooded with the information right now. However, it is a hard job to reach a workable conclusion. Data analysts and scientists are the people who can get deep into it and find functional patterns to develop technologies for our use. The jobs sector of this field is expected to rise in the years till 2023 and beyond.
Robotics Engineers
With consumerism on the rise all over the world, the need for robots at the home and industrial scale is rising exponentially. It will not only eliminate traditional hand-done jobs but will also increase industrial output.
Electrotechnology Engineers
With the exposure of industry to robotics, the need for electrotechnology engineers will be rising in the year 2028 when almost all things will be done through electricity and robots.
Agricultural Equipment Operators
At this stage, the population of the developing nations are limited to agriculture in one way or the other. But with the rising population and urban migration, food insecurity is expected to double shortly if agriculture is not put on the modern tracks. With this in mind, the job sector of manufacturing and operating of relating equipment would increase in the year 2025.
Digital Transformation Specialists
This field includes digital fluency, data analytics and digital marketing. According to the Business Intelligence of The Economist, this specific job skill is stimulated to grow 62 per cent on a year and yearly basis. At this time, a learning level specialist earns USD 86 per hour in the US.
These ten jobs will also create an environment that will facilitate the growth of other job sectors as well. These include, but are not limited, to wworking-from-home facilitators, fitness commitment counselors, smart home design managers, workplace environment architects, algorithm bias auditors, data detectives, cyber calamity forecasters and human-machine teaming managers. Apart from this perspective, the changing job sector will also be requiring a change in attitudes of the workforce that would work into these atmospheres. It won’t be a 9 to 5 desk-sitting job culture. Therefore, it would require specialized personal skills that include ccognitive flexibility, negotiation skills, service orientation, judgment and decision-making, critical thinking, creativity and foremost emotional intelligence.