What is Upskilling and Why Does it Matter? by Rochelle Parino
As cited in an article published in Forbes Magazine, “Upskilling refers to the process of teaching current employees new skills. As technology creates opportunities, employers seek to fill new jobs with candidates who possess specialized skill sets. By upskilling current employees, companies can fill open positions while retaining their current workforce by creating learning opportunities.”
As technology continuously advances, it also creates a skills gap within the workforce of any organization. To compensate for the growing gap, many companies invest in upskilling their employees. Keeping up with new trends helps employers improve their businesses, which also makes their employees more competitive. The current workforce believes that it is essential for them to enhance their skills and learn something new; because of this, companies should know that training their employees is essential to retaining them. Providing employees with learning opportunities signals that they are valued and that they have a future within the organization.
Since the process of hiring new talents — from sourcing to onboarding — requires a lot of time, effort, and money, upskilling or retraining existing employees would be a better option. It is more practical to prepare your existing employees to handle new challenges in case someone from the organization decides to leave.
Employers should also make training programs accessible to everyone in the organization, matching each to specific needs of their employees. However, it should be noted that in order to avoid wasting time and money, companies should make sure that these training programs will greatly contribute to the improvement of their employees. Once these programs are in place, consider giving rewards when an employee finishes his/her training. Lastly, companies should also measure the effectiveness of these training programs by making sure that their employees apply what they have learned within the organization.
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About the author:
Rochelle is a not-so-outgoing-person, who loves to spend her time watching Korean dramas and fangirling over BTS.
