Developing the right skills for your future

Changing jobs

There are many reasons why someone may be looking for a job. Maybe you’re looking for the first step in your career. 

Looking for a new job can be an emotional time. One way of managing this is to find others who share your experiences. That way, you can share skills and help each.

How the world of work is changing

The World Economic Forum met in 2023 to discuss the future of jobs.

They anticipate that:

• Digital technology will create 69 million new jobs by 2027.
• 1 billion people will have improved skills, jobs, and better education by 2030.

This means that there’s many opportunities for you to make the most of this change.

Here are some of the opportunities:

• Your skills – continue to change and build your skills.
• Workplace skills – keep up to date with future requirements.
• Learning from home – with more people working from home, this may give you even more time and ways to learn.

• Be aware of the digital skills that are needed for future jobs.
• Support your own development in the same way a business would operate.
• Be flexible to meet the needs of today’s fast paced world.

Changes in work

Our careers can change direction. It’s useful taking a note of the changes we make during our lives. Career changes like starting work, moving jobs, leaving, or returning can happen at any point. What other changes are there?

Here are just a few examples:

• Starting a new job
• Starting work for the first time
• Returning from parental leave
• Job loss
• Retirement
• Moving from military to civilian
• Job change from one industry to another
• Promotion
• Changing from full-time employment to self-employed, or vice versa
• A strategic step down
• Returning after sickness
• Starting a company

Having a business mindset

In today’s world, businesses are constantly having to change the way they run. You, as a person, are no different. You are your own business. Today, being aware of in-demand skills has never been more important. 

In the same way as a business, you need to:

• Identify your personal values.
• Identify where to promote yourself.
• Know how to promote yourself.
• Keep a stable income.
• Know how you manage potential customers (except for you it may be a potential employer instead!)

Creating a growth mindset

Your opportunities to improve yourself can come from anywhere. We often mistake room for growth as a weakness, so we avoid seeing the true value and purpose of learning. To develop, you need to accept that there’s room for growth. It’s more than just effort, working harder or faster doesn’t improve your personal growth. You need to create a growth mindset

What is a growth mindset?

A growth mindset believes that skill and intelligence are something that people can develop. Your room for growth is never a weakness, it’s your potential.

If you embrace having a growth mindset, you’ll believe that your future success is achieved through constant personal development.

A flexible mindset

We get asked what do we want to do when we grow up. This suggests that our options for our future are in one direction. From a young age, we gain qualifications and make choices that support that direction. This career advice isn’t helpful. Most people today can expect to change jobs several times in a lifetime.

We can have different career paths. People don’t always know what they want to do with their life. This doesn’t mean you lack ambition, direction or that you aren’t good enough. It’s a sign you are willing to adapt. And to accept all aspects of your personality and interests.

LinkedIn has published a report looking back 20 years. Their study found that millennials will change jobs regularly. It will be an average of four times in their first ten years out of college. Earlier generations changed jobs twice during the same time.

Applying your skills to the workplace

Having skills along both of your T lines will help prepare you for a wide range of job roles, industries, and companies.

Imagine all your attributes as a set of ingredients. For any recipe, you want to make, you’ll need a specific set of ingredients. This is the same for jobs. You may use some of the same ingredients. You may need to get new ones or adjust the amounts of ingredients you are using. And the way you’re using them.

By looking at roles and what you'll need from them you can start to identify gaps in your T-shaped skills and use these to create a development plan.

Let's go into each in more detail.

Identify

We've already covered identify. This is the process of looking at your skillsets and qualities and making a note of what you identify.

Visualise

This is the process of looking forward at the role and life you want in 12 months’ time. Try now to visualise what your perfect workday would look like. The more open you are, the more useful it will be. And it will help you to see the exact point you want to get to.

Ask yourself:

• Where are you in the world?
• Are you indoors / outdoors?
• Who are you with?
• What are you wearing?
• Does your day start early?
• Do you finish late?
• What does your workplace look like?
• How does your working week look?
• Busy, different every day, set routine?
• How do you get to work?
• Is your work at a desk, outside, a mix, or something else?
• What do you do on a day to day basis?

Some of these may seem like minor details. Things like the people you work with are all part of your happiness at work. Don’t ignore them when looking for a job, or you may find yourself in the ‘perfect role’ on paper, but not happy.

Setting intentions

Setting intentions is the next step. Now you’ve visualised what your future looks like. You can start to set a direction for the future. Use this to create a goal for yourself. Start with “It’s 12 months from now and I am...” and go from there.

Break it down into steps

1. What personal strengths can you write down?
2. What have you got now that you can build upon?
3. What extra skills do you need?
4. Who will you need to speak to who can help you?
5. How will you share what you want to achieve?
6. What questions do you need answering?
7. What personal areas do you need to strengthen?
8. What weaknesses can you work on?
9. What volunteering or work experience could help you?

Start small and start now

You don't have to change everything overnight. Starting now and taking small manageable steps can help you keep pace towards your goal. Remember, keep it simple, keep it realistic, and keep it positive. Keep on taking steps towards your goal. You’ll be there before you know it.

General and career specific skills

Your learning should be lifelong. And is more than just education alone. In this next section, we will explain two types of skills – general and career-specific skills.

General skills

Examples of general skills:

• Empathy
• Communication
• Resilience
• Compassion
• Working with others
• Adaptability

These skills are lifelong, slow to change and with a long shelf-life. And may just need an occasional update. They are very human skills found in mindsets and attitudes.

Career-specific skills

Examples of career-specific skills:

• Medicine
• Technology - cyber security etc.
• Business
• Law
• Construction

These are the skills which need regular updating and maintenance. And are for a specific purpose. Digital skills are a good example. They have a short shelf-life before they become out-of-date.

Tools to help evaluate skills

Not sure what your skills are or what level they're at? There are tools you can use to help.

Here are a few to get you started:

• National Careers Service
• E Skills Match
• LinkedIn

Why is curiosity important

Curiosity is a mindset, which allows you to be creative and see many options for your future. It’s the basis of learning. You must have curiosity to be able to seek out new ideas and skills. This is essential for the future workplace.

Learning happens in our lives in many varied ways. This means we need to write our goals, but also re-write them as time moves on. Curiousity and having a growth mindset can help us keep us learning and re-writing our goals.

Having lots of different learning options can help keep you motivated.

Learning options

There are lots of options for learning. Such as online lessons, YouTube videos and knowledge sharing. Once you know that anything can be a way to learn, you know that everything you done has been a source of a skill.

Here are some options to get you started:

• Lloyds Bank Academy
• Future Learn
• Learndirect
• Udemy
• nationalskillsagency.co.uk
• Short courses - university
• Continuous Personal Development
• The Open University

Some more social learning options:

• YouTube tutorials
• Social infographics
• Specific interest WhatsApp groups
• Company ‘lunch and learns’
• Skill sharing
• Thought pieces and article reading
• Eventbrite
• Meetup
• Mentoring

The value of mentoring

A mentor is someone who teaches or gives help and advice to a less experienced person.

There are lots of apps and organisations to help you find a mentor. Mentoring can be formal through an organisation. Or informally through someone in your day-to-day life.

“Employees of greater than 5 years were more likely to have a mentor. Many companies found having a mentor for a new employee improves productivity. This also improves the level of engagement of those joining their organisation.” - Jeff Webber, How leaders and employees should harness the power of mentorship, 2018.

So, now you understand the value, let’s look more at how to make the most of mentoring.

Mentoring can help re-skilling through:

• Adding perspective.
• Advice.
• Encouragement.
• A wider network of contacts.

A mentor can also:

1. Take a long-term view on your development.
2. Offer insight from their perspective and experience.
3. Be the person to bounce ideas off.
4. Share your barriers and ‘failures’ to see a route through.
5. Give feedback on your strengths and areas of growth.

Asking someone to mentor you

Think about what areas of your life or career you would like help and advice with. Then identify someone to be your mentor. A mentor isn’t a coach or a therapist. A mentor is someone you can aspire to be and learn from professionally.

Related learning links