COVID-19 landed each and everyone across the world in an unprecedented crisis, and we were grappling for breath. It affected the highly skilled professionals as much as young professionals ready to kickstart their career. This impression further informs of the turbulence businesses navigated through.
Now, guess what is wild? We human beings are programmed to withstand anything by our will power and making the best use of available resources. When COVID-19 challenges us to the survival of the fittest, we see highly skilled professionals and young professionals ready to face them head-on.
We have been at the hiring-end for over a decade, and we can tell how excited we are to see businesses rapidly adapting to the change in their hiring needs. What we always maintained in terms of desirable employment opportunities for highly skilled professionals and young professionals are now embraced by leading organizations.
COVID-19, in a way, has validated our hiring vision for organizations where skill has become the new watchword. But has COVID-19 created an opportunity for highly skilled professionals or those young professionals who believe in constant skill development? Let’s discuss the top six areas that are rooting for highly skilled professionals and how you can fit the bill.
1. Technology Function Skill
Today, the pursuant of technology is the real hero to wade through all challenges COVID-19 has prepared at a ground level. Smarter are those organizations that realized the utilitarian ubiquity of technology pre-COVID19 and harnessed it organization-wide. Getting started with basic automation to developing R&D for AI-driven solutions is a technology function skill that rendered the manual obsolete.
SkillDemand recommends skilled professionals looking for a change or professionals preparing to kickstart their career, to train on the latest 4.0 digital technologies is the way ahead. Irrespective of your area of service- specialization (HR, IT, Digital Marketing, Business Development…) you must have a necessary foundation in how Industry 4.0 technologies determine your function. You improve your hiring/re-hiring chances with this a lot more.
2. Digital Services Skill
McKinsey, in an article, talks about companies going digital in the future. Interestingly, Covid-19 has already brought us to live in that future where we don’t have to wait until 2040. It is 2020, and digital transformation is the mandatory step ahead to stay in business. With this, using the Internet to host a company website is just elementary. Then?
For skilled professionals or the young aspiring ones, the opportunity is in the digital. Here, the scope is immense. It can simply start from building a website to managing social media accounts to integrating the one-click payment gateway to make that sale happen the very moment. Basically, be trained to be on the pilot’s seat to drive business profitability from every digital aspect.
3. Global Supply Chain Function
COVID -19 has disrupted the global supply chain. Businesses around the world have gone berserk figuring a recourse to avoiding China for sourcing raw material for manufacturing. Countries have imposed strict regulations on companies operating with their territory to avoid sourcing from high-risk zones that will impact the wellbeing of their population.
This crisis has turned out to be an opportunity for professionals to join the supply chain as able innovators and decision-makers. While some professionals are welcome to join supply chain organizations, and help them manage it locally, others have resorted to go solo, build their own small and medium enterprises (SMEs).
4. Innovation Management Skill
Depending on the scope of performance, invention may not be necessary, but at all times, reinventing strategies and service models top priority. Re-invention is wholly possible with innovation management in which an organization can use its creativity to introduce new ideas, processes or products in response to external or internal opportunities.
Corporate professionals who are ready to culture an appetite for innovation, have opportunities too many. This is slightly harder than said; a situation wherein one’s affinity for technology, management, and creative instincts come together for business success. Consider how COVID-19 reinvented delivery practices from home delivery to contactless home delivery?
5. Customer Success Function Skill
COVID-19 outbreak has forced businesses to scale up on agility. Corporates are undergoing massive change management to accommodate customer concerns. The locus has shifted to customer retention more than new customer acquisition. This significant shift in management interest is telling of the increase in customer-centricity.
For highly skilled professionals or aspiring management professionals, the opportunity lies in skilling oneself in people relationship to deliver the maximum to customer success and retention for business. Needless to underline the growing need for companies to hire skilled customer success managers.
6. Empathy Hotspot
So far, we have been discussing business skills at a functional level. Being an empathy hotspot is above and beyond all these functions. Traditionally, organizations hired Chief Executive Officers, but now with the shifting paradigm and reevaluation of business affairs, organizations are hiring Chief “Empathy” Officers.
Professionals aspiring to lead as an empathy officer must develop people management skills and compassion. Your hard skills that we discussed so far take a backseat because they are trainable. Empathy is acquired and perceived. One has to continually pursue being an active listener and culture a drive to resolve challenges. Businesses are an outcome of people and to mark your professional leadership, practice empathy.
Conclusion
As per the World Economic Forum, at least 133 million new roles may be generated globally by 2022 as a result of the new division of labour between humans, machines, and algorithms. While individuals must develop the required skills to keep pace with changing technology, organizations must also encourage skills development internally.
As a leading recruitment house, we urge professionals to relook their growth strategy. In this fast-paced era of digitalization triggered by COVID-19 over and above our inherent drive toward excellence in technology, professionals must prepare themselves agile and read to learn and scale. Professionals with a blended mindset of creativity in management and technology are the ones in demand. If you identify yourself as one such candidate, we are ready to discuss a rewarding placement. Contact us today!
