Future of Work in Asia & SkillBangladesh Initiative

Digital talents crunch

Korn Ferry’s global talent crunch study estimates that the Asia Pacific is set for a severe skills crunch due to the digital revolution with talent shortage rising to 47 million (55% of Global Shortage) by 2030 at an annual opportunity cost of $4.2 trillion.

Post-Covid virtual workplace

Cushman & Wakefield Study – 50% of the workforce will work from anywhere with an internet connection. Future workplaces will be mobile, connected, collaborative, flexible, and distributed.

Rising income inequality

In Asia, despite recent economic growth, income inequality has been profound. Fresh graduates in Singapore earn 5-10 times more than neighboring countries.

Future of Learning

Digital Skills Shift

Mckinsey Global Institute (MGI)5 survey reported that workforce skills will shift with the digital revolution. It indicated that all digital skills, both basic and advanced technology skills, including 21st-century soft skills, will see substantial growth in demand.

Digital skills have become essential skills for achieving career growth in the new digital economy.

Academic to Applied Education

With frequent reskilling needed for rapid job changes, academic education front loading at higher education institutions is no longer practical. It is a poor return on investment when the jobs learners study for no longer exist by the time they graduate.

There needs to be a convergence between academic education and skills-based training for an applied learning delivery able to develop ‘plug and play’ skills talents required by modern employers.

Classroom to Workplace Learning

Classroom-oriented learning is ineffective and inefficient.

To keep pace with today’s VUCA environment – Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, and Ambiguity, talents and enterprises need to adopt learning that delivers workplace skills utilization with tangible career and business outcomes.

SkillBangladesh Skills Mission- (Digital Skills to Transform Businesses to Digital Businesses, for Disruptive Business World to Welcome Digital world by 2030)

SkillBangladesh Initiative

SkillBangladesh Scheme delivers Competency Learning as a Service to support digital upskilling for higher education students, working adults, and enterprises.

It adopts work-integrated learning pedagogy with Pan-Asia industry eco-systems support for a borderless work2learn journey that delivers GLOCAL (Global yet Local) talents ready to grow in the digital economy. LCBS Dhaka learners progress from knowledge acquisition in the classroom to workplace skills mastery, mentored by industry experts using real-work projects.

LCBS Dhaka has been providing knowledge based training and qualification since 2007 and meeting industry needs both locally and globally. Digital transformation due to covid-19 digital talent pool is in huge demand to handle disruptive business operations digitally. Converting knowledge to skills was a continuous process of LCBS Dhaka. And an initiative to convert skills to digital skills by LCBS is a timely move and was challenging. Young talent pool of LCBS Dhaka made it happen and was very successful with the new transformation called skills to Digital skills. Statistics show they have produced thousands of digital talent pools in the area of Digital marketing, Accounting for Freelancing, Web Development & Design, Graphics & animation, AI, Cloud Computing, Cyber Security,  Business operations, Network administration, Sales Management, Operation Management , HR & Payroll to meet this disruptive business. They bring it further by naming business to  Digital Business in all means. Any business can be operated digitally and the digital talent pool is the only drawback that should be taken care of. And SkillBangladesh is here to take care of it. 

LCBS Dhaka is the first organization in Bangladesh to introduce an ‘Earn n Learn’ program instead of ‘Learn and Earn’ to promote Digital Skills to meet the target number of the ‘Digital Talent Pool’. This scheme is highly appreciated by potential employers and industry experts along with the unemployed youths who are seeking skills and jobs at the same time. It is a bold move by LCBS Dhaka and industry should come forward to make this new venture successful. SkillBangladesh could be the timely response for the Future of Work in Asia and the rest of the world. It is a small example of a great initiative and skills authorities / skill providers/ universities should come with large programs to present nation with right talent pool to take advantages in economic growth over neighbor countries.