Education Trends: Careers that will rule the future job market

By Dr S V Singh

The very fundamental nature of work is changing, and one needs to prepare for the future. Predictably, new categories of jobs will emerge, partly or wholly displacing others. Some of the most in-demand jobs today didn't even exist five or ten years ago. Similarly, Industries that did not exist a decade ago are going to be largest employers in near future.

Education in itself is a term, which encompasses varied perspectives, which changes with time. If we go through the chronological changing trends in education, the basic tenets detected through the years are eye-openers. Initially it is based on popular stereotypical mindset, which focuses only on certain established domains like medical fields, engineering and to some extent management. Further, the dynamics move towards some splinters arising out of the above mentioned fields. To what extent these changes affected the overall mindset of people the world over, in the current scenario, which is going to shape the future education trends is the brainstorming issue which needs to be addressed by the institutions and all those entities that are actively associated and close to academia.

As the whole world is passing through a challenging phase with the outbreak of coronavirus pandemic, it is unitedly fighting the situation by adopting Social Distancing as a meaningful and effective way to mitigate this deadly disease. Surprisingly the concept of social distancing in fact inherently gives rise to the concept of Social Cohesion, which means willingness of members of a society to cooperate with each other in order to survive and prosper and which also contributes to a wide variety of social outcomes such as health and economic prosperity. Such an outcome connected the whole world digitally for the eradication of the single cause of the pandemic in society.

This major development and changing scenario has given a new and trending meaning to global work culture in the form of the popular buzzword “work from home”. Now the whole world is interacting and interfacing digitally for day-to-day functioning. Such an unexpected development provides a new platform for future trends of education and to learn its technicalities. To understand this changing spectrum of education, is imperative to academia, industry and importantly job aspirants for better skilled knowledge and efficiency compatible to prospective work scenario.

Future work activities could be more automated. So what is the way forward to prepare for the future work opportunities?

The impact of changing scenario also creates lots of apprehensions around economic recession and loss of jobs as after-effects but the silver streak amidst all this leads to new technologies, opening of economies, privatization and shrinking global societies on the job scenario. At the same time, there is growing polarization between high paying and low paying jobs, underemployment and migration, which cause unrest and need attention holistically. Industries that did not exist a decade ago are going to be largest employers in near future. Similarly, some of the most in-demand jobs today didn't even exist five or ten years ago.

Although we cannot completely predict what the future would look like. To a certain extent, we can presume dynamics of change in the work-environment, type and kind of jobs available will only accelerate in the coming years. Predicting this, new categories of jobs will emerge, partly or wholly displacing others. The very fundamental nature of work is changing, and one needs to prepare for the future.

Future work activities could be more automated. It will also create new occupations that do not exist today, much as technologies in the past have done. So what is the way forward to prepare for the future work opportunities?

Courses for Upskilling

Employees need to have the appropriate skills enabling them to thrive in the workplace of the future and the ability to continue to re-train throughout their lives. Focus will be on courses which are essential to bridge the growing skill gap in the industry as they can be updated frequently and give students an opportunity to explore different interests. Such courses also help those looking to shift careers or rethink fundamentals and play an important role in this transition. For example, courses which give more emphasis on real world domain knowledge in a managerial capacity. Today anyone can specialise in various emerging fields of management studies and find their foot in the industry. In the past, digital marketing grew in the same way and now it is going to be a trendsetter in the most innovative way to fulfill the present industry demand the world over on digital interface platform.

Although knowledge helps build the foundation of an individual, innovative disciplines which are the outcome of management studies help sustain that base by focusing on bringing education closer to work requirements. Hence, innovative management courses which are built in collaboration between employers and educators will help impart skills closer to employers' needs.

Trendsetter Jobs in the Future

The front runners will be the online companies that don't rely upon brick-and-mortar locations, like healthcare providers, supermarket chains especially those with a robust online presence, pharmaceutical companies working on cures for diseases, technology companies and services that cater to people working from home. 

Today, as we are entering a new decade, trends suggest that some of the next big opportunities would be in marketing intelligence, machine learning, big data, process automation, etc. Tech companies are still hiring feverishly as they move to take advantage of a world shifting increasingly to digital.

Giant global corporations with enormous amounts of cash on their balance sheets and supply demand, like Amazon, Google, Apple, Microsoft and Netflix, will have the dominance and funds to outlast the outbreak.  People working in these fields may find jobs available and strong demands from some companies due to overwhelming demand. As people are working from home and unable or unwilling to venture out of the house, e-retailing and e-commerce kind of companies are the natural choice for shopping and in turn will facilitate robust job opportunities for aspirants to work with such type of organisations in a near globalised and coherent economy.

About the Author:

Dr S V Singh is Director of IMRT Business Lucknow. IMRT offers MBA program (Affiliated to AKTU) and UG programs like BBA, BCom (H), BCom, BCA, BEd & BTC. Dr Singh is an alumnus of University of Delhi and Indian Institute of Mass Communication (IIMC) Delhi, carrying a synergy of academic and corporate experience of more than 22 years with a forte in training, research and content development.

*Disclaimer: Some thoughts and data presented by the author are based on secondary sources.