The Future of Jobs

On By Silvan Mifsud

The 2025 Future of Jobs Report, published by the World Economic Forum, a few days ago provides a comprehensive analysis of the global labour market trends and projections for the period 2025-2030. This report is based on a survey of over 1,000 employers representing more than 14 million workers across 22 industries and 55 economies. You might be asking, why this should be relevant for you as the owner or leader of a SME or family business? The report provides extremely valuable insights on the following questions:

  • What does an SME and family business need to do to attract and retain the best talent?
  • What are the most important things workers are looking out for?
  • What are the things SMEs & Family businesses need to do to become more resilient to changes in the labour market?
  • What will the future of work look like?

What does an SME and family business need to do to attract and retain the best talent?

Attracting and retaining top talent is crucial for the success of SMEs and family businesses, especially as they navigate the evolving future of work. This report offer valuable insights into effective strategies these businesses can implement:

  • Prioritise Upskilling and Reskilling: Skill gaps are identified as the biggest barrier to business transformation, with 63% of employers considering them a major obstacle over the 2025-2030 period. Thus, SMEs and family businesses should proactively invest in upskilling and reskilling initiatives for their existing workforce, as 85% of employers surveyed plan to do. This not only enhances productivity and competitiveness but also improves talent retention (cited by 70% of employers). It also demonstrates a commitment to employee development, which is a key factor in attracting and retaining talent.
  • Focus on Employee Health and Well-being: Supporting employee health and well-being is a top priority for talent attraction, with 64% of employers identifying it as a key strategy in this report. SMEs and family businesses can implement various initiatives to enhance employee well-being, including: Offering flexible work arrangements, which employees highly value, Providing mental health resources and support programmes, Promoting a positive and inclusive work environment and Improve Talent Progression and Promotion. In this report, employees consistently rank opportunities for career advancement as a key factor in job satisfaction. Therefore, SMEs and family businesses should establish clear career paths and provide opportunities for growth and development. This also means implementing transparent and fair promotion processes that further enhance talent attraction and retention.
  • Offering Competitive Compensation: Higher wages are identified as a key factor in both attracting and retaining talent. SMEs and family businesses should conduct thorough market research to ensure their compensation packages are competitive within their industry. Offering performance-based bonuses and other incentives to reward and motivate employees is ideal.
  • Align with Employee Expectations: The report highlights potential misalignments between employer practices and employee priorities. It is therefore crucial for SMEs and family businesses to gather feedback from employees to understand their specific needs and expectations. This can be achieved through surveys, focus groups and regular performance reviews. Using these insights to tailor workforce strategies and policies, ensuring they resonate with employees and address their key concerns, is key to help increase the retention of best talent.

By implementing these strategies, SMEs and family businesses can enhance their ability to attract and retain top talent, reducing employee turnover and positioning themselves for success in the evolving job market.

What are the most important things workers are looking out for?

This report highlights some key factors that employees are looking for in their jobs, particularly in the context of talent attraction and retention and emphasises these key points about employees’ desires in the workplace:-

  • Employees value opportunities for career advancement. Improving talent progression and promotion processes is ranked as the second most important factor by employees and the third most important by employers.
  • Fair compensation remains critical. Employees rank higher wages as the third most important factor for staying in a job, while employers rank it fourth in their talent attraction and retention strategies.
  • Flexibility in work arrangements is increasingly important. The ability to work remotely or in hybrid models is highly valued, ranking fourth for employees and sixth for employers.
  • There are misalignments in perception around certain areas. For example, employees place a higher value on working hours and overtime policies (ranked first) compared to employers (ranked eighth). Conversely, employers see supporting employee health and well-being and providing upskilling and reskilling opportunities as more important than employees do.

The report concludes that understanding these convergences and divergences is crucial for companies to effectively attract and retain talent in the evolving labour market.

What are the things SMEs & Family businesses need to do to become more resilient to changes in the labour market?

The report highlights some key areas that could enhance resilience for businesses of all sizes facing labour market shifts:

  • Stay informed about technological advancements and their impact on skills. The report emphasizes the significance of technological change in shaping future job markets. To remain competitive, SMEs and family businesses need to stay updated on emerging technologies and proactively identify how these advancements might affect make their operations more efficient by having things done with less human input. Investment in technology has to be a continuous process.
  • Embrace upskilling and reskilling initiatives. The report emphasises that skill gaps are the biggest barrier to transformation. To adapt to the evolving demands of a technology-driven market, businesses, including SMEs and family businesses, need to prioritise upskilling and reskilling their workforce. This involves providing employees with training opportunities to develop new skills or enhance existing ones, including skills in relation to leadership, teamwork and communication.
  • Support employee health and well-being. The report highlights that employee health and well-being are a top focus for attracting and retaining talent. SMEs and family businesses should consider implementing strategies and policies that promote a healthy and supportive work environment.
  • Facilitate talent progression and promotion. The report suggests that clear pathways for talent progression and promotion are key strategies for talent attraction. SMEs and family businesses should establish transparent mechanisms for career development and advancement within their organisations.
  • Culture: The report outlines that as businesses need to adapt to short cycles of change they need to rely on having s strong internal culture of resilience, flexibility and agility. This involves encouraging employees to adapt to new situations, embrace change and develop problem-solving skills.

What will the future of work look like?

The report predicts that the job landscape will undergo significant transformations by 2030 due to a confluence of factors including technological advancements, the green transition, economic uncertainty, geoeconomic fragmentation and demographic shifts. Here are some insights into what jobs will look like in the future:

  • Substantial job creation and displacement are anticipated, representing a combined 22% of today’s total jobs. This will involve the creation of 170 million new jobs (14% of current employment). However, 92 million existing jobs (8% of current employment) are expected to be displaced.
    The net result is projected to be a growth of 78 million jobs (7% of current employment) by 2030.
    Jobs experiencing the highest growth are driven by technological advancements, particularly in AI and robotics, and increased digital access. These include roles like Data Specialists, FinTech Engineers, AI and Machine Learning Specialists and Software and Applications Developers. Conversely, job decline is most prominent in roles susceptible to automation, including Bank Tellers, Cashiers and Ticket Clerks, Data Entry Clerks and General Service clerks.
  • The Shifting Human-Machine Frontier: The way work is performed will change, with a decline in tasks performed solely by humans. Currently, humans perform 47% of work tasks, technology performs 22%, and 30% are done collaboratively. By 2030, these proportions are expected to be almost evenly split, indicating a rise in automation and human-machine collaboration. This shift raises questions about the future of human value creation in the economy. If machines and algorithms generate more output and income, ensuring human workers share in this prosperity becomes crucial. Investment in human-machine collaboration (“augmentation”) is highlighted as key. Technology can be developed to complement human skills, while reskilling and upskilling can enable workers to thrive in this collaborative environment.
  • Skills Outlook: Significant skill disruptions are expected, with 39% of on-the-job skills needing to change by 2030. Core skills for the future workforce include: AI and big data, Analytical thinking, Creative thinking, Resilience, flexibility and agility, Technological literacy. Demand for skills like network and cybersecurity is surging due to increasing digitalisation and geoeconomic fragmentation.
  • Workforce Strategies: Addressing skills gaps in the labour market is the top priority for businesses to successfully navigate these transformations. Businesses need to increasingly prioritise upskilling and reskilling their workforce. Moreover, attracting and retaining talent is crucial.

Overall, the future of jobs is characterised by a dynamic interplay between technological advancement and human adaptability. The report emphasises the importance of proactive workforce strategies, continuous learning, and a focus on developing skills that complement and leverage emerging technologies.

P.S. It is obvious that upskilling and reskilling is what will help business grow and develop. Therefore, below is a list of upcoming training sessions for the first half of the year, offering general topics that may interest you or your employees under our MITC or EMCS Academy:-
 
2-hour online sessions 

 Masterclass series
 The Role of the MLRO – from Theory to Practice

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