The Most Important Competency in a Post-2016 World

With technology evolving faster than states and institutions can keep up with, to drastically redefine work and labour needs, as of the last working day of 2016, the big question is, what are the key competencies of the future, after mass-automation and robotisation have become manifest?

To answer the big question, it is necessary to begin with the competency that will hold the highest priority, upon which a downward cascading of other competencies would be sensible. My intention herein, is to do just that; begin. And I intend to do that, by naming that competency, demanding the highest priority, and hence being the most important, in a roller-coaster of a period in the human story that awaits; 2017-2026.

And so I get to the point. The most important competency in a Post-2016 world is none other than Autodidacticism. The ability to self-educate and self-learn or self-teach. It makes sense, because in a world where business would be defined as the act of disrupting the disruption by another before it succeeds to build and maintain a personal relationship with an ever changing and unique customer, anything that is a business or organisational function will have to be, constantly evolving, creative, dynamic and innovative. Even textbook definitions will be constantly shifting when it comes to occupational knowledge.

You can't stay in university forever as that would not be an economically sensible solution unless you pursue a career in academia or academic administration, and "skills upgrading" or "certification" will serve as redundant impediments rather than tools to mitigate effects of change and new demands of work.

The Role of Institutional Education

Before you embrace the anti-intellectual thought train that degrees are unimportant, or before you decide to boldly pull your kids out of school, know this, that despite the future being one where the key competency, the most important one, is autodidacticism, the role of schools and varsities will remain unchanged, in their importance towards providing a foundation for enabling people, from the earliest stages. The basic 3 Rs in education will always remain necessary, for one to ever be able to learn anything of contemporary importance beyond that. Schools will still have to prepare students for contemporary or future rigours and demands of universities, which in turn will have to play a role in opening minds to directions of enquiry and discovery. Universities are for students to learn how to learn that which is necessary to get a job done in a chosen field. That will remain important to pursue. Not everyone is Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg, who themselves are Autodidacts, and most of us need to be humble enough to appreciate that. If you are not either of the two men, in terms of their genius, you need to respect the value of that degree.

The Limits of Education

Whether school, university, adult education or professional education, the limit is that a structured and planned programme can only be customised to individual needs to a limited extent, the learning or future competencies of an individual is only best known by that individual and providers can only deliver what is known, thanks to which, by the time a programme is delivered, its contents may be obsolete. And time is of the essence, thanks to which the expense of time in formal settings beyond university is a burdensome expense of just that; time. And it isn't free, because someone works on delivering the education. How much should each individual learner intending to remain relevant in the world of work invest through his or her life, on learning? There needs to be a sensible measure, or cut-off.

With the advent of the nature of things to come in commerce, and therefore work, along with change, the necessity to learn, relearn and acquire new competencies, is going to be a daily routine constant. Post-university, individuals cannot be returning to classrooms or be pursuing paid courses and certifications on a daily basis. Picture this; an individual starts a certification course, the need for which is rendered redundant by developments in the workplace or the market, midway through. That is likely to happen more often than not, ahead.

Relevance

An individual's competence is relevant to the world of work or commerce, only so much, that in a "present" point in time, he or she is to able to constructively add value that ensures returns ahead. In the context of a post-2016 world, that would mean identifying and capitalising on opportunities presented by evolved states and realities of automation and access, that will be of non-linear and limitless nature. That is something impractical to cater to in a classroom or a structured learning programme catering to large groups.

While schools and universities too will have to evolve to customise and individualise education to be effective, they will only be able to do so, to limited degrees, but which realistically should suffice, to start each individual off, on a life-long learning journey, to be able to carry on to seek out competencies that are relevant ahead, with autodidacticism. That is where, other key competencies of the future start building.

Future of Work

Organisations or businesses of tomorrow will need to move, evolve and strategise fluidly. The people that constitute organisations or businesses will have to work fluidly. And to be able to do that, they will need to develop themselves, you guessed it, fluidly. That requires a rapid spontaneous pace and effort, that comes, again, you guessed it, only from autodidacticism. So if people are autodidacts, they will have the competencies to remain relevant contributing members of the working economy.

Conclusion

To teach a person something each time he or she faces a risk of becoming obsolete with continued technological or market evolution, which is only going to become ever more rapid over the decades ahead, would be like feeding that person for the day. Teaching that person, through the formal education years of school and varsity, how to teach himself or herself, would be like feeding that person, for life. You decide, what makes sense.

Harish Shah is Singapore's first local born Professional Futurist and a Management Strategy Consultant. He runs Stratserv Consultancy. His areas of consulting include Strategic Foresight, Systems Thinking, Scenario Planning and Organisational Future Proofing. Harish also has a background in HR Consulting, Executive Search, Recruitment Process Outsourcing, Executive Coaching, Career Coaching, Assessment & Development Centres and Vocational Programme Management for Employability Enhancement.