Future Skills: What Employers Will Want in 2025

The leaders of tomorrow are those who look ahead today. In a rapidly developing world, it is necessary to adapt and stay ahead of the game in order to succeed. We at College Life teamed up with EMERCE to bring you the list of the most important future skills you will need in the following few years.

Take a look at the top 5 future skills to master by 2025!

Cross-Cultural Competence

In a tightly interconnected world, the workforce is becoming increasingly international and culturally diverse.

The perfect future employee understands that there are different customs and cultures. They also aren't afraid to listen and ask questions. Most importantly, they actively seek out knowledge on how to better understand the ever-changing world around them. Thinking of pursuing a career in an international environment? Then also consider adding a foreign language to a list of your future skills and increase your recruitment chances.

Similarly, cross-generational competency is also a key ability to keep in mind. As the workforce by the late 2020s will most likely range from Gen Z to Baby Boomers, the top employees will need to know how to bridge the generational divide and find a common ground.

Interdisciplinarity

Gone are the days when you could start a job straight out of school and keep doing the same thing until you retire. The workplace is changing too rapidly to stay in one place and specialize only in one narrow aspect. Experts agree - interdisciplinarity is one of the key future skills to develop before 2025.

If you want to succeed in a rapidly changing workforce, you should be open to expanding your horizons and finding new specializations, not just being good at what you do. The top employees of 2025 are lifelong learners and willing to adapt to the changing environment. In case you're about to enter university, it might be a good idea to pick a minor from a different discipline. If going back to school isn't your thing, the Internet is rife with top-level courses to help you develop and learn new skills.

Critical thinking

A critical thinker is someone who is able to skillfully process, analyze, and scrutinize information. They are able to conceptualize solutions to problems never faced before. Most of all, however, they have the ability to look at their work, and the work of their co-workers, find mistakes and improve upon them.

You can teach yourself to think critically, whether it is during your university courses, internships or job. A good start is being more curious about your job and giving yourself time to review your tasks and think about what could be done better next time. At its core, being a critical thinker is all about allowing yourself and the company you work at to grow.

Emotional intelligence

Sure, it's nice to have a high IQ. But to successfully thrive in the workplace, the ideal employee needs to possess a different kind of intelligence— emotional intelligence.

Closely related to cross-cultural and cross-generational competence, emotional intelligence is a group of 'soft skills' related to identifying, understanding and managing one's own emotions, as well as the emotional states of others.

Even in a highly digitalized world, emotional intelligence is one of the key abilities to possess. According to experts, emotional intelligence is one of the future skills to keep in mind. Employees who are more in touch with their emotional side are proven to be more empathetic, curious and focused. They also work harder and are considered to be more 'marketable' by their employers.

Tech aptitude

You knew this would be our #1. According to Business Insider, the hottest jobs in the next years will be related to STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics). Experts predict the biggest demand for data scientists, engineers, and software developers. Interestingly, there will also be a growing need for tech-related positions in other sectors. These include educators, tech-savvy HR professionals, and experts in the legal side of new technologies. So, good news for more humanities or social science-oriented people!

Being able to successfully navigate a digital environment is one of the key skills to have right now. Technology is becoming increasingly advanced and more closely integrated into our lives. As a result, developing new tech-related skills is crucial to succeeding in the workplace.

So, if pursuing a successful career in tech is your dream, you might want to think about learning basic code such as Java & Python.

We don't necessarily mean everyone needs to suddenly become a machine learning engineer by 2025. However, no matter in what sector, the perfect employee in 2025 will be able to operate digital tools used in the workplace (i.e. Microsoft Office, social media, or cloud technology) and be able to quickly adapt to technological changes.