Masterplan Study 2024 - Upskilling for the future

DACH companies put to the test: The Masterplan.com Study 2024 "Upskilling for the Future" reveals that 68% of companies see their employees as poorly to moderately prepared for current and future challenges.

The latest Masterplan study focusing on "Upskilling for the future" shows that companies in German-speaking countries are intensively addressing the challenges of the changing world of work. The survey of executives and HR managers reveals that the shortage of skilled workers (83.4%), staff retention (58.3%), advancing digitalization (52.6%) and coping with global crises (33.6%) are perceived as key challenges.

What is surprising, however, is that despite being aware of these challenges, more than two thirds of companies (68%) consider their employees to be poorly to moderately prepared for current and future requirements. However, the universal skills considered crucial for the 21st century, such as collaboration and leadership (67.2%), digital skills (62.1%) and communication (61.3%), are only moderately developed within the workforce.

Insufficient upskilling

The study results indicate insufficient upskilling for the future, with a lack of time (54.5%) and a lack of HR resources (41.2%) identified as the main problems. Surprisingly, the training budget is stagnating for the majority of companies (59.4%), although the need for training is obvious.

Another critical point is the lack of understanding of future-relevant skills in every second company (49.4%). There is also a lack of evaluation methods to accurately assess the effectiveness of further training measures. Alarmingly, 40.3% of small companies do not measure the success of training at all.

The study recommends that companies in the DACH region invest in efficient training strategies and infrastructures in order to ensure needs-based, scalable and cost-efficient personnel development. Instead of individualized learning plans, structured frameworks should be created that enable employees to learn independently and flexibly.

The focus on power skills, a universal set of 21st century core competencies, should enable employees to independently identify and learn relevant hard skills. This will not only strengthen the individual's ability to act, but also improve the adaptability of companies to successfully meet current and future challenges in the business world.

Further information and insights on the study can be found directly at Masterplan and Quadriga.