Our shifting economic landscape is creating new jobs, and will need new ways to educate students and tomorrow’s workforce.
Those were among the key points made Thursday morning, April 13, during the second annual Innovation Summit hosted by St. Ambrose University, Davenport.
“We are exploring the evolution of learning in the classroom. … This is a shifting landscape. The real question is ‘How do we equip people for these (future) jobs?’” St. Ambrose President Amy Novak told a crowd of more than 100 people, mostly from the business and education communities.
The summit’s goal was to bring together business leaders to help identify curricular approaches and teaching practices that will help prepare students for the next generation of work.
A portion of the event focused on the need for employees and employers to have a “growth mindset.” That is, people who are agile thinkers and show intellectual curiosity; people who can change and grow through application and experience.
People with those “growth mindset” skills will be needed, she said, because there are many workplace changes on the horizon. Some of those changes include:
- 60% of the jobs in the next decade will be job titles or categories that have not yet been developed, according to the Economic Forum in 2022.
- 52% of the jobs in the next five years will require upskilling or reskilling of workers, according to the Economic Forum.
- CEOs indicate that recruiting, retaining and engaging a qualified labor force will be the single biggest challenge of the next three to five years, according to Fortune.
Those changes have, in large part, spurred changes in some education programs offered by St. Ambrose. (The changes also were spurred by comments and suggestions participants offered at the 2022 Innovation Summit.)
This fall, the university will launch more than 50 online certificate programs in health care, information technology, advanced manufacturing and other areas that are designed to help people launch careers in a relatively short time. Some of the new programs include: certified Cloud security professional in 33 weeks; sterile processing technician in 14 weeks; and project management skills in nine weeks.
“This initiative, geared toward working professionals and those looking to launch their career quickly, will help them upskill and reskill, offering greater career mobility,” according to information from St. Ambrose.
“It’s encouraging to see that higher education is willing to adapt to current events,” said Charla Hollowell, chief financial officer for Vera French Community Mental Health Center, Davenport, who attended the summit.
Adapting to the changing times also means adapting to technology. Those attending Thursday’s summit got a chance to look over the virtual reality and augmented reality methods and devices being used by students to learn a variety of new skills. St. Ambrose faculty and students were on hand to demonstrate the new technology to business leaders.
Ms. Novak told the crowd a story about the ongoing advances in technology. During a recent trip to California, the St. Ambrose president visited a friend at a university and was interested in seeing a robot named “A.J.” at work at the school. It turned out that Ms. Novak was unable to see that particular robot because it was off work that day for a “learning day.” Three days a week, the robot has these learning days to help improve its performance the rest of the week.
“The machinery is spending more time learning … so it can generate content the other four days a week,” she said.
St. Ambrose’s summit also included a panel of three business leaders discussing the evolution of talent pipelines as well as workplace learning and engagement.
Panelist Joy Schmidt, manager of organizational development and technology at Modern Woodmen of America, said that one of her organization’s main focuses is to not only get talented people, but also keep them on the job. “We don’t want them walking out the door after six months with us,” she said.
Ms. Schmidt added that the Rock Island-based Modern Woodmen is using training programs and partnering with St. Ambrose to help develop employees’ skills and retain them.
Another tactic is to schedule “stay interviews” to help keep employees on the job, said Linda Nedelcoof, executive vice president corporate human resources and strategy with CUNA Mutual Group, and another one of the panel members.
She added that CUNA Mutual is using artificial intelligence (AI) to help deliver personalized service – such as reminding managers to conduct those “stay interviews” – to help keep valuable employees.
Panelists Patricia Snyder, vice president of home management for WalMart, added that it’s key for managers to surround themselves with people who are intellectually curious and competitive.
“There’s an opportunity to learn from everybody in your path,” Ms. Snyder said.
At the event, Ms. Novak asked the business leaders to open the doors to students who have that competitive drive and intellectual curiosity that will help a company. Some of those people are not considered for job openings because many job postings often state the requirement of “three to five years of experience.”
She added that people with learning agility are needed in today’s jobs, and that trait needs to be highlighted in posts for job openings.
