A recent study report from India Skills has indicated that India is forecasted to spend over $500 billion a year on mega-infrastructure projects to meet the requirements of its growing population by the year 2030.

Skilled labor shortage has been an imminent problem across various sectors in India over the years. Several initiative programs, like the National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) and Skill India, have been launched by the Government of India over the years. These programs yet lack the resources to scale and facilitate the need to educate a huge distributed blue-collar workforce which is contributing to a huge demand-supply gap, as well as a skill set gap.

Unlike white-collar workers, the entry-level/intermediary training for blue-collar workers is not properly organized (matching to the requirements). With supportive advisory regulatory policies, increased investments, and the appropriate learning/training platforms, the nation has the resources and the intent to build globally competitive supply chains, but only when  skilled labor for various industries requirements are met.

For Organizations, the best way to address this situation is to upskill their frontline workers. Given the cost of hiring new talent, it is now crucial to build a workforce that is adaptable to market & emerging technological changes.

Why Upskill Frontline Workers?

1) Building an Agile Workforce to Drive Digitalisation:

Upskilling has become more relevant and extremely important now with the advancements like automation traction in industries. Frontline workers will need to be able to handle machines to oversee their performance and maintenance and also handle reporting with a rapid influx of new technologies.

Reskilling and Upskilling need to be embedded into workforce models in the next nearest years, to help employees adapt to changing business environments with agility.

To build a tech-savvy workforce that can embrace digital transformation, organizations need to invest in tech skills across the organization.

2) The Advent of the Gig Economy:

The “gig economy” is expected to create over a billion jobs in India alone which includes both new jobs created, as well as jobs that migrate to technology-based gig platforms.

Hence, workers need a certain level of digital literacy to manage intelligent workflows. Moreover, as gig platforms span multiple industry verticals and job types, the specific prerequisites associated with the growth of individual platforms vary and hence require unique skills to be developed.

The success of individual platforms will thus depend on how much companies invest in their workers’ training and reskilling  which is also expected to boost employee morale and retention.

3) To Make Workers Compliant:

Compliance is a crucial aspect of the blue-collar industry and hence companies need to continuously train employees regarding onsite safety protocols, and other critical issues to avoid paying hefty fines or be dragged into litigation.

Compliance enhances the safety of workers dealing with new technologies, preventing mishaps & unwanted accidents.

4) Imparting In-Demand Soft Skills:

As customer demands evolve continuously, ensuring the training of the frontline workers with upskilling/reskilling with soft-skills training has become important in the age of rapid transformation across industries to build resilience. No longer are blue-collar employees engaged only in mindless physical tasks only. They need skills to think out-of-the-box and make informed decisions to solve customer pain points in order to remain successful and boost sales.

The most difficult to access soft skills in workers include reliability, discipline and accountability apart from in-demand soft skills such as:

• Creativity
• Reasoning
• Leadership and social influence
• Stress tolerance and adaptability

5) Technology Makes Upskilling Blue Collar Workers Effortless:

Organizations are facing many challenges training blue-collar workers, which include:

• Shorter attention spans of frontline workers
• The complexity of planning training sessions for frontline workers spread across regions and work shifts
• Frontline Workers being at different proficiency levels in the same batch
• Lack of interest in certain topics for frontline workers

Organizations now have more opportunities to train and re-skill workers, thereby providing them with tools to grow and succeed in the future.

Emerging Technology comes to the rescue so that workers can pull out of their busy schedules and impart training without hurting their deadlines.

Organizations via L&D Teams can create personalized learning pathways via AI-powered platforms. Such platforms can facilitate learning through bite-sized modules, distributed in vernacular languages which facilitates learning on the go anytime anywhere of their choice. AI also enables frontline workforce to discover new content, based on past learning behavior, proficiency levels, and search history. Chatbots can be used to address queries and offer required additional support.

Such platforms allow self-paced learning, driving greater engagement. They also provide companies many ways to incentivise workers to complete a training course, a useful strategy to drive adoption in the workforce, for enhanced performance.

Conclusion:

Organizations need to step-up and take the initiative to upskill Frontline workers for embracing digital transformation and hence digital acceleration.

An LXP such as mPowerO, can help you in an end-to-end training development solution, from identifying the right skills to building them while providing an impactful learning experience. For instance, as the distributed workforce do not have time to learn, they need an OJT platform that is mobile-friendly as they are always on-the-go.

Upskilling Frontline workforce is crucial to get the most out of this valuable resource. By creating a culture of continuous learning through on-the-job training for the frontline staff via m-Learning with LXP tool from mPowerO, a frontline workforce enablement solution, can help train the frontline and take them to the desired next level.

mPowerO platform can assist in managing the complete lifecycle of a frontline, from onboarding to moving them up the career ladder by empowering them with the right skills and knowledge, with an improved performance.

OJT with the right mix of the latest technology via an automated skilling platform creates uninterrupted learning/training and seamlessness in a hybrid work model/environment, thus promoting impactful learning experiences.

An LXP can be a definitive helping hand in providing impactful personalized learning/training experiences in order for the employees to be successful and also the organization.

An LXP powered by the latest AI could further keep up the Frontline workforce up-to-date through micro-learning content merged with AI content recommendations along with an advanced data analytics platform to showcase the outcomes for better learning/training outcomes and learning/training experiences.

For upskilling Your Frontline workforce, mPowerO provides continuous support and is an end-to-end offering to Online Learning Platforms/Solutions, Digital Publishing Solutions, Upskilling/ReSkilling and Skilling training opportunities for medium to large companies.

mPowerO has evolved from being an Online Learning Solution (LMS) to serving as LXP in order to accommodate larger targeted audiences for educational/publishing and skilling requirements of various medium to large organizations/enterprises.

Talk to our expert team members for a deeper understanding and more related information.

Reach out via email at info@mpowero.com or visit us at https://www.mpowero.com/ for more information.

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