Developing and enhancing human skills and capabilities through education, learning and meaningful work are key drivers of economic success, of individual well-being and societal cohesion. The global shift to a future of work is defined by an ever-expanding cohort of new technologies, by new sectors and markets, by global economic systems that are more interconnected than in any other point in history, and by information that travels fast and spreads wide. Yet the past decade of technological advancement has also brought about the looming possibility of mass job displacement, untenable skills shortages and a competing claim to the unique nature of human intelligence now challenged by artificial intelligence. The coming decade will require purposeful leadership to arrive at a future of work that fulfils human potential and creates broadly shared prosperity.

In 2020, economic globalization is stalling, social cohesion is being eroded by significant unrest and political polarization, and an unfolding recession is threatening the livelihoods of those at the lower end of the income spectrum. As a new global recession brought on by the COVID-19 health pandemic impacts economies and labour markets, millions of workers have experienced changes which have profoundly transformed their lives within and beyond work, their well-being and their productivity. One of the defining features of these changes is their asymmetric nature—impacting already disadvantaged populations with greater ferocity and velocity.

Over the course of half a decade the World Economic Forum has tracked the labour market impact of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, identifying the potential scale of worker displacement alongside strategies for empowering job transitions from declining to emerging roles. The fundamental rate of progress towards greater technological incursion into the world of work has only accelerated over the two years since the 2018 edition of the report. Under the influence of the current economic recession the underlying trends toward the technological augmentation of work have accelerated. Building upon the Future of Jobs methodology developed in 2016 and 2018, this 2020 third edition of the Future of Jobs Report provides a global overview of the ongoing technological augmentation of work, emerging and disrupted jobs and skills, projected expansion of mass reskilling and upskilling across industries as well as new strategies for effective workforce transitions at scale.

Over the past decade, a set of ground-breaking, emerging technologies have signalled the start of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. To capture the opportunities created by these technologies, many companies across the private sector have embarked on a reorientation of their strategic direction. By 2025, the capabilities of machines and algorithms will be more broadly employed than in previous years, and the work hours performed by machines will match the time spent working by human beings. The augmentation of work will disrupt the employment prospects of workers across a broad range of industries and geographies. New data from the Future of Jobs Survey suggests that on average 15% of a company’s workforce is at risk of disruption in the horizon up to 2025, and on average 6% of workers are expected to be fully displaced.

This report projects that in the mid-term, job destruction will most likely be offset by job growth in the ‘jobs of tomorrow’ —the surging demand for workers who can fill green economy jobs, roles at the forefront of the data and AI economy, as well as new roles in engineering, cloud computing and product development. This set of emerging professions also reflects the continuing importance of human interaction in the new economy, with increasing demand for care economy jobs; roles in marketing, sales and content production; as well as roles at the forefront of people and culture.¹ Employers answering the Future of Jobs Survey are motivated to support workers who are displaced from their current roles, and plan to transition as many as 46% of those workers from their current jobs into emerging opportunities. In addition, companies are looking to provide reskilling and upskilling opportunities to the majority of their staff (73%) cognizant of the fact that, by 2025, 44% of the skills that employees will need to perform their roles effectively will change.

The sections that follow in this first chapter of the Future of Jobs Report situate the 2020 COVID-19 economic recession in the context of past recessions, and in the context of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. They review the impact of this health shock on the labour market, paying particular attention to its asymmetric nature. Chapter 2 outlines the latest evidence from the Future of Jobs Survey, taking stock of the path of technological adoption, the scale and depth of the job transitions and the learning provision that is in place and planned in the horizon up to 2024. Finally, Chapter 3 reviews the public and private sector policies and practices that can support a proactive adaptation to these unfolding trends. In particular, the chapter outlines the mechanisms for job transitions, the imperatives of creating a learning organization and structures which can support such adaptation both across government and across business.

This edition of the Future of Jobs Report takes stock of the impact of two twin events—the onset of the Fourth Industrial Revolution and of the COVID-19 recession in the context of broader societal and economic inequities. It provides new insights into effective practices and policies for supporting worker transitions towards a more equitable and prosperous future of work. In economies riddled with inequalities and sluggish adaptation to the demands of the new world of work, there is an ever-larger need for a ‘Great Reset’, which can herald opportunities for economic prosperity and societal progress through good jobs.