Knowledge and Skill: In the new age Remote Working Environment

The debate is still on and so are the diverse opinions on what is important Knowledge V/S Skills. Especially in the workplace learning arena.

As 2020 comes to a close, a year when most of us have been cooped-up at home and working a pertinent question in every business leader is how do we adapt to this new reality? While 7 months is quite a long time to find an answer, some have found it some are still looking for a viable long-term solution.

“Adaptability” became the most popularly used phrase in all forums. Most organizations and work places that never in their wildest plans had designed to work remotely adapted to this. Enough and more stories have been circulated on this and some still being written and played out. Whilst, some of the leaders and industries have come out with revelations on how what they thought was impossible do remotely is possible today like training programs, forums, summits, conferences, sales calls, deal closures, project implementations, etc, others have predicted actively how this is going to be the new normal pandemic of no pandemic. While only time will bare testimony of what will actually happen.

The other term that has caught on corporates is “Disruptive Idea” a term that was only confined to entrepreneurial / Start up culture is being used in seasoned operations and organization. This has meant that every leader has started many new initiatives that recognized under this category, whilst most of these never took off, some are in the gaining momentum. Some of other terms that have been heard in more leader talks/forums/discussions/presentations are “New Normal”, “Upskilling”, “Skill Development” to name a few. Whilst these terms were only confined to boardrooms and strategy meetings a year back today these have become part of regular meeting conversations at all levels of the organization.

With so much changing one is forced to ask questions like, what are you doing to ensure that your workforce is catching up to these? How are they coping with all these? What is the impact on our ability to deliver? What are your priorities when it some to keeping pace with these changes? A year back all these questions were directed to the HR and Learning communities, not any more. These questions are being asked across the organization.

This gets to the pertinent question that we started this article with What is more important in today’s new age Skill or Knowledge? Or both? In a series of articles that will be published through next week, we seek to decipher this with many examples and share some experiences. Do share yours too, to help enrich this discussion.