Hello Future Skills: Skill Up, #2

By Vijay Banda

The technological revolution is here, and it is changing Future Workforce needs and the job landscape. Future of work is no longer going to be based on Degrees but based on Holistic skills. Thus, There is an urgent need to guide and equip today's teens and young adults with a "new-mindset" and empowered with "new-actions", to achieve "new-results" aligning with the future workforce needs. This book will enable this New You transformation through a 4 'A' transformation framework, an integrated approach combining personality and skill development in a self-help manner, and an upskilling scorecard to track/progress your New You transformation.

This '4 A transformation Framework' helps teens and young adults arrive at a new and improvised version of themselves that is future job-ready! Below is a little more about this framework for the journey of Creating a New You:

 

To get to a New You, let us first acknowledge that one cannot get different results by doing things the same old way, especially during transformation times like today. Thus, preparing for Future You requires a new mindset, a different attitude, and an innovative approach toward future jobs that will allow you to compete successfully with Artificial intelligence, Robotics, and Automation.

Creating a New You is challenging and requires a complete re-engineering effort. I have provided a simple framework based on my experience, exposure, and industry needs and structured it as a 4 'A' Transformation Framework.

This 4 'A' Transformation Framework will help you establish a baseline of your current self, followed by ways to increase industry awareness. Then it will guide you in developing the right future skills and competencies and enable you with the fungible attitude to adapt to changes.

Let us briefly refresh the four A's.

In the first 'A,' Increase Self Awareness, I outlined the ideology that one can only master something if one takes time to know oneself first through discovering their natural styles, strengths, and talent and identifying their true passion and purpose.

In the second 'A,' Develop Industry Awareness, I discussed the importance of staying aware of industry landscape changes and trends to help align your thought process accordingly as you build your future skills.

In the third 'A,' Be Adept, I introduced the focus areas of upskilling to help you arrive at the best version of yourself that is future-skill-ready and provided you with tips and tools for continuing to reskill or upskill.

In the fourth 'A,' Fungible Attitude to Adapt, I emphasized the importance of having the right attitude for adapting to complex future changes by keeping an eye on the big picture and the respective opportunities and long-term benefits that a change will bring and not fearing failure.

For tracking your progress, I provided you with an Upskilling Scorecard (see next page) to holistically apply what you have learned in this book.

As a closing remark, today's teens, young adults, and young professionals across the globe, please realize that the future is now for you to take this leap to boldly transform yourself into a better version of yourself that is future job ready.

Good Luck and Godspeed.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Vijay Banda
• Release date: Sep 20, 2023
• ISBN: 9788196124120

Vijay Banda

The author has 25+ years of experience in information technology, working with various Fortune 100 companies worldwide, including 12+ years in the USA. He has a master's degree in Computer Science and a bachelor's in Mechanical Engineering. Past few years, he has spent extensive time providing free mentoring sessions across various schools and colleges. Giving him deep insights into the ground reality, a mismatch between future industry needs vs. available skilled and competent talent pool. This mismatch will widen further amid the digital revolution, making him write this self-help book that will impart the youth and young professionals in India with the right guidance and tools for future skill readiness. His guru once said that converting one's acquired competency into human service is an excellent way of giving back to society. This book is a direct result of that divine guidance. He is confident that this book will result in highly talented skill-based professionals capable of furthering the goal of a more robust and self-reliant India.

Book preview

Why this book?

The job landscape is changing drastically as all businesses are going through Digital Transformation by embracing modern technologies such as artificial intelligence, intelligent automation, quantum computing, among others. It is thereby drastically affecting future workforce needs, and it is not only creating new jobs with advanced skill needs but also eliminating many generic ones.

At the same time, today's way of doing things in education and learning is becoming redundant, requiring children, teens, and young adults to shift towards tomorrow's way or a new way of doing things to be employable in the future.

Thus, there is an urgent need to guide and equip today's children, teens, and young adults to develop a new mindset and equip them with the right tools for the right actions and to achieve the right results; aligning them with future workforce needs.

I have authored this book to invigorate this new thought process by enabling children, teens, and young adults (You) to arrive at a new and improvised version of themselves (New-You) that is future ready thereby transforming them into holistic Skill Based Professionals, aligning to future of work.

This book enables your New-You transformation through 4 ‘A' transformative framework integrating personality and skill development in 4 repeatable steps. This book also contains an upskilling scorecard at the end to help measure your progress towards future job readiness.

Good luck in your New-You transformation.

About the author

Vijay K Banda is a Global IT professional by profession with 30+ years of experience across various top 100 companies.

Adhering to the divine guidance, True success cannot be just individual success but needs to be inclusive and contribute to others’ success too. He recognized the importance of converting his experience and competency into service by mentoring youth in India during his free time. This led to the formation of the non-profit ‘Yes Mentor’ in 2016. Through this non-profit, Vijay envisions mentoring 1 million youth across the globe on future skills and respective readiness needs.

Taking the ideology of competency as a service further, and to invigorate a new mindset across children, youth, and young professionals Vijay authored a self-help book called Skill Up India in 2020, which went on to become Amazon’s best-seller, 10,000 copies of which are sold so far across the world.

Vijay strongly believes the future is now and children, teens, and young adults must start aligning to the new way of doing things (#newmindset and #newactions) to get the right results (#newresults) aligning to the future of work. To drive this ideology further with a larger audience, Hello Future Skills, this book is authored, a global version of the Skill Up India book.

Vijay is continually active with various mentoring and speaking sessions, you can track his activities through www.hellofutureskills.org and on various social media portals.

Author's disclaimer

Friends, before you work through this self-help book that will empower your future skill-readiness journey and transform you into a skill-based professional. Please read the below disclaimers:

I authored this book as an extended version of my previous book, Skill Up India, to suit a global audience. Thus, you will find many similarities in the content.

All views represented here are my own and are not in any way associated with any corporations or companies I worked for or working for.

The materials provided in this book are for general information, awareness, and education purposes only. Thus, it will not constitute or replace professional advice, including materials, tests, counseling, coaching, mentoring, and training.

The tools, methods, and techniques mentioned in this book are generic and put together based on research data, tools, and blogs available on the world wide web. I referred to them, citing relevance, and added insights; thus, they are neither new nor proprietary. The references section of this book has these respective reference details.

The interpretation and usefulness of the analyzers, questionnaires, self-help tips provided, and the subsequent results are solely your responsibility. Thus, ensure you invest adequately focused time and effort.

For those interested in exploring some of the topics from this book, I added a few accredited psychometric tests and links to the various tools and online training portals in the Appendix as a reference only, to which I do not have any direct association.

I authored this book on Goodwill, translating my experience and expertise into service to help youth worldwide. Thus, most of the proceeds from this book will go to YesMentor.org trust.

Acknowledgments

This positive endeavor is only possible with the blessings of my Parents, my Guru(s), and the Almighty.

Grateful to my wife and children,

who means the world to me!

Special thanks to my extended family, friends, and all well-wishers.

Special thanks to the World Economic Forum.

I dedicate this book to my motherland India.

Universal prayers for positive learning

OM Saha Naav[au]-Avatu |

Saha Nau Bhunaktu |

Saha Viiryam Karavaavahai |

Tejasvi Naav[au]-Adhiitam-Astu Maa Vidvissaavahai |

॥ Om Shantih Shantih Shantih ||

English translation

Om, together may we two Move in our Studies, the Teacher, and the student,

Together may we two Relish our Studies, the Teacher, and the student,

Together may we perform our Studies with vigor, deep concentration,

May what have been studied by us be filled with the brilliance of Understanding, leading to Knowledge, and may it not give rise to Hostility due to lack of Understanding.

OM Peace, Peace, Peace OM.

Preface

Today's children, teens and young adults are on the cusp of a global transformation, demanding them to shift from the old way of doing things to tomorrow's way of doing things, in all aspects of life, school and work.

The diagram below explains this shift. The FIRST CURVE shows today's way of things: how we have been studying, learning, educating, working, and managing our lifestyles. But this way of doing things is declining. At the same time, a SECOND CURVE, tomorrow's way of doing things, is emerging. But what is causing this?

Graphic-Credit: Ian Morrison, Institute for the Future.

To understand what is causing this, let us introspect our day-to-day experiences from the present day to those a decade ago; everything is different and better today, made possible due to technology and digitalization.

One must realize that we are in the middle of a digital transformation, forcing all businesses, industries, and enterprises to reinvent themselves by embracing modern technologies. However, the underlying truth is that digital transformation is also rapidly changing future workforce needs, thus, future jobs. And for those of you looking for a new job or starting a new venture, the impact of this transformation will be much more direct, requiring you to evolve into an improvised version that is future ready.

Simply put, this digital transformation requires today's children, teens, and young adults to shift from today's way of things (FIRST CURVE) to tomorrow's way of doing things (SECOND CURVE) to be ready for their future jobs.

With 30+ years of experience in Information Technology across the globe, I underwent multiple industry transformations. But the changes driven by the upcoming digital transformation are much more drastic and require today's teens and young adults to think differently, evolve, and align with it earlier.

Also, over the past decade, I have interacted with thousands of high school and college students through interviews, seminars and mentoring sessions, providing me with critical insights into the skill and mindset gap between the industry needs vs. the available talent pool.

Per the above, I sensed an urgent need to educate

[Parthiban Vijayaraghavan · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Great book, very practical easy to comprehend and most importantly easy to execute