Supporting the development of skills and roles for the future workforce

With a growing digital transformation movement, there are a wealth of new and exciting career and training opportunities for people, regardless of their technical ability, to make our built environment a fairer, more environmentally friendly, and more productive through the National Digital Twin (NDT).

The development of the Information Management Framework (IMF) will drive effective information management across our nation’s built environment. The IMF will enable an ecosystem of connected digital twins, the National Digital Twin (NDT) – where high-quality data about the built environment is shared securely, on a massive scale to improve decision making across the UK.

Over the coming years, the IMF will outline the technical foundations needed to connect and integrate digital twins – digital replicas of physical assets, processes, and systems. The elements that make up the Skills and Competency package, are the people enabler needed to develop and drive adoption of the IMF.

It can be a challenge for companies and HR departments to navigate. The World Economic Forum has estimated that 40% of core skills will change for workers who remain in their roles, and 50% of employees will need reskilling. Gartner has found 53% of organisations can’t identify the skills they need to transform their workforce.

We need a future workforce with the right skills to play their part by supporting the secure and resilient exchange of data across organisational and sector boundaries; and make meaningful data-driven decisions. Right now, there is a significant talent gap and a great opportunity to retrain or upskill for a new career path. The Skills and Competency Framework and supporting suite of resources, outline the roles and skills needed to develop and implement the IMF and support for organisations and individuals to develop these.

The Framework is a practical tool to help organisations and individuals assess their own needs and consider how to address them. It considers requirements for different roles, from ontologists to data regulators, while emphasising the need for a culture shift towards improving data quality and adopting systems-based outcomes-focused approach.

Resources

• If you want to find out more about available resources that support the development of skills and roles for the future workforce, please visit: https://www.cdbb.cam.ac.uk/what-we-do/national-digital-twin-programme/resource-skills-and-competencies-national-digital-twin
• Watch some videos in the Hub’s YouTube channel about the skills and roles required for better Information Management