The need and the opportunity to put skills first have aligned. For bold leaders, the result is business transformation. Solutions such as a skills-based hiring have the potential to position organizations at the forefront of innovation, allowing business strategy to adapt to the complexities of the future job market – a proactive attack on labour shortages and skills gaps which hold back productivity and equity.

“Skills-first” strategies focus directly on skills rather than how they have been acquired. The previous report by the World Economic Forum, Putting Skills First: A Framework for Action, laid out how businesses can most effectively knit these ideas into their operational culture. This report combines data from executive and employee surveys to identify the biggest business opportunities, and highlight 13 Skills-First “Lighthouses” which demonstrate the ideas in action.