Find the Top Skills for Almost Any Role with This New Tool

Think about how you do your job today: the skills you need, the technology you use, your day-to-day practices. Now think back to 2015 and consider what the job called for back then. If you’re like most people, you’ll find some meaningful differences.

The top skills for a given role have changed by about 25% between 2015 and today and are on pace to shift by about 40% by 2025, according to a recent LinkedIn analysis.  

The short shelf life of skills affects all workers — but it’s particularly important for recruiters and other talent professionals. 

You need a solid understanding of the top skills for a host of roles, not just your own. Whether you’re drafting a job description, identifying internal skills gaps, or planning a learning and development (L&D) program, having an outdated sense of the necessary skills can lead to frustrations and missed opportunities.  

That’s why this new interactive “Future of Skills” data tool from LinkedIn can be so valuable for talent professionals. (Anyone can play around with this tool for free, by the way — you don’t even need a LinkedIn account.) 

Jump over to the “Future of Skills” tool now, or read on to learn how to easily find the top skills for the roles you’re working on. 

How to see which skills have changed for the roles you care about 

Let’s say you’re looking to hire a software engineer — a role that’s almost always at the top of our list of most in-demand jobs. Let’s also say you’re recruiting for a company based in the United Kingdom. 

(Remember, these selections are just one example: You can use the tool to find similar information on hundreds of roles globally, from project managers in India to salespeople in Brazil.)

To get started, make sure you’ve scrolled down to the bottom of the “Future of Skills” page. You can also click the “Skip to explore the data now” link toward the top of the page to get right there.

You’ll know you’re in the right spot when you see these drop-down selections:

First, select your country by clicking on it in the drop-down list, or start typing it out to find it faster 

In this case, we’ll select “United Kingdom.” Note that you can also select “Global,” which will provide more robust information from the entire LinkedIn platform, rather than data from a single country.

Next, select an industry or a specific job title 

For this example, we’ll select “Software Engineer” from the job title drop-down list. 

Here, too, it may be faster to start typing out the role to narrow down the results: for example, if you type “Software,” you’ll see a shorter list of about 10 roles with “Software” in the job title, like software analyst and software architect. If you don’t find the job title you had in mind, try a few variations or select “Global” instead of a specific country to get the full list of titles.

Alternatively, you can select a single industry (globally or for a specific country) to get a broader sense of how skills are shifting in that sector. 

Once you make your selection, the data visualization below will auto-magically update with the information you’ve requested, like this:

Finally, it’s time to interpret your results

Here, you’ll see that skills for software engineers in the U.K. have changed by about 28% — more than the overall average of 25% across all roles. You’ll also find a column chart indicating how much skills have changed each year in comparison to the 2015 benchmark. 

You’ll then see two lists of top skills: one from the 2015 benchmark, and one from 2021, the last complete calendar year. These lists alone can tell you a lot by themselves — but you can also hover over them for even more information. 

For example, if you hover over the first skill in the 2015 list, “Software Development,” you’ll see a line appear illustrating that it fell by three spots in the 2021 list, where it’s now fourth instead of first. 

Now let’s look at the top skill in the 2021 list, “React.js.” You’ll notice right away that the skill didn’t appear in the 2015 list, as indicated by the green “New” label to the right. 

When you hover over “React.js” (or any skill that’s not in the older list), though, the tool will helpfully point out the 2015 skill that’s most similar to the new skill. This can be especially useful if you’re not very familiar with the new skill. 

In this case, you’ll see it points to “JavaScript,” a skill that’s 94% similar to “React.js.” This makes sense, since React itself is actually a JavaScript library (that’s what the “js” stands for). 

Final thoughts: Put these insights into action

If you notice that your job descriptions tend to talk more about the 2015 skills than the 2021 skills, it’s probably worth refreshing them. 

Check with the hiring manager to confirm you’re looking for the most relevant skills — and that you’re not overlooking any recent changes.

Of course, the 2015 skills could still be the most relevant to the specific role you’re trying to fill. Hiring managers and leaders will always be the best source of truth on the skills your organization needs. 

But tools like this one can help you manage more on your own — from running a quick gut check to building a better understanding of how skills relate to each other. In turn, learning more about the skills you’re hiring for (and how they’re trending) can help you be better at your own job as a sourcer, recruiter, interviewer, or talent partner. 

If you’re interested in learning more about building skills for the future, register for Forward, LinkedIn’s virtual event at which global talent leaders discuss the disruption reshaping work. Hosted by Angela Duckworth, the event will feature a deep dive into the opportunities and challenges of a skills-first talent strategy with Sean Hudson, head of learning and development at Pfizer, and several other major talent leaders. You can register here now.

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