The dawn of 2022 finds our society going through a profound digital transformation. These changes alter the world how we know it, and its impact can also be seen in the workplace.
As the digital economy demands more skills, all employees must jump on the digital skills bandwagon to avoid a digital gap. This growing digitalization creates challenges and opportunities for all employees. Most importantly, those who could benefit the most from learning digital skills are people with disabilities with the potential to improve their social inclusion.
This post will cover the five critical digital skills in this new digital age that can help the social inclusion of people with disabilities.
Why are digital skills Important?
Digital skills have been critical in the workplace for decades. Since the first appearance of computers and electronic communication devices, employers have been after digitally literate workers. Thanks to technology, businesses are now more digital than ever. This technological revolution is not expected to slow down anytime soon.
This digital transformation brings groundbreaking structural and organizational changes in the workplace and the labor market. At the same time, this technological sweep creates many opportunities and risks for people with disabilities. New technologies create new jobs while making others obsolete, change recruitment processes and introduce new disruptive forms of work.
With all that in mind, people with disabilities should learn new digital skills to avoid a digital skills gap that will leave them further behind professionally. Following the digitalization trends, they are honing their digital skills to remain updated with current workplace demands. Essentially, they are improving their social inclusion through their increased employability.
5 digital skills for social inclusion
Digital marketing
Marketing has almost exclusively gone digital these days. Businesses have understood the benefits of having an online presence and heavily invest in building their brand online. As a result, there is an increasing number of digital marketing positions on offer to cover the whole range of digital marketing. Learning the skills necessary to become a digital marketeer offers excellent prospects for employment.
Data analytics
The penetration of digitalization in businesses has increased the amount of available data for analysis. This brought the rise of careers in data analytics whose job is to analyze raw datasets, transform them into smart business insights, and help businesses make data-driven decisions. With the digital transformation trends, demand for data analytics is only expected to grow further.
Coding
Everything that we can see through our digital devices has been created through coding or computer programming. Coding means writing the instructions based on which computers communicate with each other. The current demand for programmers is very high, and employers pay high wages for promising talents. Coding has endless possibilities and is among the best digital skills for social inclusion that someone can learn.
Cloud computing
With cloud computing, businesses can have on-demand access to computing resources through the internet. These computing services saw a remarkable rise during the pandemic as companies shifted to cloud computing to accommodate their work-from-home employees. Cloud technology is part of the ongoing digital transformation. It will be an integral part of businesses in the future.
Artificial intelligence
Businesses are not only trying to bring more technological innovations to companies but also to make them cleverer. To achieve this, artificial intelligence or AI is of great importance. Essentially what AI is trying to do is make a robot or computer act and think like a human. Artificial intelligence may take the form of speech recognition, decision-making, or visual perception.
Conclusion
The world of work is rapidly changing. Employees need to catch up with all the technological advancements to increase their employability. The same principle applies to people with disabilities who could benefit the most. Learning new digital skills that are currently in high demand in the workplace, like digital marketing, data analytics, coding, cloud computing, and AI, dramatically increases their chances of finding future-proof jobs and increasing social inclusion.
The work of “In Touch” Erasmus+ Project
In Touch project wants to bridge the opportunities gap for people with disabilities. The project focuses on young people with disabilities to provide them with the necessary entrepreneurial skills to start their ventures. This project contributes to the essential learning opportunities that persons with disabilities lack and helps them become self-employed and autonomous. That way, they will avoid the social stigma and prejudice that many workplaces are full of.
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