The US workforce has become increasingly more reliant on technology—even before the COVID-19 pandemic required many of us to work from home. Increased use of cloud-based programs, office suites, social media, and security software have required workers to know more, and it’s been hard for many to keep up.
To shine a light on the increased demand for tech knowledge in the business world, Future Learn spoke with 1,000 people about the technical demands of their job. The most illuminating findings show that 83% of respondents believe their job is either “somewhat” or “very much” tech-heavy. An additional 43% of respondents say their job is more technically demanding than they expected it to be.
Of course, the increase in tech usage results in a greater need for skills. When asked which are the most in demand right now, 62% of workers said knowledge of Microsoft Office—including Word, Excel, and PowerPoint—followed by 60% who said information literacy. Proficiency in Windows/macOS, Google Suite, and online meeting software such as Zoom round out the top five.
Given this feedback, it’s interesting to see that only 30% to 36% of respondents learned these skills in college. Meanwhile, rising skills, including web development, data analytics, digital marketing, and cybersecurity, aren’t necessarily widely used in the workforce, but 37% to 39% of respondents were learning these at school. An incredible 45%—mostly workers in their 20s—say they’ve learned coding or programming.
On average, workers said they use four to five programs in a typical work day, and the most popular were specifically relevant to our current remote-working landscape: 56% of respondents said Microsoft Office 365 was the most used program, while Google Drive (50%), Zoom (48%), Microsoft Teams (35%), and Dropbox (30%) also rank among the most popular.
It looks like this trend will only continue, given our current circumstances: 63% of employers have introduced new software or web-based programs since March 2020, when the first stay-at-home orders in the US were issued.
