Author: Jonny McCormick, Managing Director, Europe, Lancia Consult
Most organisations don’t drift all at once. Drift happens in small, reasonable steps. A reporting line moves. A new system is introduced. A strategy shifts to chase an opportunity. Each decision makes sense in isolation, but over time, they compound. The structure becomes busy rather than purposeful. The people strategy turns into a patchwork of good intentions. You end up with a list of skills you wish you had, and a workforce never fully prepared to realise the vision you now hold.
For years, businesses have said that people are their greatest asset. Yet few treat skills with the same precision and discipline they apply to financial or strategic planning. When most leaders talk about developing people, they focus on what’s available, (training budgets, platforms, existing resources) rather than what’s required to deliver the future they want.
The changing shape of skills
The half-life of skills continues to shrink. The World Economic Forum predicts that almost half of all workers’ core skills will change by 2027. McKinsey reports that nearly nine in ten companies already face, or expect to face, significant skills gaps. These are not just learning problems; they’re strategic ones.
Across industries, the same challenge is emerging: what skills will make the biggest difference in the next three to five years, and how do we intentionally build them? Too often, the answer is vague. Organisations invest in broad capability programmes without clarity on which skills create true competitive advantage.
Critical skills are those that unlock performance, enable growth, or protect the business from risk. They are the skills that underpin your strategy…not the nice-to-haves, but the can’t-do-withouts. Identifying them requires leaders to look beyond job descriptions and think about the capabilities that make the organisation distinctive.
From broad learning to targeted capability
Once those critical skills are defined, development must become intentional. Generic learning programmes can raise awareness, but they rarely change outcomes. Capability-building that drives impact is linked explicitly to business priorities.
That might mean investing in data literacy, sustainability expertise, or change leadership. It might mean upskilling frontline teams to use new technology or developing managers to lead in new contexts. The key is focus. Every hour and pound spent on learning should be traceable to the value it enables.
A consumer goods client I worked with recognised this shift. Their teams were full of bright, capable people, but their skillsets reflected the business they had been, not the one they were becoming. By mapping the skills needed for their next stage of growth and creating targeted development paths, they built confidence, performance, and momentum within months.
The leadership mindset
Building critical skills is not a side project for HR; it is a strategic responsibility for leaders. It requires clarity about the future, curiosity about what will be needed to reach it, and courage to invest ahead of demand.
Designing for tomorrow is not about teaching everything to everyone. It’s about knowing which few skills will make the biggest difference.
The organisations that make this shift will not just keep up with change. They’ll shape it.
How is your organisation preparing for the skills shift? Connect with Lancia Consult to discuss how you can set your org design up for future success.
