If you’re a professional looking to advance your career this year, we have good news: The rapid rise of artificial intelligence stands to make your core skills more valuable, not less. Today, business leaders are looking for uniquely human skills to both work with AI — and drive organizational success.
As LinkedIn’s 2024 Most In-Demand Skills list reveals, there’s more value than ever in augmenting your specialization with the age-old fundamentals of communication, collaboration, and leadership skills. "I believe we are in the early days of a world of work that is more human than before,” says LinkedIn CEO Ryan Roslansky, “giving us the chance to do more fulfilling work, and to do that work more easily and effectively with others."
LinkedIn is committed to helping you thrive in this new era. Read on to find the 10 skills that are most sought-after by employers in today’s job market, as well as the “skill of the moment” for 2024. These are top skills employers prioritized when recruiting, posting, and hiring for jobs on LinkedIn in the past year.
You can help make yourself more in-demand by sharpening your skills. And for each in-demand skill, you’ll find a corresponding LinkedIn Learning course to develop it. We’ve made all of these courses free to access through May 31, 2024.
The most in-demand skills for 2024 (plus upskilling resources)
This year, we see human-centric “soft skills” (aka “human” or “durable” skills) as evergreen places to invest your learning energy. The familiar skills at the top of the list — communication, customer service, leadership — are still business-critical in the age of AI.
1. Communication
Learn it: Communication Skills for Modern Management with Jean Marie DiGiovanna
2. Customer service
Learn it: Customer Service Foundations with Jeff Toister. Get certified with this learning path: Zendesk Customer Service Professional Certificate.
3. Leadership
Learn it: Top 10 Rules for Highly Effective Leadership with Todd Dewett
4. Project management
Learn it: Project Management Skills for Leaders with Dana Brownlee
5. Management
Learn it: Coaching and Developing Employees with Lisa Gates
6. Analytics
Learn it: Learning Data Analysis: 1 Foundations with Robin Hunt
7. Teamwork
Learn it: Teamwork Essentials: Stand Out as a Valuable Team Member with Shadé Zahrai
8. Sales
Learn it: Increase Sales with ChatGPT with Jake Dunlap
9. Problem-solving
Learn it: Strategic Thinking Tips to Solve Problems and Innovate with AJ Eckstein
10. Research
Learn it: How to Research and Write Using Generative AI Tools with Dave Birss, also #1 in LinkedIn’s Most Popular AI Courses, unlocked through July 1, 2024.
Top skill of the moment
In addition to a high-level look at the overall most in-demand skills, we also wanted to zero in on specific micro-trends, given how much AI has changed the world of work in the last year. So we took a defined six-month period from 2022 and compared it to the same period in 2023, to explore which skills grew most quickly.
One rose to the top as the “skill of the moment”: Adaptability.
Adaptability is mission-critical for both people and organizations. And since the pace of change in the world of work is predicted to increase, adaptability will help you stay versatile and composed amid these changes. “Adaptability is the best way to have agency right now,” says LinkedIn VP Aneesh Raman. “At the core of managing change is building that muscle of adaptability.”
Strengthen your adaptability skills with Building Career Agility and Resilience in the Age of AI.
In a world continuously transformed by artificial intelligence, the enduring value of uniquely human skills should reinforce a fundamental truth: that the changing world of work needs people who are more thoughtful, more curious, and more skilled at navigating change than ever before. So no matter your role or goals this year, the trick to thriving in this era of change is to embrace it. Communicate and stay adaptable, acquire skills that will help you advance in your career, and you’ll go far.
Insights provided by Manas Mohapatra.
Methodology:
The demand of a skill is measured by the share of a skill possessed by members who have been hired recently, skill possessed by members who have received recruiter InMails recently, and skill listed in paid job listings posted recently in the current 6 months (1 May 23 to 31 Oct 23). 'Skill of the Moment’ is measured by the difference in the demand of a given skill in the current 6 months (1 May 2023 to 31 Oct 2023) and the 6 months in the year before (1 May 2022 to 31 Oct 2022). Skills for languages and digital literacy are excluded.
