A part of Manipal Education and Medical Group, Manipal Global Education Services is a provider of quality higher education services.

This once in a generation Covid 19 pandemic has impacted lives across the spectrum in ways that could not be imagined. It was just not personal lives and wellbeing – it impacted businesses equally across industries, continents and generations. Survival and conservation have been the first priorities ofcompanies while negotiating these unprecedented times. They had to adapt to the changing realities of consumer, customer, and channel dynamics – the new normal. Businesses that are not core IT or IT enabled services had to make the biggest transition. As their products and services are delivered mostly offline, their employees are the ones that need the maximum amount of upskilling.

As the full scale of its impact is felt in the weeks after the pandemic started unleashing its fury across the world, strategists grappled with options to take their businesses forward. There are a few common threads among all the options. The most important among them are:
1. Integration of newer technologies into their daily business operations, and
2. Adaptability of the employees in working with these new technologies, becoming adept at those quickly

Employees, both existing and new, are required to get skilled, stay agile and flexible, and adapt to these new operations – technology enabled and otherwise. To further incorporate new-age technologies while responding to changing customer behaviour and preferences, companies must continue to build acorresponding culture within their organisations. Preparing and equipping employees is the key strategy to achieve it. This needs to be done through continuous and relevant upskilling of their employees to build an agile, effective, smart and future-ready workforce.

Technological Upskilling: As communication internally with various departments and externally with customers and vendors moved online, the first skill the organisation needed to incorporate was using these technologies. From what are now the ‘de rigueur’ meeting platforms such as Zoom, Microsoft Teams,Google Meet, etc. to more advanced new age technologies such as AI-ML, AR/VR, IoT, Cloud that make remote communication much more effective, if used intelligently. As organisations discover how effective these technologies are in ensuring seamless communication that improves upon the less efficientface to face meetings, they are investing more efforts and resources into skilling their teams to work best with these technologies. In a ‘business as usual’ scenario, organisations would have taken much longer to adopt these technologies. However, with the pandemic spreading rapidly, leaving all traditional plans in tatters, organisations have scrambled to put together technology adaptation plans in a fast forward mode. While the accelerated adaptation of these technologies has been forced upon the organisations, they are now realising the unanticipated benefits of integrating these tools. Let us consider a situation of a traditional sales call. Demonstration of a new product performance was earlier left to static visuals and the ability of the salesperson to explain the product in detail. Now, impactful VR enabled walkthroughs are making the entire sales process seamless and experiential which could lead to positive decision from the customers, faster.

Non-Technical Upskilling: With the all meetings – both internal and external – moving to the virtual space, employees now need skills to stay effective even in remote engagements with colleagues and customers. Organisations are looking to spend significant effort to get their personnel trained on performing at the same level of effectiveness as they were during the ‘physical meeting’ times. Skills such as Persuasive Questioning, Value Communication, Critical Thinking and Emotional Intelligence become even more valuable, getting the non-IT companies’ focus on them. With customers unsure about commitments, those organisations training their people on ‘soft’ skills such as these, will be able to guide, assure and win the race.

In summary, the future – at least the immediate one – belongs to those organisations that are willing to invest in their people and get them to master technical and behavioural skills needed to win in the dramatically different marketplace. It is here that professional training companies such as ManipalProLearn step-in. With their rich legacy in providing immersive and hands on training through industry expert faculty via remote classrooms, these companies will find their investment rewarding – both in short and long terms.