Employees recognise the need to re-skill, but managers need stronger tools and organisational support to help people keep pace

Employers face a growing workforce risk as employees struggle to understand which skills they need and how to develop them quickly enough to keep pace with changing work, according to WTW’s latest EX Intelligent report. The proportion of employees who say their manager helps develop their abilities has shifted from 84% to 78% over the past four years, highlighting the need to give managers more support for development conversations. At the same time, only about 30% of organisations have established processes for identifying, assessing and tracking workforce skills.

This mismatch risks creating “capability anxiety”: uncertainty among employees about whether their skills will remain relevant, what capabilities will matter most and where they should focus their development. Employees understand that work is changing. 45% say AI is already important to their daily job and another 22% say it will fundamentally change their work in the future. The pressure point is not change itself, but rather the uncertainty of whether they can keep up, what skills matter most and where to focus next.

Gaby Joyner, Head of Employee Experience Europe at WTW, said: “Employees recognise that work is evolving, but many lack clarity on what skills matter most and how to prepare for what comes next. Without that visibility, uncertainty can become a barrier to confidence and growth.

“To address this, employers need to make development more tangible by equipping managers to have meaningful career conversations, creating clearer visibility into skills and career opportunities, and linking learning directly to the work employees do every day.”

For organisations, skills uncertainty can create a blind spot. If employees cannot connect their current role with future opportunities, confidence may erode, adaptability may slow and investment in new technology may fail to translate into stronger performance.

WTW recommends that employers:

• identify the skills required to deliver current and future business priorities;
• give employees clearer visibility of career pathways, learning opportunities and internal roles;
• equip managers to discuss changing skill requirements and guide development; and
• use employee listening and workforce data to identify where uncertainty or capability gaps may be affecting confidence and performance.

Joyner added: “Workforce transformation is more likely to succeed when employees can see a clear path to growth and organisations have the infrastructure to support it. By making skills, career pathways and development opportunities more visible and actionable, employers can reduce capability anxiety and build a workforce better equipped to adapt, grow and perform.”