Intervention

Labour, skills expire every two years and managers must turn into coaches

It is no longer enough to acquire technical skills, but constant updating and strategic vision are essential to cope with technological innovation and organisational complexity

by Alessandro Rosati*

27 February 2026

Competenze della twin transition (digital&green)

4' min read

Translated by AI

Versione italiana

4' min read

Translated by AI

Versione italiana

Adaptability and upskilling. These are the two key words describing today's labour market. After a two-year period dominated by the debate on the potential of new technologies, 2026 is about to become the year of concreteness. All the talk about artificial intelligence, green innovation and Industry 5.0 have stopped being future projections and are increasingly becoming realities within business processes that we can no longer ignore.

This paradigm shift, of course, also translates into an increasingly insistent search for highly qualified profiles with hybrid skills, i.e. professionals who, together with hard skills, have an overall vision to move in increasingly complex contexts.

Skills with an expiry date: the new labour market is increasingly dynamic

The speed of innovation has drastically reduced the life of hard skills. Indeed, a very clear picture emerges from the data we have compiled: today, technical skills have an average life cycle of about two years before becoming obsolete. It is therefore no longer just a question of learning how to use new tools, but of embracing continuous and dynamic training paths to adapt to a constantly evolving and changing environment.

We can say, therefore, that 2026 represents a watershed: it is no longer enough to be a spectator of innovation, we must know how to manage it. The real challenge in the coming months will be to transform the speed of change into a strategic asset to anticipate market needs and provide concrete, precise and timely answers. The ability to unlearn and relearn becomes the real competitive advantage for candidates, but also for companies. Today, no professional can limit himself to being a mere performer, but must be a change-maker with skills that are constantly being updated to be able to bridge the gap between fast-moving technological innovation and business development needs. And in this, leaders play a crucial role.

The central role of companies and managers: from training welfare to learning organisation

In this scenario, the centrality of training, which cannot only fall on the individual but must involve organisations in their entirety, is evident. Companies must adopt the learning organisation model, within which the constant updating of skills is integrated into the workflow and no longer considered - mistakenly - as an interruption of daily activities. It is not just a matter of providing refresher courses, but of structuring a true welfare of skills, investing in reskilling and upskilling of their employees to close that gap which, if neglected, can have catastrophic impacts even on the business.

Beyond technical skills: the rise of power skills

The technical skills, of course, remain crucial, but in recent times we see a strong emergence of the need to cultivate what we might call power skills as well. In an increasingly automation-oriented world, the real added value lies in people's critical thinking skills and ability to handle the complexity (including emotional complexity) of situations. We need managers with an overall and choral vision, capable of leading multidisciplinary teams within which everyone must speak a common language.

I am convinced that, in 2026 and in the future, professional success will be determined by a mix of several elements: solid technical skills - constantly updated - and flexibility to navigate, with strategy, through uncertainty.

Towards a new humanism of work: the synthesis of vision and action for the managers of the future

In the coming months, I am convinced, the game will be played not only on innovation and technology, but on the ability to integrate these tools with human skills. Leadership, therefore, must necessarily evolve: the manager of the future, in fact, will no longer be just a supervisor of processes and actions, but a facilitator capable of creating a safe environment also from a psychological point of view. Artificial intelligence and automation do not replace people's intuition, but enhance it, freeing workers from repetitive and routine tasks and leaving them time to devote to more strategic activities.

However, we must not forget that this transition requires an unprecedented ethical and social commitment. The polarisation of the labour market - between those with the skills to govern change and those who risk being excluded from it - is a real risk that organisations must mitigate with an active and concrete commitment. Investing in inclusive reskilling paths is not only an economic imperative to preserve business continuity, but a social responsibility that defines the very identity of the modern company. Sustainability, therefore, is no longer just about environmental impact (which of course remains important), but also about the ability to keep human capital employable over time, ensuring that no skill (and no resource) becomes obsolete and therefore useless.

I believe that it is crucial not to see training merely as a cost, but to start considering it as a means for business survival. Only in this way can we turn the uncertainty of the markets and the difficulties of this period into fertile ground for innovation and growth. The professional of 2026 is not someone who knows everything, but someone who is willing to learn everything with the knowledge that the only constant will remain change. It is precisely in this ability to navigate the modern working world that lies the key to building careers and businesses capable of leaving a lasting mark.

*CEO of agap2