The survey Future of Jobs 2025 The World Economic Forum (WEF) anticipates a seismic shift in the skills landscape: employers expect nearly 4 in 10 key skills to change by 2030. At the same time, companies plan to reskill their workforces on an unprecedented scale, with 85% of employers prioritizing reskilling and 70% planning to hire talent with new skills.
When we talk about the future of work, it’s easy to be seduced by the brilliance of emerging technologies. However, the most important lesson of the survey Future of Jobs 2025 It is not on the margins, but in the center.
The WEF collected responses from more than 1,000 employers in 55 economies, representing 14 million workers, and asked them two questions:
- What skills are essential today?
- Which will be most used in 2030?
Responses were organized into a two-axis matrix: the X-axis measures how many employers consider a skill a key competency in 2025; The Y-axis measures the percentage of employers who expect the use of that skill to increase by 2030. The top right quadrant groups those skills that are already essential today and will be even more important in the future. Those are the core skills for 2030.
Why is this quadrant so relevant? Because it reveals the human capabilities that will define professional relevance and competitive advantage in the next decade. According to the WEF, analytical thinking remains the number one skill for employers, while creative thinking, resilience, flexibility and agility, technological literacy, leadership and social influence, motivation and self-awareness, curiosity and continuous learning, systems thinking, talent management, empathy and active listening, as well as service orientation and customer service, complete the core.
These are not simply “desirable skills”; They are attributes that underpin the ability to navigate complexity, innovate responsibly, and build meaningful relationships in an era of constant disruption.
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The quadrant that marks the path
In the WEF matrix, the top right quadrant tells a clear story: the skills that matter most today will be even more important tomorrow. They are not passing fads; They are enduring human competencies that survive technological changes and multiply the impact of emerging tools such as artificial intelligence.
Grouped into five thematic blocks, they offer a roadmap for where leaders should focus their personal development and talent strategy, especially in high-pressure, rapid-change environments.
1. Cognitive and analytical excellence
Analytical thinking is in the center of the quadrant. It is already a key driver of business success and, in a world saturated with complex and often contradictory data, it will become non-negotiable. It’s not just about “being good with numbers,” but about making sense of information: synthesizing diverse inputs, identifying patterns, and applying judgment when data is incomplete or messy. W. Edwards Deming once said: “Without data, you’re just another person with an opinion.”. That was a perfect slogan in a data-scarce world. But in the current reality, with abundant data, the phrase should be reversed: Without an opinion, you’re just another person with data. The leaders who will excel will be those who can combine rigorous analysis with a clear point of view—framing problems in ways that cut through complexity and inspire action. This means building teams that critically question data, not simply accept a dashboard. It involves rewarding the ability to ask the right question before going out to find the answer. Leadership of the future will be about transforming raw information into actionable knowledge at speed, filtering out the noise.
2. Creativity as a business multiplier
Creative thinking appears alongside analytical thinking, a combination that would surprise those who still see creativity as a “soft” field. In reality, when technology levels the playing field in terms of efficiency, creativity becomes the deciding factor. When all competitors have access to similar data and tools, differentiation comes from generating original solutions and connecting seemingly unrelated dots. The leaders of 2030 must make creativity a system: integrate it into processes, encourage experimentation and protect spaces for divergent thinking. It is not about hiring isolated “creative profiles”, but rather about cultivating an organizational culture that rewards original thinking, even when it challenges the the situation of which.
3. Self-management and adaptability
Resilience, flexibility, agility, curiosity, and continuous learning form a compact core in this quadrant, reminding us that the future will favor those who treat adaptability not as a survival skill, but as a competitive advantage.
Futurist Alvin Toffler summed it up this way: “The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who do not know how to read or write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn”. The relevant leaders in 2030 will be those who can pivot without losing speed, abandon outdated assumptions without nostalgia, and update their mental models as reality changes. In a world of abundance and scarcity of time, an attention economy where the focus is dispersed and the deadlines for deciding are shortened, trust will be even more decisive. When people can’t gather or process all the information to make 100% informed decisions, they turn to shortcuts: familiar names, credible voices, brands they trust. For companies, the brand becomes a decision filter. Leaders must ensure that their organization’s reputation, for reliability, ethics and consistency, is managed with the same rigor as its finances.
4. Social influence and leadership based on trust
Leadership and social influence, empathy and active listening form another fundamental block. These skills are often underestimated until a crisis exposes their absence. In an environment where remote and hybrid work blurs connection, and automation can depersonalize relationships with customers and employees, the leaders who stand out will be the ones who make trust tangible. Social influence in 2030 will not depend on charisma alone: it will rely on aligning diverse stakeholders around a common vision and translating that vision into coordinated action. Empathy and active listening will cease to be “soft skills” and become precision tools that detect invisible obstacles to execution and facilitate decisions with true collective support.
5. Technological fluency as a basic requirement
Technological literacy, artificial intelligence, big data and systems thinking are also at the core of skills. The message is clear: leaders will not need to program, but they will need to master the potential and strategic limitations of new technologies. By 2030, technological ignorance will be a career brake. Leaders will be expected to integrate AI tools into workflows, critically interpret algorithmic results, and anticipate side effects, from ethical implications to unforeseen biases. Systems thinking will be the bridge: seeing how technology, processes, people and market forces interact in a non-linear way.
The lesson of this core of skills is twofold:
- Integration surpasses specialization. The leaders of 2030 will not be the best analysts, creatives or empaths in isolation; They will be the ones to integrate these capabilities into a consistent leadership style and organizational culture.
- Human skills will scale technology. As AI and automation expand capacity, the bottleneck will move from execution to judgment, insight and trust.
This tension between integration and specialization is not new. The most influential minds in history—Leonardo da Vinci among them—were not defined by a single discipline. They were polymaths: people with deep knowledge and experience in multiple, often unrelated fields, capable of integrating ideas and solving complex problems or creating radically new concepts. Leonardo was a scientist, engineer, artist and philosopher, who united diverse disciplines to see patterns invisible to others.
Strictly speaking, the modern equivalent of a Renaissance polymath will not necessarily paint masterpieces or design flying machines, but he will navigate fluidly between strategic foresight, technological vision, human empathy and creative problem solving. This breadth will not replace depth: it will allow you to connect dots and detect opportunities that isolated specialists will overlook.
This is why, in 2030, the leaders who stand out will be those who reject the false choice between “depth” or “breadth.” They will cultivate range, not randomness: they will develop enough mastery to interact appropriately in multiple areas and the humility to lean on experts when their own depth falls short.
The upper right quadrant of the WEF chart is not just a prediction: it is an invitation to action. Whether you lead people, budgets, or strategies today, your future relevance will depend on how deliberately you develop these skills in yourself, your teams, and the culture you shape.
Ultimately, competitive advantage will belong to those who embrace integration over specialization, humanity over mechanization, and adaptability over convenience.
This article was originally published in the print version of Forbes Mexico in October 2025.
The author has served as CEO of three international marketing firms, collaborating with more than 300 companies globally. In addition, he is a Marketing Professor, lecturer and advisor on Corporate Innovation, Leadership and Marketing. Recognized by Thinkers50 as one of the world’s leading thought leaders, he has co-written three business books with Philip Kotler.
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