Independent research by specialised recruiter Robert Half shows that new technologies are expected to create more jobs going into 2020. While a McKinsey & Company report suggests new technologies are expected to impact around 24 percent of existing workforce activities in Singapore by 2030, the survey findings indicate that the rise of machines isn’t simply taking away jobs, but rather changing the definition of existing roles and creating new ones.
New technology expected to stimulate job creation in 2020
Over two-thirds (68 percent) of Singaporean business leaders think technology will create permanent jobs in their teams throughout 2020.
Singaporean business leaders are slightly more optimistic about the impact of technology on permanent job creation compared to their global counterparts. Across the thirteen markets recently surveyed by Robert Half, 64 percent of business leaders expect new technology to create permanent roles across their teams in 2020.
While still predominantly optimistic, business leaders are somewhat less positive about temporary and contract roles, with more than four in 10 (42 percent) foreseeing that technology will create new temporary and contract roles in 2020, in line with the global average (42%). More than one third (36 percent) of Singaporean business leaders think there will be no net change and 22% believe temporary and contract jobs will get lost, which again corresponds with the view of their global peers.
Business leaders in Singapore and globally were asked “How will new technologies affect the net number of jobs across your team in 2020?”
| Permanent (Singapore) | Temporary (Singapore) | Permanent (Global) | Temporary (Global) | |
| Significantly more jobs created than lost | 27% | 14% | 30% | 13% |
| Some more jobs created than lost | 41% | 28% | 34% | 29% |
| No net change in jobs | 19% | 36% | 22% | 30% |
| Some more jobs lost than created | 10% | 18% | 10% | 18% |
| Significantly more jobs lost than created | 2% | 4% | 3% | 5% |
Source: Independent survey commissioned by Robert Half among 5,165 international business leaders, including 228 from Singapore.
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Technical skills in high demand amongst Singaporean workers
While automation will continue to disrupt workplaces and contribute to job loss in some sectors, jobs for technically skilled professionals are set to increase.
New technological developments across high-speed mobile internet, artificial intelligence, big data analytics, and cloud technology require additional skilled professionals to develop and implement them, which in turn, creates and will continue to create more job opportunities for professionals with an agile mindset and appetite to develop emerging technical skills.
Business leaders in Singapore and globally were asked to indicate tech specialisms experiencing “high to urgent demand” in their IT departments. Here are the 6 skills that came out on top.
| Singaporean leaders | Global leaders | |
| Cloud technologies (AWS/Azure) | 94% | 84% |
| Business intelligence and reporting services (Power BI, SSAS, SSIS) | 86% | 79% |
| Database management (Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server) | 84% | 75% |
| Mobile development (Objective-C, Java, C#) | 88% | 77% |
| DevOps | 88% | 76% |
| Agile | 83% | 72% |
Source: Independent survey commissioned by Robert Half among 1,177 international CIOs, including 75 from Singapore.
Many of the jobs forecast to experience growth in the wake of new technologies will be tech-centric, while calling on a range of soft and strategic skills to complement the tech functionality. According to LinkedIn’s 2020 Emerging Jobs Report, the top emerging roles in Singapore include data scientists, cyber-security specialists, user-experience designers, heads of digital, and content specialists.
“Going into 2020, digital transformation will continue to put ongoing pressure on companies to quickly evolve their workforces to harness the benefits,” saysMatthieu Imbert-Bouchard, Managing Director of Robert Half Singapore in announcing Robert Half’s latest survey results.
“While some existing job functions are likely to be reallocated to automated processes, particularly manual or back-end processing, this leaves greater capacity for strategic and analytical capabilities. Our survey findings highlight that there are positive job prospects for professionals who have an agile mindset and embrace the potential of emerging technologies.”
“Some of the fastest growing job opportunities across all industries include those that are based on new technology, such as software development, specialist roles that leverage emerging technology, such as cyber-security, and those that rely on distinctly ‘human’ skills which sit alongside technology, such as change management and strategic thinking skills.”
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