Irrespective of which camp you belong to those who think that machines and robots are about to take over your jobs or those who are more optimistic about automation creating new ones, the fact, undeniably, remains that the jobs in the future will be different and will demand a whole new set of skills. The gap between the demand and supply for skilled, employable professionals is widening across various industries. This is a scenario prevalent in the Indian IT industry as well, where there is a substantial disconnect between the industry requirements and academia. 
Today, rapidly changing technology is another reason that is increasing this divide as the threat of obsolescence looms large over several job roles. Sectors like e-commerce, retail and banking are implementing AI on a large scale. The global manufacturing industry is also looking towards automation and analytics for solutions to create futuristic solutions.
 The automobile industry is one such sector. Car manufacturers are increasingly investing in technology to build driverless cars, for which they seek data analytics services as well as AI and cloud architects to build the requisite networks and infrastructure. This is where up-skilling will play a major role in creating a workforce of skilled engineering professionals and in meeting the growing demand for technology-driven requirements across industries. 
Multidisciplinary skills will position the future workforce to prepare for new skill-sets embrace the paradigm shift. Willingness to learn and stepping out of your comfort zone will further boost one's chances in the technology domain. It will also enable them to explore and implement innovative solutions to existing problems, and tackle emerging challenges. Furthermore, a multi-disciplinary skillset will prepare individuals to take on leadership roles and reinvent existing policies and frameworks. For instance, someone who is skilled in medicine, as well as technology, can effectively deploy nanobots and microsurgical techniques to develop life-saving treatments and procedures. A multidisciplinary approach throughout the academia is required to pop up with the growing demand. Radiomics is another emerging field of medical study which applies algorithms to extract large amounts of data from routine medical scans to detect diseases like cancer and improve diagnosis and treatment for it.
 Thus, with up-skilling, not only engineering professionals, but also doctors, lawyers, and teachers can effectively contribute to their respective fields by applying additional knowledge and capitalizing on current and future technologies. This would require fundamental changes in the prevalent educational paradigms. Traditional teaching and learning methods need to make way for innovative pedagogy wherein students are trained to easily apply information communication technology in their future professions and easily adopt a multi-disciplinary approach to perform job roles as well as problem-solving. Businesses implementing automation are doing so with their focus on optimising and reducing costs while bringing about greater efficiency and effective management. With automation making its way into different businesses, re-assessing the employees’ true skills and abilities becomes easier. Organisations that have not yet created learning programmes for employees must embrace the paradigm shift and come to terms with the fact that learning and development, reskilling and up-skilling are indispensable for the creation of strong and winning team. It is worthful to remember that, in the near future one need to compete with the robot or AI who in turn is learning your own skills and mistakes.