PwC Pledges US$3 Billion to Digitally Upskill its Employees

Professional services firm PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) has set aside US$3 billion to improve the digital skills of its 276,000 employees.

In the months to come, thousands of the company’s staff will be taught as to how they can use data analytics, robotics process automation, and artificial intelligence in their work.

“There is a growing mismatch between the skills people have and those needed for the digital world,” stated the company, announcing its upskilling program called ‘New world, New skills’.

Once trained, the employees will move on to advise the company’s clients.

“We will help millions of people improve their skills and knowledge for the digital world by making upskilling a focus of our not-for-profit initiatives,” PwC added.

The company is rolling out a range of programs and offering a variety of tools to help its staff unlock creativity. For example, in the US, over 28,000 people are taking part in its Digital Academies, which teaches them on bots, automation, and dynamic visualization capabilities.

“Globally, we also offer a Digital Fitness app, which provides people with a personalized assessment of their own digital acumen. To date, over 100,000 PwC people are actively using the app,” the company said.

The announcement comes after PwC’s own study found automation is killing millions of jobs around the world.

More than half of global employees are feeling worried that automation may make their job obsolete over the next ten years, studies have shown.