2022 Skills Index

The Most In-Demand and Fastest Growing Independent Talent Skills to Drive Growth and Mitigate Risk

Skills for Success in Uncertain Times

Today, companies are facing a business landscape that offers significant opportunities for growth and innovation fueled by drastic changes in consumer demand, rapid technological advancement, and the widespread adoption of hybrid work. Yet new concerns have emerged— from the extraordinarily tight labor market to rapidly rising inflation to geopolitical tensions that stress not only supply chains and global operations, but also the wellbeing of workers worldwide.

Five years ago, Business Talent Group began reporting on the project and skill needs driving the use of high-end independent talent across industries and business functions. Since that time, we’ve witnessed both a massive influx of top talent choosing the independent path and a fast-growing understanding among business leaders of how to best use this highly skilled talent segment, as well as increased reliance upon the powerful on-demand capabilities they offer.

In fact, high-end independent talent have become a core pillar in the talent strategies of leading enterprises—offering an indispensable source of in-demand skills that are simply inaccessible in the broader labor market. In this fifth annual examination of proprietary BTG data on thousands of projects by Fortune 1000 companies and global equivalents, private equity firms, and nonprofits, we reveal how high-end independent talent are helping business leaders pursue growth amid increasing risk, harness advances in data science and technology, and adapt their workforces, processes, and financial practices for the as yet uncertain business environment ahead.

Here are our findings for 2022.*

Read the Report to Discover:

• The most in-demand skills organizations require now
• The fastest growing skills in 1H 2022
• How to find the skills you need amid a tight labor market and hiring freezes
• How to balance growth and risk in the months ahead

*Internal analysis of BTG project data, July 2022.

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