Indian workers with AI skills could see salary hikes of over 54%, finds survey — Should you enroll?

Almost all employees want the best of AI. As per the survey, 95% of Gen Z, 96% of Millennials, and 93% of Gen X workers want to acquire AI skills.

Not just that 90% of baby boomers—a demographic usually contemplating retirement—say they would enrol in an AI upskilling course “if it was offered.”

Almost all employers (99%) envision their companies becoming AI-driven organisations by 2028. While most employers (97%) believe their finance department will be the biggest beneficiary, they also foresee IT (96%), research and development (96%), sales and marketing (96%), business operations (95%), human resources (94%), and legal (92%) departments driving significant value from AI.

While the top skill that employers in India demand today and in five years is AI and machine learning development, workers in India rank AI development and the usage of AI-powered tools as the most important skills they want to develop by 2028, the survey has revealed.

“54% of workers report AI development as the top five skills they want to develop by 2028… Creative thinking/design, critical thinking, as well as ethics and risk management, will be the top three skills organizations in India need to embrace AI,” the report added.

Employees want to learn AI and companies want to hire AI-skilled people. Hiring AI-skilled talent is a priority for more than nine in ten (96%) Indian employers. However, according to the survey, 79% of them can’t find the AI talent they need.

Hence, the research reveals a looming AI skills gap which must be bridged to ensure India is well-positioned to unlock the full productivity benefits of AI. The research also uncovers a training awareness gap, whereby 91% of employers indicated that they don’t know how to run an AI workforce training programme.

Meanwhile, 86% of workers said they aren’t sure about relevant career paths where AI skills are useful.

The situation is similar in the other Asia Pacific countries. According to the AWS-Access Partnership survey, 74% of workers in APAC, 83% in Malaysia, and 81% in Thailand also indicated a lack of knowledge of possible career paths where AI skills would be useful as the top barrier.

Almost 15,000 workers and 5,000 employers were surveyed across nine countries in APAC (Australia, India, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, New Zealand, Singapore, South Korea, and Thailand). Over 1,600 workers and 500 employers were surveyed in India.