A new report, ‘The State of Skills in the Apparel Industry 2020’, highlights post COVID, digital creation skills top the list of business issues faced by the industry. The report has published by Fashion e-learning platform Motif and Alvanon in partnership with 19 leading apparel organizations,

It states, in the last 12 months, more large companies have turned to upskilling their workforce while more smaller and mid-sized companies are looking to hire new skills; 66 per cent express some sort of dissatisfaction with the training they receive; biggest levels of dissatisfaction are at the junior levels with 13 per cent difference with management; 77 per cent of executives feel employees do not proactively take courses; 44 per cent say employees only take courses when they are forced to; and yet, when junior employees were asked, 71 per cent said they proactively take courses.

The report represents the views of 900 apparel professionals from across the value chain. Survey suggested that while there is clearly still a need for strong fundamental skills like apparel costing, sourcing, supply chain management, etc. One key finding is the perceived gap in “future” skills that combine 3D digitalization and data skills with technical skills.