Asana work tracking ranks as the fastest-growing, in-demand skill in the US online jobs market, the first nontech skill ever to top the list, according to the first-quarter skills index released by Upwork. However, tech skills still comprise 60% of the list.
The list includes the top 20 hottest skills on Upwork’s online staffing platform.
The four fastest-growing skills all made the list for first time, demonstrating rapid change in needs and highlighting that freelancers are fueling innovation. Artificial intelligence — the fastest-growing tech skill and the second fastest-growing skill overall — and immigration law ranked among top 10 skills, all of which grew more than 400% year over year.
The 20 fastest-growing freelance skills in the first quarter, all of which experienced more than 140% year-over-year growth:
- Asana work tracking
- Artificial intelligence
- Rapid prototyping
- Immigration law
- Natural language processing
- Instagram marketing
- A/B testing
- Twilio API development
- C++ development
- Swift development
- Brand strategy
- Marketo marketing automation
- Penetration testing
- Docker development
- Relationship management
- Application security
- AngularJS development
- Accounting (CPA)
- Machine learning
- JIRA administration
“The workforce is going through unprecedented change,” said Upwork CEO Stephane Kasriel. “At the same time, innovation is progressing faster than ever in an attempt to keep up with the world’s problems and their necessary solutions. In the next three to four years, more than 30% of the workforce’s essential skills will be new. Whereas traditional employees take time to retrain, the companies that need emerging skills can access them quickly by hiring freelancers and are doing so increasingly — 55% of companies that utilized freelancers in 2016 expect to hire more in 2017.”
The Upwork Skills Index calculates growth rates based on freelancer billings through Upwork in the first quarter 2017 versus the same quarter of the prior year.
