Research · Foundations

Future Skills Framework

24 Future Skills, 96 subskills and six development fields to help people navigate their capacity to act.

Future Skills Framework

Guidance beyond endless lists of competencies.

The framework organises 24 Future Skills into six development fields. It connects future relevance with the question of how abilities can be observed, practised and developed.

6Development fields
24Future Skills
96Subskills
Research output · Published 2026

Future Skills fürs Leben

The project addresses two related questions: which skills remain valuable across very different future scenarios, at work and in private life? And how can we understand these skills deeply enough to identify practical paths for development?

Alex Michel · Orientation, learning and development in uncertain times · ISBN 978-3-6957-2807-7

Read the foundations and Competency Atlas free of charge

Four perspectives informing the framework

  1. 01Comparison of existing Future Skills frameworks
  2. 02Research on happiness and life satisfaction
  3. 03Plausible future scenarios for Europe
  4. 04Developmental psychology
Development field 01

Learning and Development

How people stay curious, learn from setbacks and apply knowledge in new situations.

Five orientation levels per subskill

Each skill is further divided into four subskills. This creates 96 describable components and a deeper understanding of where development can begin.

LEVEL 1Starting point
LEVEL 2Early signs
LEVEL 3Available in specific situations
LEVEL 4Largely consistent
LEVEL 5Integrated with nuance

Developmental orientation: The framework provides nuanced descriptions of 24 Future Skills, their subskills and levels of development. It supports self-reflection and planning concrete development steps. The five levels provide orientation; they are not grades or clinical assessments. The free Competency Atlas explains all 96 subskills and 480 orientation anchors.