About Us

The Centre for the Future of Work provides a platform for new information, interpretations, and research on topics of importance to a variety of stakeholders. The University of Pretoria’s Centre for the Future of Work (CFoW), founded on the concept that the future of work affects every sector of study, research, and training, will include a wide range of disciplines and cross all professional and institutional boundaries.

While the Centre will conduct generative research on the future of work, and the results of this research will be used to aid UP’s curriculum transformation efforts (and, potentially, those of other partner universities), the research and its outcomes will also be aimed at advancing the University’s commitment to making a substantive contribution to the South African and African economies, as well as the broader social good.
Myklebust and Smidt (2021) argue that the levels of upskilling and re-skilling of workforces that will be required in the immediate future are enormous, and they correctly point out that universities and entities such as the Centre for the Future of Work can play a critical role in these endeavours – and thus make an important contribution to the economy.

Commenting on a report published by the World Economic Forum, Myklebust and Smidt (2021) argue that:

“There is a fast-growing void and stark mismatch between people’s current skills and the skills needed for jobs that will be created in the next decade and that will become more prevalent because of the changes brought about by the fourth industrial revolution. Governments, businesses and educational institutions are simply not helping people acquire the skills they need to succeed.”

The Centre for the Future of Work wishes to solve the gap, both for the sake of our students and to give substance to the University’s commitment to its social responsibility obligations.