Digital ASEAN

ASEAN Digital Skills Vision 2020

Training the ASEAN Workforce for the Fourth Industrial Revolution

Pledge Framework

Background
Digital ASEAN is one of the World Economic Forum’s flagship projects in South-East Asia. Launched in April
2018, and with the full involvement of ASEAN ministers of digital economy, ICT and trade as well as the heads
of regional and global businesses, the initiative aims to contribute to the development of a vibrant regional
digital economy. As part of the initiative, five task forces have been set up, each focused on a key aspect of
ASEAN’s digital future.

The ASEAN Digital Skills Taskforce is focused on developing the human capital pool in ASEAN to ensure that
citizens have the skills needed to thrive as digital disruption creates both risks and opportunities for workers.
The task force is dedicated to upgrading the skills of all types of workers in the digital ecosystem, from SME
traders adapting to e-commerce, to software coders, to government regulators.

In supporting the development of digital producers in ASEAN, the task force is setting up a pledge to develop digital
skills for the ASEAN workforce.

Objective
The broad goal is to convene a group of like-minded organisations united in their passion for developing digital skills
in ASEAN. This group of companies will together make a pledge to achieve two broad goals:
• Train ASEAN digital workers; and
• Hire ASEAN digital workers.

Character and targets of the pledge

Following discussions with members of the task force in April 2018 and September 2018, the pledge consists of the
following specific commitments to be achieved by 2020:
• Train 20 million ASEAN SME workers;
• Raise US$2 million in contributions to providing scholarships for ASEAN technology students;
• Hire directly 200,000 ASEAN digital workers;
• Engage 20,000 ASEAN citizens through “Digital Inspiration Days” (see below);
• Offer 2,000 internship opportunities for ASEAN university students;
• Train 200 ASEAN regulators;
• Contribute to shaping the curricula at 20 ASEAN universities; and
• Train 40 million ASEAN individual citizens in digital literacy and online safety.
The concept of Digital Inspiration Days is for leading technology companies to open their offices for ASEAN citizen
visitors on special Open Days, where the visitors will have opportunities to interact with state-of-the-art
technologies, understand what type of work the company does, enter into conversations with inspiring engineers,
etc. It can also reversely include the cases where organizations send their representatives to schools and
universities to give insights and build understanding about state-of-the-art technologies, future of jobs, etc.

Timeline
• April 2018: Taskforce Members convened in Singapore to shape initial ideas
• September 2018: Taskforce Members and interested parties convened during the World Economic Forum on
ASEAN Meeting in Viet Nam to shape and agree on the details of the pledge, set targets and a timeline for the
pledge, and identify other organisations that might be invited to join the initiative
• 1 November 2018: An initial pool of pledge organisations confirmed – the founding champions
Digital ASEAN

• 5 November 2018: Virtual call to finalize the pledge details with the founding champions of the pledge
• 9 November 2018: Deadline for founding champions to submit their contributions to the pledge targets by
inputting details into an online platform (see below)
• 19 November 2018: Publicly announce the pledge at a press conference held on the side lines of the third
Digital ASEAN workshop in Bangkok, Thailand
• November 2018 to March 2019: Additional organisations add their commitments to the collective pledge
• March 2019 to December 2020: A series of workshops and gatherings of the pledge companies and
governments to assess progress, share best practices, and shape aspects of the pledge, including how to
work with regulators and universities

How to make a pledge?

The Forum has built an online platform where companies can set out the details of their plans for training, skills
development and hiring by completing this ASEAN Digital Skills Pledge Form. Organisations do not have to
commit to all aspects of the pledge. Instead they can choose which parts of the pledge are most appropriate for them.
They can also update their pledge with additional commitments at a later stage.

Part of the pledge will be linked to a broader initiative under way at the Forum, the Closing the Skills Gap project.
This broader initiative serves as a platform to focus fragmented actions by different companies into one overarching
mission to gather commitments that address future-oriented skills development.

In addition to committing to numerical targets in the ASEAN Digital Skills Pledge form, companies will also be
encouraged to share their training policies and success stories, using the closing the skills gap 2020 platform. The
goal is to build a repository of practices that can inspire other companies looking to increase or improve their hiring
and training practices for digital skills development in ASEAN.

Guidelines
Commitments and activities included in the pledge should be guided by the following criteria:
• Commitments should aim for gender parity (50% men, 50% women) in the beneficiaries
• Commitments can consist of a new initiative or the alignment of an existing initiative
• Commitments should achieve a balance in contributing to the public good alongside the corporate good, e.g.
create added value for society and the economy at large by deploying skills that can be applied by
beneficiaries beyond the company
• Commitments should align with the organisation’s core business strategy and comparative advantage, e.g.
build on sector-specific expertise
• Commitments should build future-ready skills, particularly digital and technical skills, that help beneficiaries
adapt to the changing work landscape.
• Future-readiness should be defined by each company for the initial set of commitments, depending on the
needs in a particular sector or geography, with the Forum emerging knowledge as the body of commitments
grows
• Internal training activities (e.g. HR training, onboarding of new employees) will not be considered towards
the pledge.

Contact
Thuy Nguyen, Project Lead, Digital ASEAN, World Economic Forum
Email: thuy.nguyen@weforum.org