Amazon to 'Upskill' 1/3 of Its US Workforce by 2025

Amazon plans to “upskill” 100,000 U.S. employees -- a third of its ranks -- for “in-demand jobs” by 2025, after a workforce review and hiring analysis, said the tech giant Thursday. It's spending $700 million to give employees in corporate offices, tech hubs, fulfillment centers, retail stores, and its transportation network access to training programs designed to move them into more highly skilled roles “within or outside of Amazon,” it said. Programs cover a technical academy for software careers, a path from fulfillment center jobs to technical roles, on-site training for machine learning, a pre-paid tuition program to train fulfillment center associates in “high-demand occupations of their choice,” a Labor Department-certified apprenticeship that offers paid classroom training and on-the-job learning with Amazon, and courses in Amazon Web Services training and certification, it said. The company's fastest growing highly skilled jobs over the last five years are data mapping specialist (832 percent growth), data scientist (505 percent), solutions architect (454 percent), security engineer (229 percent) and business analyst (160 percent), it said. Highly skilled roles in fulfillment have increased over 400 percent in positions including logistics coordinator, process improvement manager and transportation specialist, Amazon said.