The impact of future technologies on the demand for skill sets in the Armed Forces

In this report, we describe a study we have conducted in collaboration with Cyberingeniørskolen. In this study, we interviewed several scientists at FFI about the technologies they are developing. Our goal was to identify which impact these technologies might have on the future demand for skill sets in the Norwegian Armed Forces. We found that the aim of future technologies is to make life easier for end-users. Future techno-logies should simply work seamlessly in the eyes of the end-user, and it should not require more technological skills than they naturally will have acquired growing up. Our scientists do not, however, believe that technology will be smart enough for a very long time, to operate completely on their own. There will be a need for technical personnel to operate the systems in one way or the other, for many years to come. These personnel should be familiar with military operations in order to make good decisions. All the scientists we interviewed talked about the immense amounts of data that will have to be collected and processed in the future. The need for people with skills within data processing and data analysis will increase. Our scientists do not believe that computers will make all decisions for humans in our lifetime. Our scientists also seemed to agree that within information and communication technologies, the difference between development and maintenance will almost completely disappear. Tools and systems will have to be developed and improved continuously. Consequently, there must be close and continuous collaboration between users, developers, and decision makers. In almost all of the interviews, we talked about how the technologies will let us solve tasks "better" or "with more capacity" than today. However, new technologies might also enable us to solve tasks in a completely different manner than today. When it comes to the technologies we talked about in the interviews, it seems that there are many choices to be made in the Norwegian Armed Forces, both related to the technologies themselves, and to which skills and knowledge the organization should produce and possess itself in the future.