Explore Our Futures: Excelia and Business Co-design the Skills of Tomorrow 

In a world shaped by fast-moving change, from technology and climate pressures to shifting social expectations, organisations are under growing pressure to anticipate what comes next. Against this backdrop, Excelia brought together business leaders, experts and partners for a one-of-a-kind day: Explore Our Futures. The aim was to imagine what work, tourism, communication and future skills could look like by 2040, and to draw practical lessons that will help shape the programmes of tomorrow. 

A hands-on lab for future skills 

Explore Our Futures was not a typical advisory meeting. It was designed as a working session, with practical tools that helped participants step into 2040 and stress-test today’s assumptions. 

Using scenario-building, design fiction, disruption analysis and role-play, each workshop pushed participants to imagine contrasting futures and then ask the tough questions: What breaks? What survives? What becomes essential? What becomes irrelevant? 

Bringing together Excelia’s three schools, Business, Communication and Tourism, reinforced a clear idea: the skills that will matter most will rarely sit neatly in one discipline. The future belongs to people who can adapt quickly, connect dots across fields, and stay grounded in what is human, whether that means leading alongside AI, navigating transitions, rebuilding trust, or shaping business models that stand up in a more constrained world. 

Clear takeaways, with real impact on our programmes 

One message came through strongly throughout discusssions and fiction design exercices : technical expertise alone will not be enough. The capabilities organisations kept coming back to were the ones that help people operate in uncertainty, including: creative problem-solving, critical thinking and judgement, empathy and relationship-building, ethical decision-making and the ability to work effectively with AI, without outsourcing responsibility…. …all of which are adaptive skills that will become strategically important for organisations. 

For Excelia, this experience is more than inspiring: it directly informs how we rethink and evolve our programmes, so future graduates are equipped for the real needs of employers and fast-changing industries. 

A space for dialogue and co-creation 

The day created a genuine space for dialogue. Partner organisations did not come to give a polished testimonial. They came to build with us. 

By combining forward-looking scenarios with the realities of the field, Explore our FutureS became a rare meeting point where professional challenges and innovative pedagogy could shape each other. Participants left with ideas they could test, language they could use internally, and a sharper sense of what “future-ready” should mean. Explore Our Futures marks another step forward in bringing schools and businesses closer together. 

Shaping the future of organisations and talent, together 

Explore Our Futures reinforces a clear conviction: real organisational transformation depends on close collaboration between businesses and higher education. The insights from the day will help us evolve our programmes, strengthen job-ready capabilities, and prepare talent equipped to meet what comes next. 

Excelia would like to warmly thank all participating organisations for the quality of the discussions and the sharp recommendations shared. They will directly inform the evolution of our programmes and the development of future talent. 

We look forward to welcoming you at the next edition, and to continuing, together, the work of building futures that are more sustainable, more responsible and more human.