AI Skills for Business Competency Framework

Artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping how people live, work, and participate in society, offering significant potential to enhance productivity, competitiveness, and public value. As AI systems become increasingly embedded in everyday services and organisational processes, employees across all roles require the skills and confidence to engage with these technologies safely, effectively, and ethically. For organisations, successful AI adoption depends not only on technical capability but also on ensuring alignment with ethical principles, regulatory expectations, and long-term public trust.

The AI Skills for Business Competency Framework has been developed to provide a structured understanding of the skills needed across the workforce. It offers a clear, role-aligned articulation of the knowledge, skills, and behaviours required for responsible and effective AI engagement across the workplace and wider society. The framework is designed to support organisations, educators, and policymakers in planning capability development, informing curriculum design, guiding organisational governance, and targeting professional training.

The AI Skills for Business Competency Framework was formally launched in May 2024 in response to the UK Government National AI Strategy commitment to "publish research into what skills are needed to enable employees to use AI in a business setting and identify how national skills provision can meet these needs. Since its launch, the framework has been used to underpin national skills infrastructures, support supply-demand-gap analysis for AI skills in the UK, and support the development of national curricula to meet the needs of industry.

We now bring to the community a consultation draft for Version 3 of the framework, the culmination of 12 months of engagement and co-design with businesses, educators, and policymakers. The new edition of the framework presents substantial updates across competency domains, new duty-based articulations of AI skills. 

We recognise that no two organisations are alike, and that different sectors have very different needs. That’s why this consultation process is so important. It is your opportunity to tell us what resonates, to challenge us on what needs to change or be improved, and to tell us what “good” looks like for your sector, your staff, and your customers.

Please provide your feedback via the Consultation Feedback Form.