The Future of Production: Building the Global Workforce of Tomorrow

As seen in IF.

The production industry used to be defined by geography. Today, it’s increasingly defined by capability.

A story may be commissioned in Los Angeles, financed in London, shot in Sydney, post-produced in New Zealand, animated in Seoul, and distributed globally. Creativity has become borderless, and production is profoundly interconnected. 

Growing a thriving production industry will no longer depend solely on who has the biggest studios or the strongest incentives. It will belong to ecosystems that can mobilise talent, technology, infrastructure, and ideas at a global speed.

At Entertainment Partners, we see this shift every day, through the movement of productions, crews, workflows, finance, compliance and technology across territories. What was once a largely domestic industry has evolved into a sophisticated global supply chain powered equally by creativity and commerce.

And while this evolution brings complexity, it also presents one of the greatest opportunities the screen sector has ever seen. 

Investing in People: The Heart of Production

The globalisation of production is no longer just about where projects shoot. It’s about where talent emerges, where skills evolve, where innovation happens, and ultimately, which markets are prepared to invest in the workforce of the future.

For decades, the conversation around attracting production centred on incentives, locations, and infrastructure. Those things matter enormously, but increasingly, the differentiator is people.

Can the market provide world-class crews? Can it scale quickly? Can it deliver digitally sophisticated workflows? Can it support increasingly complex international financing and compliance requirements? Most importantly, can it attract and retain the next generation of creative and technical talent?

Australia has built a globally respected production ecosystem. Its crews are exceptional, its creative reputation is strong, and its infrastructure continues to mature. But global demand is accelerating faster than traditional workforce models can sustain. 

The next generation of production professionals will look fundamentally different from the one that built the industry over the past 30 years.

Tomorrow’s workforce will still need extraordinary storytellers, craftspeople, and creative leaders. But increasingly, it will also require fluency in virtual production, AI-enabled workflows, cloud collaboration, real-time rendering, sustainability reporting, cybersecurity, cross-border finance, and creator-led production models.

The lines between entertainment, technology, gaming, advertising, sport, and creator-led content are blurring rapidly. Someone joining the industry in 2026 may work across film, television, branded entertainment, gaming, and immersive experiences during a single career, across multiple countries and even with entirely virtual teams. 

With all of these avenues converging, it is clear the workforce of the future will be more fluid, entrepreneurial, technologically enabled and globally connected than any generation before it. 

What the Data Tells Us: Australia's Workforce Gap

A study released in April 2026 by Olsberg•SPI and Screen Australia identified four key challenges constraining Australia’s long-term competitiveness: business scalability, skills shortages, limited career progression, and infrastructure constraints across production, PDV, animation and digital games.

The report recommended four strategic focus areas to sustain long-term growth:

• Targeted workforce training and upskilling
• Stronger education and industry partnerships
• Improved career progression and mentoring pathways
• Increased infrastructure coordination and investment

The findings reinforce a broader global reality: production growth is no longer just about attracting projects. It’s about building sustainable ecosystems that can evolve alongside the industry itself.

Historically, production has relied heavily on informal pathways and “learning by surviving.” While that created resilience, it also limited access for many talented people unable to absorb the instability and lack of visibility that often came with entering the sector.

The next generation expects something different: clearer pathways, more inclusive workplaces, better mental health support, greater flexibility, and opportunities to move across disciplines.

Technology is also reshaping expectations. Increasingly, workers see technology not as a threat, but as an enabler of creativity, mobility, and career sustainability.

EP's Approach: Education, Enablement, and Long-Term Investment

At Entertainment Partners, we work with productions of every size and scale, giving us a unique insight into where pressures are the greatest, and where investment can have the most impact. 

We believe supporting the future workforce requires more than technology alone; it requires long-term investment in education, enablement, and industry development. That’s why EP has developed an Industry Education & Enablement specialism designed to support both Australia’s evolving production landscape and the broader global market.

This includes initiatives such as:

• EP Academy training programs
• Production finance and SmartAccounting education
• Specialist development programs for production companies and teams
• Partnerships with universities and schools such as TAFEs and AFTRS
• 1:1 mentoring and professional development pathways

These programs are designed to help future-proof careers, strengthen production finance capability, and support creative professionals navigating increasingly technology-driven workflows.

We’re already seeing encouraging momentum across the sector. Governments, educators, industry bodies, and businesses are collaborating more intentionally around skills pipelines, regional growth, inclusion initiatives, and digital transformation.

But we are still only at the beginning.

AI and emerging technologies will reshape production operations over the next decade. Not by replacing creativity, but by redefining workflows around it. Scheduling, budgeting, forecasting and production management will increasingly be augmented by intelligent systems.

That means the most valuable people in the future may not simply be those with technical expertise, but those who can combine creativity, adaptability, emotional intelligence, and commercial acumen.

The future production leader may look less like a traditional operator and more like a systems thinker: someone equally comfortable speaking with creatives, technologists, financiers, regulators, and global partners.

While technology will continue transforming how content is produced and distributed, audiences still connect through emotion, culture, and the human experience. The magic still matters.

The opportunity now is to build an industry capable of supporting that magic on a global scale sustainably, inclusively, and intelligently. The next generation of production professionals won’t simply inherit the industry; they’re going to reinvent it. And at EP, we’re excited to help build that future alongside them.

To learn more about our education and training initiatives, explore EP Academy and our suite of industry education programs, or connect directly with our Australia and New Zealand team to discuss how we can support your organisation's goals.