INSEAD published this week the eleventh edition of its “Global Talent Competitiveness Index 2025: Talent and Resilience: Navigating an Era of Disruption” report. INSEAD noted that this edition of the report was co-produced for the first time with Portulans Institute, which according to the report adds value from the expertise of Portulans Institute in digital transformation, innovation metrics and global indices that complement the leadership of INSEAD in the talent and human capital space. The report stated that although the GTCI’s foundations remain strong, the global context has changed due to the geopolitical tensions, climate risks, and the quick development in Artificial Intelligence (AI) that transformed talent into a pillar of the resilience & transformation of societies. According to the report, the geopolitical uncertainty presents substantial challenges to the resilience of global commerce and markets while AI presents opportunities to improve the potential of humans on the one hand yet it comes with “unfathomable” risks on the other. The GTCI is prepared as an Input-Output model that combines an analysis of what countries do to produce and acquire talent (input) along with an evaluation of the resulting skills and competencies available (output). The report noted that the Input-Output model of the index comprises six pillars that define a nation’s talent competitiveness in addition to its ability to attract, grow, and retain human capital, in order to convert these efforts into talent outcomes that can be measured. More specifically, the Input sub-index is composed of four pillars (Enable, Attract, Grow, and Retain) that are responsible for capturing the institutional, regulatory, and policy determinants of the national talent ecosystems, while the two pillars of the Output sub-index (Vocational and Technical Skills (VT Skills), and Generalist Adaptive Skills (GA Skills)) reflect the outcomes of the aforementioned inputs regarding skills availability and their impact on productivity and innovation.

The INSEAD 2025 GTCI report is made up of 77 indicators and covers 135 countries, which together represent more than 97% of global GDP and 93% of the world’s population. In detail, and on a global level, Singapore came in first in the world in the 2025 GTCI with  a score of 73.29, followed by Switzerland (score: 73.14), Denmark (score: 72.05), Finland (score: 71.06) and Sweden (score: 70.76) among others. On a regional basis, the United Arab Emirates came first in the GTCI 2025 rankings of Arab countries with a score of 59.36 (global rank: 25), followed by Qatar (score: 53.87; global rank: 35), Bahrain (score: 52.71; global rank: 38), and Saudi Arabia (score: 50.06; global rank: 48), only to name a few. Lebanon scored 41.42 in the GTCI 2025, placing it in the 8^th position among its Arab peers and 78^th in the world. In detail, Lebanon ranked 83^rd globally in the Input Sub-Index and 72^nd in the Output Sub-Index. On the Input Sub-Index front, Lebanon ranked 70^th in the world in the talent enabling pillar (score: 48.16), 54^th in the talent attraction pillar (score: 54.44), 62^nd in the talent growth pillar (score: 37.49), and 105^th in the talent retention pillar (score: 36.94). With respect to the Output Sub-Index, Lebanon positioned 93^rd in the “Vocational and Technical Skills” criterion (score: 41.59) and 45^th in the “Generalist Adaptive Skills” criterion (score: 29.92). Lebanon’s best performance on the “Enable” front was in the field of Enterprise Software (score: 100; global rank: 1), on the “Attract” front in the field of Financial Globalization (score: 83.62; global rank: 21), on the “Grow” front in the field of Use of Virtual Networks (score: 68.24; global rank: 62), on the “Retain” front in the field of Sanitation (score: 99.08; global rank: 28), on the “Vocational & Technical Skills” front in the field of Ease of Finding Skilled Employees (score: 73.66; global rank: 5), and on the “Generalist Adaptive Skills” front in the field of Mobile Apps Development (score: 72.70; global rank: 27).