Management of Material Resources
Cross-functional skill · O*NET work requirement
Obtaining and seeing to the appropriate use of equipment, facilities, and materials needed to do certain work.
In the O*NET occupational database, Management of Material Resources is a skill that work requires. O*NET rates how important it is (1–5) and what level of it a job needs (0–7) for every U.S. occupation. It is rated as important (3 or higher) in 29 of 894 occupations.
Breadth here means how widely O*NET rates this skill as important across occupations — not that it is rare, high-paying, or currently in employer demand.
Occupations that rely most on Management of Material Resources
Ranked by O*NET importance to the occupation (1–5). Bars are sized against the 1–5 scale; the level column is what depth of the skill the job needs (0–7).
How AI is used by roles that need Management of Material Resources
This skill is not itself "being automated" — but we can look at the roles for which O*NET rates it important and ask how those people actually use AI. This rolls the Anthropic Economic Index per-role signal up across those roles (importance-weighted). 65.5% of the 29 roles where this is important carry observed AI-usage data (19 roles).
Across those roles, 40.4% of AI conversations are people working with AI and 34.2% hand a task to AI , with an average autonomy of 3.54 / 5.
| Collaboration pattern | Share | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| directive | 32.8% | AI does it; you give the instruction |
| task iteration | 28.1% | you and AI go back and forth |
| learning | 10.8% | you ask AI to explain or teach |
| validation | 1.5% | you do it; AI checks your work |
| feedback loop | 1.4% | AI does it, then adjusts from your feedback |
Roles behind this signal
The roles where this skill is most important and that also have the most AEI data. "Works with AI" is the role's share of conversations that augment rather than automate.
| Occupation | Importance | Works with AI | Autonomy |
|---|---|---|---|
| Chief Executives | 4.0 | 65.7% | 3.0/5 |
| Education Administrators, Elementary and Secondary School | 3.3 | 56.5% | 4.0/5 |
| Curators | 3.0 | 56.3% | 4.0/5 |
| Medical and Health Services Managers | 3.3 | 49.5% | 4.0/5 |
| Dentists, General | 3.0 | 77.1% | 3.0/5 |
| Purchasing Managers | 3.3 | 38.0% | 3.0/5 |
| Education Administrators, Preschool and Childcare Center/Program | 3.1 | 41.0% | 3.0/5 |
| Construction Managers | 3.4 | 59.7% | 3.0/5 |
| Purchasing Agents, Except Wholesale, Retail, and Farm Products | 3.3 | 30.0% | 3.0/5 |
| General and Operations Managers | 3.1 | 46.8% | 3.5/5 |
| Chefs and Head Cooks | 3.3 | 38.5% | 4.0/5 |
| First-Line Supervisors of Food Preparation and Serving Workers | 3.0 | 50.0% | 4.0/5 |
Source: Anthropic Economic Index (2026-01-15-v4-plus-2025-03-27-v2) over a sample of Claude.ai Free and Pro conversations — not all AI tools and not the whole workforce. Shares are of observed conversations, weighted by how important this skill is to each role; some conversations are left unclassified by Anthropic's taxonomy, so shares need not sum to 100.
Industries that concentrate this
Where Management of Material Resources matters most across the economy. Employment reach is the share of an industry's workers in occupations that significantly rely on Management of Material Resources (O*NET importance ≥ 3 of 5). Concentration compares that reach to the national average industry, so a value above 1× means the requirement is more pervasive here than across the economy as a whole.
Nationally, about 5.0% of workers are in occupations that significantly rely on Management of Material Resources (measured across 67 industries).
Sectors with the most such workers
| Sector | Workers | Employment reach |
|---|---|---|
| Accommodation and Food Services | 1,629,940 | 11.5% |
| Health Care and Social Assistance | 994,470 | 4.3% |
| Construction | 569,900 | 7.0% |
| Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services | 539,230 | 5.0% |
| Retail Trade | 528,470 | 3.4% |
| Educational Services | 496,770 | 3.6% |
| Manufacturing | 346,370 | 2.7% |
| Wholesale Trade | 338,170 | 5.6% |
| Administrative and Support and Waste Management and Remediation Services | 309,740 | 3.4% |
| Other Services (except Public Administration) | 257,110 | 5.8% |
| Finance and Insurance | 252,960 | 4.1% |
| Management of Companies and Enterprises | 218,540 | 7.8% |
Industries where it is most concentrated
| Industry | Level | Concentration | Employment reach |
|---|---|---|---|
| Accommodation and Food Services | Sector | 2.3× | 11.5% |
| Labor Unions and Similar Labor Organizations | National industry | 2.26× | 11.3% |
| Full-Service Restaurants | National industry | 2.02× | 10.1% |
| Management of Companies and Enterprises | Sector | 1.56× | 7.8% |
| Construction | Sector | 1.4× | 7.0% |
| Roofing Contractors | National industry | 1.36× | 6.8% |
| Power and Communication Line and Related Structures Construction | National industry | 1.3× | 6.5% |
| Exterminating and Pest Control Services | National industry | 1.18× | 5.9% |
| Other Services (except Public Administration) | Sector | 1.16× | 5.8% |
| Other Building Equipment Contractors | National industry | 1.16× | 5.8% |
| Wholesale Trade | Sector | 1.12× | 5.6% |
| Arts, Entertainment, and Recreation | Sector | 1.12× | 5.6% |
Reach is a measure of how widespread a requirement is across an industry's workforce, not how intensively any individual uses it. Sector worker counts come from BLS OEWS employment; the significance threshold and tool use come from O*NET. Industries shown by concentration are filtered to a real worker base so a tiny specialty cannot top the list on rounding.
Related skills, knowledge & abilities
Capabilities required by many of the same occupations — a measure of which skills, knowledge and abilities tend to travel together, not a judgment of similarity.
| Capability | Type | Shared occupations |
|---|---|---|
| Management of Financial Resources | Cross-functional skill | 19 |
| Economics and Accounting | Knowledge | 19 |
| Personnel and Human Resources | Knowledge | 22 |
| Management of Personnel Resources | Cross-functional skill | 27 |
| Negotiation | Cross-functional skill | 26 |
| Systems Evaluation | Cross-functional skill | 27 |
| Persuasion | Cross-functional skill | 27 |
| Number Facility | Ability | 18 |
| Learning Strategies | Basic skill | 27 |
| Instructing | Cross-functional skill | 28 |
| Systems Analysis | Cross-functional skill | 26 |
| Sales and Marketing | Knowledge | 9 |
Sources for this page
Every figure above traces to a named public dataset and the exact release below — not hand-written opinion. See the full methodology for what each measure does and does not mean.
- O*NET 30.3 U.S. Department of Labor / National Center for O*NET Development
- BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) May 2024 U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
- Census NAICS 2022 U.S. Census Bureau
- Anthropic Economic Index v4 (2026-01-15) + v2 (2025-03-27) Anthropic
Data compiled June 2, 2026. Figures are estimates, not advice.
Cite this page
Singulariki. "Management of Material Resources." Singulariki: a source-backed encyclopedia of work. Built from O*NET 30.3; BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) May 2024; Census NAICS 2022; Anthropic Economic Index v4 (2026-01-15) + v2 (2025-03-27). Accessed June 7, 2026. https://singulariki.com/skills/management-of-material-resources
Singulariki. (2026). Management of Material Resources. Singulariki: a source-backed encyclopedia of work. Retrieved June 7, 2026, from https://singulariki.com/skills/management-of-material-resources
@misc{singulariki-management-of-material-resources,
title = {Management of Material Resources},
author = {{Singulariki}},
year = {2026},
note = {O*NET 30.3; BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) May 2024; Census NAICS 2022; Anthropic Economic Index v4 (2026-01-15) + v2 (2025-03-27). Accessed June 7, 2026},
url = {https://singulariki.com/skills/management-of-material-resources}
} Citations name the underlying public dataset releases — they reflect what this page is built from, not just the URL.