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Speaking

Basic skill · O*NET work requirement

Talking to others to convey information effectively.

In the O*NET occupational database, Speaking 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 801 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 Speaking

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).

Occupation Importance Score Level
Anthropology and Archeology Teachers, Postsecondary 4.9 4.9
Education Administrators, Kindergarten through Secondary 4.9 4.8
Atmospheric, Earth, Marine, and Space Sciences Teachers, Postsecondary 4.8 4.8
Broadcast Announcers and Radio Disc Jockeys 4.8 4.1
Clergy 4.8 4.8
Criminal Justice and Law Enforcement Teachers, Postsecondary 4.8 4.9
Art, Drama, and Music Teachers, Postsecondary 4.6 4.8
Education Teachers, Postsecondary 4.6 4.9
Law Teachers, Postsecondary 4.6 5.0
Lawyers 4.6 4.9
Political Science Teachers, Postsecondary 4.6 5.0
Social Work Teachers, Postsecondary 4.6 4.9
Sociology Teachers, Postsecondary 4.6 4.8
Child, Family, and School Social Workers 4.5 4.1
History Teachers, Postsecondary 4.5 4.8
Coaches and Scouts 4.4 4.0
Training and Development Specialists 4.4 4.3
Air Traffic Controllers 4.3 3.9
Anthropologists and Archeologists 4.3 4.8
Biological Science Teachers, Postsecondary 4.3 4.8
Business Teachers, Postsecondary 4.3 4.9
Chief Executives 4.3 4.8
Detectives and Criminal Investigators 4.3 4.1
Eligibility Interviewers, Government Programs 4.3 4.3
Emergency Medicine Physicians 4.3 4.3
Human Resources Managers 4.3 4.1
Labor Relations Specialists 4.3 4.8
Marriage and Family Therapists 4.3 4.3
Media Programming Directors 4.3 4.0
Mental Health Counselors 4.3 4.3
Neuropsychologists 4.3 4.8
Pediatricians, General 4.3 4.1
Preventive Medicine Physicians 4.3 4.9
Psychiatrists 4.3 4.4
Radiologists 4.3 4.3
Sales Representatives, Wholesale and Manufacturing, Technical and Scientific Products 4.3 4.0
School Psychologists 4.3 4.3
Special Education Teachers, Elementary School 4.3 3.9
Substance Abuse and Behavioral Disorder Counselors 4.3 4.3
Survey Researchers 4.3 4.3

Showing the top 40 of 801 occupations where this is important.

How AI is used by roles that need Speaking

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). 61.5% of the 801 roles where this is important carry observed AI-usage data (493 roles).

Across those roles, 46.6% of AI conversations are people working with AI and 31.8% hand a task to AI , with an average autonomy of 3.57 / 5.

Collaboration pattern Share What it means
directive 29.6% AI does it; you give the instruction
task iteration 24.4% you and AI go back and forth
learning 19.3% you ask AI to explain or teach
validation 2.9% you do it; AI checks your work
feedback loop 2.2% 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
English Language and Literature Teachers, Postsecondary 4.1 63.2% 4.0/5
Biological Science Teachers, Postsecondary 4.3 63.2% 4.0/5
Foreign Language and Literature Teachers, Postsecondary 4.1 65.2% 3.0/5
Editors 3.8 68.2% 4.0/5
Poets, Lyricists and Creative Writers 3.9 46.2% 4.0/5
Social Work Teachers, Postsecondary 4.6 67.2% 3.5/5
Educational, Guidance, School, and Vocational Counselors 4.1 70.6% 4.0/5
Education Teachers, Postsecondary 4.6 65.3% 3.5/5
Criminal Justice and Law Enforcement Teachers, Postsecondary 4.8 65.7% 3.3/5
Atmospheric, Earth, Marine, and Space Sciences Teachers, Postsecondary 4.8 66.3% 4.0/5
Recreation and Fitness Studies Teachers, Postsecondary 4.1 66.2% 3.3/5
Political Science Teachers, Postsecondary 4.6 65.7% 3.3/5

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 Speaking matters most across the economy. Employment reach is the share of an industry's workers in occupations that significantly rely on Speaking (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 79.3% of workers are in occupations that significantly rely on Speaking (measured across 67 industries).

Sectors with the most such workers

Sector Workers Employment reach
Health Care and Social Assistance 17,288,720 74.8%
Retail Trade 12,393,990 79.5%
Accommodation and Food Services 11,534,580 81.0%
Educational Services 11,410,580 83.6%
Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services 9,774,910 90.8%
Manufacturing 8,575,140 67.2%
Construction 6,704,230 82.5%
Administrative and Support and Waste Management and Remediation Services 6,416,850 71.0%
Finance and Insurance 5,879,800 94.4%
Transportation and Warehousing 4,992,430 67.5%
Wholesale Trade 4,660,220 77.2%
Other Services (except Public Administration) 3,599,170 81.3%

Industries where it is most concentrated

Industry Level Concentration Employment reach
Offices of Chiropractors National industry 1.26× 99.7%
Insurance Agencies and Brokerages National industry 1.24× 98.2%
Offices of Optometrists National industry 1.23× 97.7%
Labor Unions and Similar Labor Organizations National industry 1.23× 97.8%
Pharmacies and Drug Retailers National industry 1.21× 96.3%
Offices of Physical, Occupational and Speech Therapists, and Audiologists National industry 1.21× 96.2%
Radio Broadcasting Stations National industry 1.21× 96.0%
Newspaper Publishers National industry 1.2× 94.8%
Television Broadcasting Stations National industry 1.2× 95.5%
Finance and Insurance Sector 1.19× 94.4%
Direct Health and Medical Insurance Carriers National industry 1.19× 94.3%
Nuclear Electric Power Generation National industry 1.19× 94.2%

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.

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
Speech Clarity Ability 765
Oral Expression Ability 791
Active Listening Basic skill 780
Speech Recognition Ability 765
Critical Thinking Basic skill 760
Oral Comprehension Ability 792
Problem Sensitivity Ability 782
Near Vision Ability 796
Information Ordering Ability 767
Deductive Reasoning Ability 753
Written Comprehension Ability 726
Reading Comprehension Basic skill 709

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.

Data compiled June 2, 2026. Figures are estimates, not advice.

Cite this page
Plain

Singulariki. "Speaking." 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/speaking

APA

Singulariki. (2026). Speaking. Singulariki: a source-backed encyclopedia of work. Retrieved June 7, 2026, from https://singulariki.com/skills/speaking

BibTeX
@misc{singulariki-speaking,
  title  = {Speaking},
  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/speaking}
}

Citations name the underlying public dataset releases — they reflect what this page is built from, not just the URL.