Core Competence—As a Key Factor for a Sustainable, Innovative and Resilient Development Model Based on Industry 5.0

The main objective of this paper is to highlight the importance of core competences as an important catalyst to enable a sustainable transition of business models to Industry 5.0. According to our research based on a scientific methodology, we illustrated that Industry 4.0 might greatly affect the labor market by introducing ITC, AI, IR and AR that will change many jobs in most areas of activity. One alternative solution to diminish these negative effects is to accommodate and prepare the shift to a more human-centric approach. In order to better implement this alternative solution and to generate mid- to long-run positive effects (from an economic, social and environmental perspective), we consider it is imperative that human resources be prepared to understand and to use new technologies. We have focused our research context on European countries. We found that only a part of the European Union Member Countries benefit from the use of human resources with advanced digital skills. Under these circumstances, we consider that only some countries will be able to face the challenges generated by the transition to Industry 5.0, while others, the emergent countries, such as Romania, will have to intensify the complex process of designing competitive and coherent strategies and implement a more efficient and effective mix of policies. This will help to better capitalize the potential sustainable competitive advantage of industries 4.0 and 5.0.