A study was conducted to determine the list of highly demanded competencies in the metallurgical and machine-building industries of the Ural Federal District. The article provides a detailed description of the research methodology, which included both conducting surveys of employees of enterprises in the metallurgical and machine-building sectors, and interviewing experts according to a specially developed scheme for constructing questions. The list of highly demanded competencies is revealed, and it is also shown that the existing approaches of classical engineering education need to be reconfigured to actively modernize and new production technologies that require not only possession of a fundamental subject base, but also communication skills of project work in teams and the digital environment. Special emphasis is placed on interdisciplinary knowledge, which largely determines the possibilities of personal growth in a multivariate environment of engineering solutions. The role of classical engineering education is assessed and two approaches are proposed to improve the level of competence of employees of enterprises in the metallurgical and machine-building industries of the Ural Federal District: the first is through the targeted development of additional professional education programs in narrow issues of engineering solutions, the second - by redesigning traditional bachelor’s and master’s degree programs that already contain design workshops that need to reorganize the institute of student practice, as well as introducing disciplines that develop the digital competencies of future engineers.