Employers are facing major challenges in closing their skills gaps, diversifying their workforces, and remaining agile in a rapidly changing global economy. As a result, many employers are pursuing skills-based hiring and advancement strategies. They are starting to right-size their requirements by asking for only their most critical specific skills while reducing their use of more indirect indicators of skills such as traditional college degrees and work experience that prevent them from tapping into a broader and more diverse pool of candidates pursuing alternative pathways. They also are exploring new recruitment and hiring practices enabled through advanced data analytics. However there remain many barriers to adoption and scaling. Candidates also are facing major challenges in navigating this dynamic talent marketplace. These challenges can be addressed through a new generation of resumes and learning and employment records (LERs) and new analytics-based guidance services and initiatives, but adoption strategies are needed. This project provides a framework and forum for aligning and scaling innovative employer practices and initiatives with related learner and worker-centered initiatives designed to empower workers that together have the potential to create significant value for both employers and learners/workers.
Skills-Based Hiring and Advancement (SBHA) is the process by which employers and their HR service providers identify, recruit, hire, and advance candidates based on the match between a work opportunity’s skill requirements and a candidate’s skills. SBHA processes produce well-crafted and debiased job requirements and trustworthy candidate information backed by evidence. This candidate information is communicated through new types of resumes and learning and employment records (LERs) that embed proof of their accuracy to accelerate verification. SBHA reduces reliance on indirect indicators of skills (e.g., four-year college degrees, years of experience) that traditionally do not provide evidence of specific skills and can create barriers for candidates qualified through alternative means (e.g. microcredentials, life experiences, and endorsements). Candidates also benefit by using skills-powered guidance services and technologies which recommend opportunities, support decision making, and provide fairer hiring and advancement experiences.
