How Micro-credentials are Meeting the Needs of the Workforce

With all the technological advances in the past few decades, industries are constantly evolving to meet the needs of society, which generates new job opportunities to address those needs; however, it also brings about job displacement for individuals in the workforce who lack the necessary skills for these emerging job prospects. According to the World Economic Forum, 50 percent of the workforce will need to reskill by 2025.

Today, employers find it difficult to recruit and retain employees who have the necessary skills their industry seeks. Brown et al. (2021) state that standard higher education pathways “are being increasingly criticized for their high cost, especially in the United States, lack of alignment with employment needs, and inability to adapt in a timely manner to changing trends.” Pursuing a standard higher education pathway will not address the lack of alignment and gap that exists between employees and employers; in fact, it will widen it since such credentials require a longer time commitment (Brown et al., 2021). By the time a standard higher education degree is earned, the skill may no longer be relevant.

Several employers see micro-credentials as the solution to the rapid change in industries’ demands, allowing their workforce to quickly gain the skills critical to perform their job-related tasks (Orman, Șimșek, & Kozak Çakir, 2023). Due to their design, micro-credentials hold the potential for employees, or workforce learners, to develop career-aligned skills and become lifelong learners.

Designing Micro-credentials for Workforce

Micro-credentials are designed to be affordable, flexible, and personalized for workforce learners. A workforce learner is an employee who strives to obtain skills critical to their success in their career’s industry. With micro-credentials, the employee is able to become competent in a skill or set of skills needed to be successful in their current role or in a future role. In the workplace setting, micro-credentials represent competency-based units of learning aligned to workplace tasks. They archive the learning achievements of workforce learners and encourage them to develop other skills essential to be successful in their industry. The workforce learner is able to learn quickly and implement the new skill or set of skills to remain current in the workplace as opposed to pursuing a degree that will require extensive time and financial commitment.

Micro-credentials personalize learning by highlighting skills that are not represented by a transcript, certificate degree, or diploma. The employee is able to pursue a specific skill or set of skills they need to be successful in their industry but did not acquire via the completion of a standard higher education pathway.

Moreover, micro-credentials provide visibility into the knowledge and skills held by the employee. The micro-credential assessment requires the employee to implement the new skill or set of skills in an authentic workplace setting and demonstrate evidence of this implementation. For example, earning the Social Media Marketing Micro-credential requires the employee to gather information about their employer and “distill it into the essential elements needed for social media marketing platforms such as Facebook and Instagram.” The employee is able to share this evidence of skill implementation with their current or prospective employer, allowing the employer to validate the understanding. Clicking on the micro-credential digital badge “enables any employer to independently verify, in more detail, the individual’s skills” (Bell, N., Liu, M., & Murphy, D., 2022, p.37).

Just as employers are looking for quick ways to train their workforce to increase productivity, workforce learners are looking for quick ways to reskill and upskill (Gauthier, 2020). Micro-credentials help both the employee and the employer; employees compete for job opportunities just like employers compete for employees. “Micro-credentials expand the competitiveness and capacities of both groups by providing opportunities for employees in both recruitment and professional development processes” (Orman, Șimșek, & Kozak Çakir, 2023, p. 12).

Impact on Workforce

The employer is able to provide intentional learning opportunities to its employees by offering micro-credentials as professional development. In-house micro-credentials developed by employers train new employees or retrain current employees (Bell, N., Liu, M., & Murphy, D., 2022). Some other employers request their employees obtain specific micro-credentials from educational institutions or subject matter expert organizations. Regardless of which avenue an employer takes, the micro-credential option provides them with a fast avenue to improve or increase the skill set of their employees.

“As the skill demands continue to change, people will continually need to re-train, reskill or redeploy to avoid redundancy and social and economic displacement in their local communities” (Brown et. al., 2021, p. 234).

Workforce learners need affordable, flexible, and personalized lifelong and life-wide learning that provides them with the skills necessary to adapt to an ever-evolving society.

This blog is part of a yearlong series exploring how to design micro-credentials for equity and inclusion. If you are interested in learning more about micro-credentials, check out our current offerings on the Micro-credential Platform or visit our website to learn more about our services.