Focusing on skills taps internal talent
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What do hiring managers prioritize during the recruitment process? If it's not skills, then they may be looking for the wrong qualifications.
Graphic design platform Canva launched its "Skills Passport" initiative last year in a push to identify and nurture key skills like visual communication and leadership in candidates and current employees. Canva has already gotten rid of degree requirements from their job listings, and even hosts high schools workshops, annual internships and graduate programs to nurture talent early on. But after increasing headcount by 300% in just three years, the Skills Passport became vital to ensuring the tech company was investing in talent, says Charlotte Anderson, head of people experience at Canva.
"Building a skills-first organization is helping to identify and fast track talent, upskill our team and support our internal mobility program, Canva Pathways," says Anderson. "[This] ensures fewer skills gaps while creating a really rich pool of global talent to drive our ambitious global expansion plans."
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A great skills source: A young military veteran walks into a job interview for an entry-level management position at his local pharmacy. He presents well, makes good eye contact and answers the interviewer's questions politely. He does not get an offer.
What the interviewer doesn't realize is that he would have been a great fit. The veteran's resume did not include the key words the interviewer was looking for, or portray all of the skills he has. The interviewer also didn't know the right questions to ask to find out more about him.
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This is an all-too-common scenario for veterans transitioning into the civilian workforce, and one that employers can benefit from avoiding with the right awareness.
"There's this myopic view of what we've been prepared for, what we could assume from a responsibility standpoint, what the skill set transfers would be, and so forth," says Jim Rowley, a Marine Corps veteran and CEO of gym franchise Crunch Fitness. "What struck me when I departed the Marine Corps was that the transition was really focused on becoming a highway patrol officer, becoming a local sheriff, working in the prison system, working for the U.S. Postal Service — and I thought, the Marine Corps had to have prepared us for much more than that."
Steering clear of social media mistakes: Landing a job interview is hard enough as it is, and the last thing job seekers need is for an opportunity to be squandered over a mismanaged Facebook wall or X feed.
Fifty-four percent of employers have admitted to eliminating a candidate based on their social media feed alone. But there are a few strategies that applicants can follow to keep their social media presence clean and appealing to potential hiring managers.
"Keeping social media employer-friendly is crucial in today's digital age," says Guy Thornton, founder of cognitive research platform Practice Aptitude Tests. "Often, your online presence can be considered an extension of your professional identity, and employers specifically look for candidates who represent themselves well both online and offline, as their employees are a reflection of their brand."