9. CreatExchangeNewIdeas
Pearson GlobalLearner and EmployerResearch
Learner views toward degrees and lifelong learning
Employer views around needed skills and alternative credentials
How employers should think about up-skilling/re-skilling
Leah Jewell
Managing Director, Pearson
Employability Solutions
@LeahJewell1
9
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16. A lack of candidates with needed hard skills
A lack of candidates with needed
qualifications/certifications
A lack of candidates with required years of
experience
A lack of candidates with needed soft skills
Difficulty competing with benefits packages
Difficulty attracting candidates to the industry
Hiring for diversity
A lack of candidates with the needed
schooling
Low unemployment/competition for jobs
Government regulations
Company not perceived as leading or
cutting-edge
Hiring Challenges: Finding Hard Skills Is Top Challenge
16
• Other challenges include finding those with needed qualifications and certifications or years experience.
• Employers in Brazil, China, and India are more concerned about soft skills than those in other countries.
Denotes top three challenges/country
Which of the following makes hiring for your company difficult today?
Base: Total
Australia Brazil Canada China India UK US
41% 50% 34% 47% 51% 44% 41%
30% 46% 36% 31% 37% 31% 36%
33% 31% 26% 47% 40% 37% 31%
28% 36% 27% 36% 38% 27% 26%
24% 15% 22% 31% 35% 29% 24%
22% 15% 30% 28% 24% 27% 23%
21% 14% 17% 29% 26% 19% 18%
13% 27% 17% 27% 18% 19% 15%
8% 10% 19% 12% 18% 13% 19%
13% 17% 10% 10% 19% 13% 11%
9% 6% 12% 16% 17% 12% 11%
17. 17
Skills Training: Soft Skills Training Is Priority
• Employers are also interested in offering training for these soft skills; Project Management is the only hard skill in the top
tier.
Hard skills Soft skills
Interest in offering training/courses (top 2 box)
Base: Total
19. 19
Non-degree Credentials: Employer Openness to Alternative Credentials
• 42% of employers actively exploring or already hiring on non-degree credentials in the US
Base: Not currently using formal assessment tool; Note that due to rounding percentages may not add to 100
Which of the following best describes your hiring of employees with only non-degree credentials?
Have always hired
only non-degree
credentials
Considering,
actively exploring,
or started hiring
only non-degree
credentials
Don’t today and not
likely to in the near
future
20. 20
Non-degree Credentials: Employer Openness Spans Industries
• This openness to non-degree credentials is consistent across industries, with the exception of a few (e.g. Retail) who are
more likely to have always hired such credentials.
• Health care and Professional service employers are more likely not to hire today or in the future
Base: Not currently using formal assessment tool; Note that due to rounding percentages may not add to 100
Have always hired
only non-degree
credentials
Considering,
actively exploring,
or started hiring
only non-degree
credentials
Don’t today and not
likely to in the near
future
Which of the following best describes your hiring of employees with only non-degree credentials?
21. Despite this openness, employers
aren’t necessarily equipped to
evaluate non-degree credentials and
often default to traditional
credentials like Bachelor’s Degrees.
22. How Can Employers
Think About Skills
and Credentials?
• Map job descriptions to
skills/capabilities
• Inform, Create, Endorse, Validate skill
based learning/assessment and digital
credentials
• Open hiring practices to account for
validated digital credentials
22
