Through the new skills-based hiring program, called Skills Path, hiring managers at participating companies, such as Microsoft, BlackRock and Ralph Lauren, will identify the core skills candidates must possess to perform specific roles. Free LinkedIn Learning Courses will be curated around these core skills and offered to job seekers. When applying for jobs at these employers on LinkedIn, candidates will be asked to demonstrate their skills in a multiple-choice LinkedIn Skill Assessment, as well as in a video or written test. Those who pass earn interviews with company recruiters.
“I do think there are barriers for people to get their first shot at something. A lot of jobs will say you need two years of experience or four years of experience,” says Hari Srinivasan, LinkedIn’s vice president of product. “This will let you get your foot in their door and prove some new skills along the way.”
Pilot program participants—including Citrix, Gap Inc., GitHub, Gusto, Prologis, TaskRabbit, Wayfair and LinkedIn—are looking to hire for a variety of positions, among them customer service, sales development, data analyst, product manager, project manager, recruiting coordinator and supply chain coordinator roles.
Wayfair, which plans to use Skills Path to source candidates for recruiter roles, is searching for talent with strong communication and analytical skills, as well as resilience, says Ryan Gilchrist, Wayfair's global head of talent acquisition. He says the online furniture retailer will ask candidates to share their professional experiences, like a time when they failed to achieve a goal and how they handled the situation, or a time when they tried something new and what they learned.
Srinivasan says LinkedIn tested the first iteration of Skills Path last year when, trying to fill a customer service role in its office in Omaha, Nebraska, it removed traditional requirements, such as a bachelor’s degree or one to two years of prior experience, from the job posting. “We were blown away by the results,” he says. “Not only were we getting candidates with a completely different set of experience than we had before, but our hiring efficiency improved.”
The first roles Gap will hire for on LinkedIn’s Skills Path pilot will include an inventory planning analyst with Banana Republic. Candidates will be assessed on analytical skills, excel, communication and problem solving, says Meghan Kelly, Gap global head of talent acquisition.
Courtesy of LinkedInThe product announcement is part of LinkedIn’s global skills initiative with Microsoft, which acquired the professional social network in 2016. Last summer, the two companies made a commitment to offering workers access to free educational resources and employers access to pre-qualified candidates, with a goal of helping 250,000 companies make a skills-based hire this year.