NextGen Workforce Pathways Edition# 4 -The Intersection of artificial intelligence, education, and career development.

In this edition, I explore the transformative intersection of artificial intelligence, education, and career development that's reshaping how organizations hire talent and how individuals navigate their professional journeys. As technology continues to evolve at an unprecedented pace, we're witnessing a fundamental shift in hiring practices, educational credentials, and career exploration tools. From relationship-based hiring powered by AI to the rise of micro-credentials in higher education, these innovations are creating new pathways for both employers and job seekers. This newsletter highlights cutting-edge approaches and practical frameworks to help you stay ahead of these trends, whether you're looking to optimize your organization's talent acquisition strategy, enhance your educational offerings, or navigate your own career transitions in an increasingly dynamic job market.

Artificial intelligence and strategic hiring

Using AI to Create Win-Win Hiring: Beyond Efficiency to Relationship-Building

Lou Adler

Lou Adler, CEO of Performance-based Hiring Learning Systems, argues that most companies are missing AI's transformative potential in talent acquisition. While many organizations use AI simply to accelerate transactional hiring processes, Adler suggests a more strategic approach: leveraging AI to create a high-touch, relationship-based hiring model focused on connecting candidates with meaningful career growth opportunities.

The Financial Case for Relationship-Based Hiring

Research shows that high-touch, relationship-based hiring outperforms transactional approaches by 3-5X on key profitability measures:

• Candidates from relationship-based channels (internal transfers, referrals, executive search) demonstrate 30-40% faster productivity ramp-up
• These hires show significantly higher engagement scores
• They maintain substantially lower turnover rates
• They ultimately deliver greater performance impact

Moving Beyond Efficiency

While many HR leaders view AI primarily as a tool for efficiency—screening resumes faster or automating interview scheduling—this represents a tactical rather than strategic use of the technology.

The real competitive advantage comes from using AI to create a hiring process that feels personal and connected to candidates' career aspirations. This approach transforms talent acquisition from a cost center to a strategic asset that consistently attracts exceptional talent.

Performance-based Hiring as a Framework

Adler recommends Performance-based Hiring as the ideal framework for implementing high-touch hiring at scale. Unlike traditional methods designed to process mass quantities of candidates, this approach was developed by benchmarking how top talent actually wants to be hired.

Three key implementation steps:

1. Replace generic job descriptions with compelling career-focused ads highlighting specific challenges and growth opportunities
2. Reduce application overhead by rerouting strong candidates to streamlined career sites
3. Transform the application process to emphasize accomplishments over skills, using AI to screen for the "Achiever Pattern"

The True Value Proposition

The most successful organizations understand that hiring isn't just about filling positions—it's about building relationships that lead to mutual growth. AI's true value lies not in marginally improving transactional hiring but in creating a hiring experience where people feel genuinely connected and aligned with meaningful opportunities.

Higher Education Transformation

Micro-Credentials Are Transforming Higher Education: New Global Survey Results

Coursera's new Micro-Credentials Impact Report 2024, surveying 1,000+ higher education leaders across 850+ institutions in 89 countries demonstrates Universities are embracing micro-credentials at unprecedented rates.

? 94% of higher education leaders believe micro-credentials strengthen students' career outcomes

? 51% of institutions already offer micro-credentials, with 53% of those providing academic credit

? 68% of universities not yet offering micro-credentials plan to adopt them within five years

The benefits are compelling:

• Higher student satisfaction and engagement (87%)
• Increased enrollment in programs offering micro-credentials for credit (75%)
• Improved student retention (80%)
• More job-ready graduates (87%)
• Better alignment with employer needs (93%)

While challenges remain around awareness, curriculum integration, resources, and faculty buy-in, the momentum is clear. Since launching Career Academy across the University of Texas System, 10,000+ students have enrolled in Professional Certificates from companies like Google, IBM, and Microsoft. As higher education continues to evolve, micro-credentials are clearly becoming an essential component of a modern ?learning ecosystem that prepares students for today's dynamic job market.

Internship adaptation and innovation

There are not enough internships for students. That was the reality for nearly 4.6 million college students last year.

Employers face the following in providing internships: - Economic uncertainty, - Operational challenges, and - Difficulty designing quality internships.

Universities and career services office can do the following: 1?. Partner with businesses and organizations to build pipelines - Identify high-interest occupations. - Create opportunities with relevant employers. - Facilitate meaningful student-employer connections. 2?. Streamline internship processes - Simplify complex federal and institutional policies. - Collaborate with your advisory board to refine strategies. - Support nonprofits and companies in developing internships. 3?. Increase student competitiveness - Convert on-campus jobs to internships. - Increase and promote early experiential learning. - Build tailored programs. Internships are crucial for career readiness. Strengthening these relationships benefits your students and partner organizations.

Content provided Rebekah Pare

Work-based learning

Redefining Work-Based Learning: More Than Just Workplace Pedagogy

Jeremy McQuigge, C.Mgr.

Jeremy’s perspectives and research that workplace learning is a comprehensive system of learning that occurs through work.

What WBL truly is:

• A learning system that develops through active participation in purposeful activities
• Applicable across diverse settings: jobs, family roles, community projects, and civic engagements
• A continuous process embedding skill development in real-world experience and reflection
• A transdisciplinary model extending beyond formal education

Why WBL isn't just pedagogy:

• It's a holistic learning system, not merely a teaching method
• It's driven by context rather than instructional design
• It encompasses both formal structures (apprenticeships) and informal learning
• It represents situated learning within communities of practice

The limited view of WBL as workplace pedagogy restricts its potential as a universally accessible global learning system. By broadening our understanding, educators, employers, and policymakers can better integrate this powerful approach into learning and workforce development strategies.

To learn more about work-based learning and the indexing and standards work, follow the Council Advancing Work-based Learning (CAWBL).

Career development and job search tools

Google Career Dreamer

Google is offering grow.google/careerdreamer?to support career exploration for users

The?World Economic Forum reports?that workers typically hold an average of 12 different jobs throughout their lifetime, with Gen Z expected to hold?18 jobs across 6 different careers.

And the less traditional career path is, the harder it can be to frame previous experiences into one cohesive narrative, or to understand what careers align with an individual’s skills and strengths. However, understanding the skills a person already possess and learning how to articulate them effectively is incredibly valuable. According to Google, this tool can help job candidates showcase their relevant experience to employers and open doors to fulfilling new roles. Career Dreamer uses AI to find patterns and connect the dots between your unique experiences, educational background, skills and interests. Think of it like a helping hand to bridge where you’ve been and imagine where you could go next.

It can assist the user to identify skills and talents and how to talk about them and connects the user? with careers (based on job market data from Lightcast and the Bureau of Labor Statistics) that might be a good fit. It can even help the user discover training resources like?Google Career Certificates?and?Google Cloud Skills Boost.

With Career Dreamer, a user could:

• Shape a professional story.?Craft a Career Identity Statement that showcases the value the user bring to the workforce, which you can add to their resume or professional profile and use as talking points during an interview.

• Explore career possibilities.?Uncover a variety of careers that might align with the user unique background, delve deeper into those that interest the user, and find relevant jobs near the user.

• Take the next step.?Collaborate with Gemini, your AI assistant from Google, to start drafting a cover letter, refine a resume, spark new ideas for potential careers, and more.

You can learn more or get started at?grow.google/careerdreamer.

Theoretical framework to support the job search

The Jobs to Be Done (JTBD) theory is a powerful framework for understanding customer motivation that can be equally valuable when applied to career development. Let me break this down for you:

Jobs to Be Done Theory: Core Concepts

JTBD theory, popularized by Clayton Christensen, focuses on understanding the underlying reasons or "jobs" customers "hire" products or services to accomplish. The central idea is that people don't simply buy products; they "hire" them to help them make progress in particular circumstances.

Key principles include:

• People "hire" products/services to solve specific problems or achieve progress
• Understanding the job is more important than customer demographics
• Emotional and social dimensions often drive decisions alongside functional needs
• True competition isn't just similar products but anything that could be "hired" for the same job

Applying JTBD to Career Development - When applying this framework to career development, it transforms how we think about careers:

1. Understand Your Core "Jobs"

Rather than focusing solely on job titles or industry, identify what progress you're trying to make in your life and career:

• Are you "hiring" a career to provide financial security?
• To create social status or recognition?
• To provide intellectual stimulation?
• To allow for work-life balance or flexibility?
• To create meaningful impact?

2. Recognize Career Competition

Just as products compete against surprising alternatives, careers compete against various options that fulfill the same jobs:

• Entrepreneurship might compete with executive roles if the job is "give me autonomy"
• A lower-paying nonprofit role might compete with a corporate job if the job is "make me feel my work matters"

3. Identify Progress-Blocking Forces

JTBD recognizes four forces that influence decisions:

• Push: Dissatisfaction with current situation
• Pull: Attraction of a new option
• Anxiety: Concerns about the new option
• Habit: Comfort with current situation

For career changes, understanding these forces helps navigate transitions: What's pushing you from your current role? What's pulling you toward a new one? What anxieties are holding you back? What habits make change difficult?

4. Design Career Experiments

Rather than making dramatic shifts, JTBD encourages you to test hypotheses about what will satisfy your job to be done:

• Volunteer projects
• Side gigs
• Informational interviews
• Job shadowing

5. Frame Your Value Proposition

When interviewing or networking, articulate how you can help employers with their jobs to be done:

• What progress are they trying to make?
• How can your unique skills help them make that progress?
• What evidence can you provide to help others make similar progress?

Practical Application Example

Consider someone feeling stuck in accounting who believes they want to shift to marketing:

Traditional approach: Focus on getting marketing credentials and applying for marketing jobs.

JTBD approach: Dig deeper to understand the actual job to be done.

• What progress are they seeking? Perhaps it's "more creativity" or "more visible impact."
• This might lead to discovering that the true job could be satisfied by: Taking on more analytical marketing projects while staying in accounting Moving to a product development role Staying in accounting but at a creative company or startup

By focusing on the underlying job to be done rather than the surface-level solution, they might find more satisfying paths forward.

JTBD theory ultimately helps reframe career development from "what job should I get next?" to "what progress am I trying to make in my life, and what career path will help me achieve that progress?" This perspective leads to more meaningful and sustainable career decisions.