Skills-Based Hiring: What’s Changing and What Needs to Change

Some employers are starting to rethink how they recruit and hire job candidates.

Skills-based hiring is an approach that evaluates an applicant’s skills rather than their previous job titles or work history. Emerging technologies like digital credentials and learning and employment records (LERs) could help job seekers showcase their abilities in a clear, verifiable way while giving employers a way to look beyond degrees and job titles when evaluating candidates.

But for now, these tools remain largely unused.

Most companies still rely on degree requirements and past job experience when making hiring decisions. While many digital credentials exist (over 1 million!), there is no widely accepted system for comparing them or determining their reliability. At the same time, many job seekers are unfamiliar with how to earn, use, or present digital credentials in a way that strengthens applications.?

Although the concept of skills-based hiring is gaining traction, it remains far from being a widespread practice

How Could Skills-Based Hiring Help?

If these tools were widely adopted, they could give more people a way to show what they know—especially those who learned skills outside of a traditional classroom. Workers with experience from apprenticeships, military service, or self-directed learning could have a clearer way to demonstrate their skills.

Employers might also benefit. Digital credentials could provide a way to verify skills rather than relying on resumes that only give a broad summary of experience. In theory, this could make hiring more efficient by helping employers match candidates to jobs based on what they can actually do.

Barriers to Adoption

Despite the potential, skills-based hiring has seen barriers to adoption. Employers are unfamiliar with digital credentials and don’t know how to evaluate them. With over a million credentials available, there is no clear standard for which ones are useful. Most hiring processes are still designed around degrees and job titles, making it difficult to integrate new tools.

Job seekers also face challenges. Digital credentials are not widely recognized, so some candidates don’t see the value in earning them. Even when they do, they lack guidance on which credentials are credible, how to earn them, and how to present them to employers in the hiring process.

What We’re Studying in 2025

At SkillRise, we are working with training partners around the country to better understand how job seekers interact with digital credentials, digital wallets, and other skills-based hiring tools. We want to know whether these tools actually help in job searches, how they influence confidence in career navigation, and what obstacles prevent people from using them effectively.

The goal is not to promote these tools but to understand their impact. Do they make hiring more effective? Are they useful for job seekers? What would need to change for employers to take them seriously? We’ll be sharing insights as we go.?

If you work with job seekers, are they asking about digital credentials? Do they know how to use them in a job search? We’re curious to hear what you’ve seen—are people engaging with these tools, or do they still feel like an unfamiliar concept? Share your experience in the comments!