Micro Credentials Part 3 - Opportunities, Benefits and Challenges

 Opportunities for growth

Traditional education models such as diplomas and degrees earned at Universities and Tertiary Institutions will remain relevant and current for the foreseeable future, "however, as concerns grow about workforce shortages, greater needs for diversity in the workforce and more accessible pathways for nontraditional learners, microcredentials may be a solution whose time has come." (Jones-Schenk, 2018) Whilst micro credentials are still a fairly new pedagogy, there are many universities offering them as viable courses, this is evident if a quick internet search is done for Universities that offer micro credentials. Australian Universities have been a bit slower to uptake this pedagogy with the Australian Government only recently allocating A$24.5 million for tertiary education providers to create mini-courses, they have also allocated A$8 million for Australian Industry to develop micro-credentials (Ross, J. 2021).

Employers agree that a combination of a degree and micro-credentials are what is needed when hiring new employees, a degree provides a certification in a given field and a micro-credential is proof of a possessed skill or competency that is required. The advances in technology and the labour market means employees need to be able to develop skills quickly, a buzz word that has cropped up recently is "just-in-time" learning which refers to this need (Andersen et al, 2021). Employees need to keep their skills relevant and employers need to ensure that they are putting the framework in place to enable their workers to gain the relevant skills rapidly.

How can micro credentials fill this gap?

According to the LinkedIn Workplace Learning Report 2021 one of the top priorities of L&D (Learning & Development) professionals globally is upskilling and reskilling the workforce. They also found that 76% of Gen Z learners believe learning is the key to a successful career (LinkedIn 2021).

Source: https://learning.linkedin.com/content/dam/me/business/en-us/amp/learning-solutions/images/wlr21/pdf/LinkedIn-Learning_Workplace-Learning-Report-2021-EN-1.pdf

Thanks to the pandemic, hybrid workplaces (organisations with some employees working remotely and some in the office) are here to stay, this also means that blended online learning (virtual instructor led and online learning) will remain as the dominant form of learning in the workforce. Some of the ways that L&D professionals are taking advantage of the above information is to create career pathways with course recommendations and skills needed. Internal mobility is also a growing priority that requires career pathways and upskilling to support movement within a company and to retain talent. (LinkedIn Workplace Learning Report, 2021).

LinkedIn acquired the learning platform Lynda in 2015 (techcrunch.com) and then changed the name to LinkedIn Learning, it offers thousands of professional online short courses that cater for a range of different needs. 

LinkedIn Learning was used in a recent case study by Santa Barbara City College in 2019 where it was identified that candidates for jobs are missing business-critical soft skills that are not always taught in school. Their Career Skills Institute built out more than 40 short courses that used content available on Lynda.com (now LinkedIn Learning), the students then used the skills learnt through Lynda.com to work through real-world workplace challenges and further develop their abilities. The Career Institute then provided students with a digital badge, that they could share anywhere online such as LinkedIn or in their email signature. Employers can click on the badge to view the course context, related skills and the verification. The college issued 72 badges to 35 students in the first 2 semesters (Santa Barbara City College, 2019) 

It appears that LinkedIn is at the forefront of filling this gap for employers, they recently introduced the Learning Hub for workplaces to use to upskill their employees, the video below gives a brief introduction to LinkedIn Learning Hub. 

Source: https://www.linkedin.com/products/linkedin-learning-hub/

The suite of learning options offered by LinkedIn is growing, from personal, to students, to workplace learning. Any course successfully completed on LinkedIn earns you a certificate, which can be showcased on your LinkedIn Profile, downloaded as PDF or shared as an image online to demonstrate skills learnt. Whilst LinkedIn are not calling these courses micro credentials, they do seem to cover all of the requirements of a micro credential (flexible, portable, time and cost effective) they even offer a downloadable image (or badge) of the skill acquired.

Source: https://www.linkedin.com/learning/excel-tips-and-tricks

These types of certificates are becoming sought after by talent acquisition consultants as they offer an easy way to ascertain the skills that a candidate holds and has competency in, "These mini qualifications and learning experiences are becoming the forefront of professional skill sets, with 95% of human resource managers actively seeking micro-credentials from potential candidates" (Blazevic, 2020).

While employers and their workers are easily able to take up these courses and use them as proof of skills learned, it is a different story in universities. We will now look at some of the challenges faced by traditional learning institutions.

What are the challenges 

and how can we overcome them?

"While a growing number of higher education institutions, including those involved in the Erasmus+ European Universities initiative, are already working on the development of these microcredentials, a common definition and a common approach on their validation and recognition is lacking" (Andersen et al, 2019)

This lack of consistency and quality assurance is creating a challenge for traditional learning institutions; traditionally certificates, diplomas and degrees are upheld by strict regulatory and assurance requirements which ensures that the certifications are consistent and recognised nationally. Micro-credentials also need to go through this process, but with so many different platforms (such as LinkedIn), workplace Learning Management Systems and training providers rushing to implement them, the consistency needed for credentials to be transportable between jobs and across borders is missing.

So what is the solution? According to Prof Beverley Oliver of Deaking University if a micro credential earns admission or credit towards a formal qualification then further clarification is required and her proposed clarifying statement includes the following points:

• assessment must occur, and is aligned to the target qualification level
• credit or admission may be earned to more than one qualification 
• the offer of credit or admission does not depend on its being used in the future
• standards practices, including duration and effort, mirror or contribute to the standards in the target qualification(s).

She goes on to say that in contrast to the above, non credit-bearing micro credentials are assessed but do not earn any credit towards a formal qualification and so there must be a comparison between the types of credential being earned. Are they credit-bearing or non credit-bearing? (Oliver, 2019)

Source: https://dteach.deakin.edu.au/wp-content/uploads/sites/103/2019/08/Making-micro-credentials-work-Oliver-Deakin-2019-full-report.pdf 

If a national or, at the very least, state clarification is implemented for the regulation and standardisation of micro credentials then this could provide consistency and trust from both learners and the organisations that will be employing them that the credentials earned are of high quality and meet minimum standards.

Workplace learning is another story, usually learning that happens inhouse is not certified and does not offer credit in terms of RPL (recognition of prior learning). A credential offered by one employer may not be recognised by another employer, so the problem faced for workplaces is that the micro-credential they offer to an employee may not be transportable. A possible solution for this is for workplaces to allow third party learning platforms to manage and regulate these types of credentials, such as LinkedIn Learning or the SkillSoft offering of Percipio, which is a specific offering to companies. See the video below to learn more about Percipio.

Source: https://www.skillsoft.com/meet-skillsoft-percipio

According to the Deloitte 2020 Global Human Capital Trends Survey 75% of organisations know that reskilling their workforce is important in the next 12 to 18 months, but only 9% feel ready to address this trend (Deloitte, 2020). So these types of digital learning platforms could fill that gap and provide employers with ready made, skill based courses and micro credentials that will be recognised by various employers and so be transportable for the employee.

The next and final blog will recap on what has been covered in this series and conclude on the investigation of micro credentials.