1. Certified Data scientist

This certification is for beginners just starting their journey in data science, analysis, and machine learning. This certification course will help the learners with data science, including machine learning, data visualization, data cleaning, python, MATLAB, SQL and NoSQL, predictive modeling and linear algebra, and calculus. 

This certification helps the students learn;

· Applying data science methodologies, for example, the CRISP-DM method

· Leveraging python for AI development

· Leveraging valuable open-source data sets

· Conducting data analysis as well as data science projects.

· Using SQL and other databases for data science insights.

With this certification, you can look for machine learning development, data visualization, and analytics jobs. You can earn up to $145,000 annually with a Certified Data scientist certification.

2. Certified Social Media manager

Certified Social Media manager certification is a must-have certification for remote jobs, especially if you are a social media marketer or manager. This certification will give students everything they need to manage large companies’ social media pages. This certification helps the student know when and how to use social media to supplement their overall marketing strategy. Covered in this certification are the major social media channels, creating social media strategies, determining the appropriate content and how to optimize it on each channel, and to respond to customer complaints. The students also get to learn content optimization, writing skills, creativity, and the latest digital marketing trends. 

3. Certified E-commerce specialist

This is one of the best known certifications for remote jobs. Whether you are employed or want to start and run your own e-commerce website, you can enroll in this course. The target audience for this certification is; internet consultants, web designers, web and graphic artists, marketing professionals, and any other IT professional. To enroll for this certification, you need a degree or diploma in any of the above-highlighted areas and some basic computing skills. 

Some of the things you’ll be assessed on are; 

· Search engine optimization and artificial intelligence

· Data collection and analytics

· Marketing and advertising

A social media manager can earn up to $55,000 annually; therefore, enroll for this certification as soon as possible.

4. Certified content marketer

If you are a digital or content marketer or an aspiring one, this is one of the certifications for remote jobs you should enroll for. It’ll give you the essential pointers on becoming an effective content marketer. Creating content without a clear strategy is a recipe for disaster; that’s why you need to create it with a clear purpose to give value to your customers. Let the content you create inspire your potential clients to take action. 

You’ll also learn how to produce compelling content consistently, creating and repurposing content that’s both loved by search engines and humans. Other things you’ll know on this certification for remote jobs are; research and data analysis, strategic planning, project management, storytelling, copywriting, video production and editing, and graphic design. 

To enroll in this course, you need a degree or diploma in either marketing or any business-related course ad basic computing skills. These certifications for remote jobs will increase your chances of getting better jobs or improving your business if you are a marketing agency.

5. SEO and Content Writing Certifications

Almost everyone and their puppies are running a blog. To stay ahead of all the other bloggers, you must enroll for an SEO (search engine optimization) certification. Not only will this certification help you become an expert in SEO, but it will also help put your blog on the first page of Google, increasing sales and revenue.

Content creation, whether content writing or video creation, needs one to apply SEO skills for fast ranking. If you are a video blogger, popularly known as vloggers, you also want your videos to rank first on social media platforms; this is where SEO comes in. Besides giving you an in-depth understanding of SEO, these SEO certifications for remote jobs also offer you great digital marketing courses; you get to hit two birds with the same stone. 

We are in the process of creating this course for students aspiring to venture into SEO and content writing. Meanwhile, you can check Semrush for some SEO and content writing insights. 

How do you find suitable certifications for remote jobs?

• Determining your objectives

Before picking any certification for remote jobs, you should highlight your current and future goals. Research the areas you want to see their relevance in the coming years.

• The course’s duration and your availability

The course’s duration and availability are other factors you should consider before choosing your preferred certifications for remote jobs. Some certifications can be quite taxing, so you may need to dedicate much of your day to studying. How many hours can you set aside for learning, and how long does the course take from start to end? These are some of the questions you should factor in.

• Pricing

Pricing is also a significant thing you should consider before enrolling for any certification. Some courses could be free (meaning almost everybody has registered), while others may cost you an arm and a leg, but they’ll add value to your CV. Most free courses don’t offer a certificate at the end of the course, which might not be very useful for your CV. Luckily the world of online certifications has something for everybody; you can get courses ranging from a few dollars to hundreds of dollars. You are spoilt for choice!

Conclusion

In conclusion, there’s so much you can get from online learning; you are your only limitation. Strive to get an online certification after every few years, depending on your career development. Not only can you rise through the ranks, but you are also able to get salary raises after every few years. 

 Depending on your profession, you can enroll for some of these top certifications in demand today that will set you apart from the rest. Luckily you do not have to leave work in a hurry in the evening to attend a class, whether in person or on zoom. Everything will happen online, from registering, enrolling, learning, sitting for the exam, and graduating.

 A certification is the ultimate proof that you have the seasoned knowledge and professional skills needed in that specific profession. Certifications come in very handy during a career advancement. Some certifications require renewal after every few years, which means you have to undertake periodic assessments.

Here are some top certifications in demand today that could give you an edge over all the candidates during job interview

CERTIFIED FULL-STACK DEVELOPER

 This is one of the top certifications in demand today within the IT arena; it equips you with the technical know-how and skills to advance your career as a Certified Full-Stack developer. You basically refine your skills to build cloud-based applications. It has hands-on experience exercises and projects to help you develop your IT portfolio. 

Certified full-stack developer certification or course enables you to develop skill sets in various technologies, for example, HTML, JavaScript, CSS, Github, React, Python, DevOps, application security, serverless computing, HTTP and REST, basic design skills, and web architecture among others. 

The only requirements to enroll for this certification are; an IT diploma or degree, some knowledge of programming, and of course, knowing how to use a computer. The certification exam duration is 4 hours and the pass mark is 75%. Upon accomplishment of this, you are awarded with a certificate to acknowledge your finesse in full stack development.

What you’ll learn

• Using front-end-development languages and tools like CSS, HTML, Bootstrap, React, and Javascript.
• Using back-end languages and frameworks like Node.js, Express, Python, and Django to program applications
• Building your GitHub portfolio by applying the full-stack development skills you have acquired. 

CERTIFIED DATA SCIENTIST

Almost like data mining, data science uses scientific methods, algorithms, processes, and systems to extract unstructured and structured insights from available data. To excel in this certification, you’ll need a background in sociology, a science degree or economics, organizational behaviour, communications, and basic computing knowledge, especially MS Office. However, a passion for learning is just as important as all the other requirements. 

This certification will equip you with the latest tools and skills, which include open-source tools, libraries, databases, Python, data visualization, SQL, statistical and data analysis, machine learning and predictive modelling algorithms.

You learn all this through hands-on practice using IBM natural data science tools.

The scope of assessment in this certified data scientist certification includes Python, data visualization and cleaning, MATLAB machine learning, SQL and NoSQL, linear algebra and calculus.

What you’ll learn

• Data science description and the job description of a data scientist, and how to think and work like a data scientist.
• Importing and cleaning data sets, analyzing and visualizing data, and building and evaluating machine learning models using Python.
• Hands-on skills using languages, tools, and libraries that professional data scientists use.
• How to apply various techniques, data science skills and tools to finish a project using real-world data.

CERTIFIED CUSTOMER CARE SPECIALIST

So many businesses struggle because of their horrendous customer care service. You may have the best products and services, but if the way you handle your customers is wanting, you may lose all of them. If you struggle to be a better customer care agent, taking a customer care specialist certification will elevate your skills; it is one of the top certifications in demand today.

You can provide customers with better support on their queries, products, and services upon completion. The scope of the assessment includes problems solving, time management, customer knowledge, and effective communication.

What you’ll learn

• Communication skills that focus on concise and clear communication and listening.
• Being empathetic, curious, patient, and willing to help.
• Problem-solving skills which help in determining the appropriate solutions to problems.

CERTIFIED HUMAN RESOURCE PROFESSIONAL

A human resource professional certification helps you maintain the highest human resource management standards. This certification enables you to defend everyone’s interests equally; employees, employers, and the entire business community. 

A human resource professional certification cements your knowledge of HR management, commitment to your career and ethical practices, and readiness to serve your workplace. Some of the skills you’ll gain are; managing people, resource management, interviewing and onboarding, recruiting, performance management and performance appraisals and incentives.

 The scope of the assessment will be on performance management, scheduling, teamwork and collaboration, task management, customer service, employee relations, Human Resource Information Software (HRIS) and onboarding.

To enroll for this certification, you’ll need a degree or diploma in HR management, some HR experience and basic computing skills. 

What you’ll learn

• Understanding alternative approaches to managing human resources 
• Appreciating the diverse factors that will motivate the employees
• The best practices to use when hiring and rewarding employees as well as managing the employees’ performance.
• Avoiding critical mistakes that people make when managing human resources.

CERTIFIED SUPPLY CHAIN PROFESSIONAL

One of the best supply chain certifications available. It provides you with skills to effectively manage supply chain activities that involve plants, suppliers, distributors, and the customer. This certification covers business ethics, understanding cross-cultural and global issues, purchasing and supplier management, resource planning systems, customer relationship management, demand forecasting and inventory, and sustainable and ethical sourcing.

Some of the skills you’ll gain from this supply chain certification are; data analysis, business intelligence, management consulting, demand and supply planning, competitive analysis and benchmarking.

To enroll for this certification, you need a business degree or a diploma, a few years of related business experience, and any other supply chain certification. 

What you’ll learn

• Understanding the pain points in a supply chain
• Planning for demand and supply and designing effective logistic strategies for the distribution systems.
• Prioritizing problems in the demand and supply chain.

Data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) even shows that people change jobs on a consistent basis. A BLS study revealed Baby Boomers had an average 11.7 jobs over a 30-year period. In other words, they changed jobs about every 2.5 years. Interestingly, both men and women switched jobs on a fairly equal basis, suggesting that both genders are interested in job change and advancement.

Yet, job advancement can be different from career development, both strong motivators in the workplace. Career advancement is basically having the opportunity to be promoted to a higher position, move ahead in a company or position or be given more responsibility in a current role,” she said. This is very important to the emerging workforce of millennials. Career advancement is, quite frankly, more tangible and therefore easier to identify with. Career development, on the other hand, is more intangible in the sense that it deals with the professional journey that an employee travels over a lifetime. It includes more than getting promoted, it encompasses an individual’s experience, training, education, etc.. It is the big picture, in other words — what an individual ultimately aspires to accomplish career-wise. Yet, good employers know the importance of both and offer career advancement opportunities as well as career development opportunities for employees.

Career Advancement: The Financial Advantages

One significant advantage to advancing in your career is the potential it may bring for more pay. It seems obvious there would be an education-to-pay link, but the BLS offers actual data as evidence.

In fact, the BLS reports that the median pay for master’s degree holders was $1,341 weekly. This compares favorably to people having only a bachelor’s degree – $1,137 weekly — and those who completed associate degrees – $798 weekly.

High school graduates might feel this data as a financial crunch, with their median weekly wages estimated at $678. (Note: That’s $663 less than the weekly wages for a master’s degree holder.)

However, no one has ever said that obtaining a college education is easy to do. The truth is tuition and fees can be expensive and the amount of time that needs to go into a program can be draining, particularly to adults with families.

Also, advancing in a career can come with unforeseen ‘surprises.’ For example, an employee who recently advanced to a higher position might quickly see what it means to move from a nine-to-five job to one with on-call responsibilities. Similarly, that person with more upper-level management responsibility may need to put in the extra hours to finish off a report before a board presentation. Career advancement opportunities, in other words, can lead to both beneficial and challenging outcomes.

Career Advancement: Not All the Benefits Are Monetary

While data from the Pew Research Center also shows a clear difference in pay for bachelor’s degree holders (an annual pay of $45,500) compared to those with two-year degrees (an annual pay of $30,000), career advancement is not always about money. There could be other motivators that drive people to look for new opportunities. Those might be opportunities to:

• Become involved in research
• Work or travel abroad
• Publish professional findings
• Become better at a skill
• Qualify for membership in a professional organization
• Take on new challenges and learn more

Motivation, broad-based engagement, job ownership and loyalty are also byproducts of working for an employer who invests in providing advancement opportunities. Job satisfaction also wins the day for employees. Other benefits of advancement can be personal. In fact, 62 percent of college graduates felt that an undergraduate education helped them to grow both personally and intellectually, according to Pew Research.

Career Advancement: The Challenge

In some jobs, the door to opportunity easily swings open, but in some careers moving up the ladder requires resilience and a never-give-up-attitude. Challenges can pop up to career advancement opportunities, such as a lack of higher-level positions, a lack of mentors and that “glass ceiling” bias that may prevent women from garnering top-level C-suite positions. Each can be a real and even deflating experience.

• Lack of upper-level jobs: The truth is that without an opportunity to try out new skills employees can experience substantial frustration. An article published on the Workplace Psychology website notes that employees may leave a company after receiving training when there are no advancement opportunities. At the same time, employees are likely to stay, following training, when they find the opportunities to move up. As well, a Society for Human Resource Management study, dating back to 2008, shows that one-third of interviewed employees would leave a job due to a lack of career advancement opportunities.
• Lack of mentors: Sometimes someone within a business is needed to advocate for an employee and to ensure their name comes up when new opportunities or promotions arise. A mentor who can provide feedback about the skills worth developing and act as role model can be that person. The challenge can be finding a mentor with as much interest in investing time in you as you are in your own job and career path.
• “The Glass Ceiling”: This bias can prevent women from moving into positions of authority and create a rocky path to career advancement opportunities. Gender discrimination, an old-boy network and stereotypes about the types of roles that women hold make this glass ceiling more palpable. Does this bias really affect women? A study by Procurement Leaders, which did research in the corporate purchasing field, indicates the answer is yes. The study not only revealed that women earned only 75 percent of the pay of men, but that fewer females held roles such as senior vice president and senior director.

Certification, a step that can be helpful to career advancement in many different fields, typically requires a set number of years or experience in the field and an education for a reason.

How To Advance Your Career?

The ways to advance in your career can be affected by your current position and goals. Working on an education is one strategy, but gaining professional certification or seeking sponsorship are others. In more depth, these strategies could include:

1. Looking for training opportunities through your company: Many organizations offer ways for employees to build skills; sometimes companies even pay for these. For example, at the Whirlpool plant in Clyde, Ohio, employees can be reimbursed for tuition expenses for college-level skilled trade classes they take. This opportunity might surprise employees. “I don’t think a lot of people realize how many different opportunities are inside the plant, it’s not just line work,” said 11-year-worker Heather Arndt in an WTOL News 11 article about the Whirlpool plant.
2. Earning professional certification in your profession: Professionals of all types could seek career advancement by applying for certification in their field. For example, registered nurses can seek certification through the American Nurses Credentialing Center while the HR Certification Institute offers certification for human resources careers. Certification typically does require an education as well as a specific number of years on the job.
3. Earning an advanced degree: Some careers simply require more education to develop the needed skills and understanding. For example, a graduate-level certificate or degree program in nursing enables nurses to become licensed as advanced practice registered nurses, a professional step above the RN. In the auditing and accounting field, professionals with a master’s degree or an MBA could find better career opportunities than those without one, reports the BLS. Employees should just be sure to carefully choose a degree program and understand the learning outcomes before enrolling.
4. Seeking sponsorship: While sponsorship may seem synonymous to mentorship, it actually entails finding a person to advocate for you professionally in your career. According to The Balance Careers website, a sponsor could put your name forward for a job, make calls on your behalf, introduce to you others or advocate for you in meetings. Finding a sponsor may require a significant amount of networking and outreach until you discover the person that is right for you.
5. Moving horizontally instead of vertically: It may be common to think that vertical movement is the only way to experience career advancement, but looking for horizontal opportunities is another way to move. An article in Forbes describes horizontal advancement as the opening of doors on the “floor you are already on” instead of the route of taking an elevator upward. Horizontal movement could also be thought of as adding ‘value’ to your current job and requiring mastery of self instead of a mastery of others, according to the piece.

A person’s traits as much as their goals and aspirations may affect their career advancement. While there may be challenges along the way, the potential benefits to advancement can be motivating. After all, the chance for more pay, more job satisfaction and more opportunities ring out loud and clear as worthwhile and rewarding.

If we look at the upcoming technological development, we need to first instigate ourselves for more alluring ideas. The need for a technical certification is actually vital in 2022 as it is the time of development where various opportunities and platforms have been introduced. Few of the reasons are as follows:

• Specialized knowledge in particular field
• Evident learning
• Differentiation from your peers
• Self-satisfaction

Above all, certifications are the shortest paths towards success. If you are certified in specialized IT field, you stand a chance to get various opportunities within that field. Information Technology is looking for the brilliant skilled IT professionals who are well certified in specialized fields.

Why is it so important to be a certified specialist?

Well getting an appropriate certification in specialized fields offers various advantages to you. The first fact about the certification in technical terms is that you are getting credibility in the firm. The certification acts as an evidence for your skills and proficiency in the expert area of work. Credibility factors validate your expertise skills in particular IT field. This is the reason why it’s so very important to get certified technically.

The second reason is the marketability factor where you get an appropriate market value for your skills. Certain certifications are important for you in specific fields when you are on your career ladder. The certification can present you competitively in the market among potential employers with a validation about your IT skills.

The third reason is the personal and professional development that you may get with effective technical certification. It may serve you with an opportunity where you can get a path to move towards success and this development may also be helpful personally. It may reinforce the skills you are having and also covers new areas of learning.

Credibility, marketability and personal and professional development are foremost areas which can be a big reason for the requirement of the certification in any professional line. As thus, the choice for the certification in IT learning depends on two main factors:

• Where you stand now?
• Where you wish to go?

If you are working with a small platform and wish to get other top opportunities in IT sector you need to get up from your work. This is possible only through appropriate certification courses. They are proved to be highly advantageous for us and hold several top reasons to step up in the market.

Top reasons that are essential for getting certified as an IT professional in 2022

The certifications will help you:

• Develop yourself and your business in a particular field

Certification courses are holding a key role in various specialized fields of information technology. Several reasons are available that may help you commence for yourself to get certified. One of them is the development of yourself and your business in the specialized field of technology. These certifications are very helpful in developing your own technical abilities and are great means of offering greater customer support. Learning skills along with valid certification are great means of development in you. If you get certified this year, it means that you can get an effective way of development in learning and your businesses as well.  You can simply grow your small business to a next level and also enhance your technical skills as well.

• Break into the industry

Another major reason for getting certified this year is that the certifications offer an effective way to break into the industry. If you are planning with any technical industry, before putting your foot into the industry certification is very essential. A certification in any specialized field of information technology field is a great way to move forward with skills and validation. Any of the industry is not going to accept you as an employee until and unless you are well certified. Certifications along with skills can be best proven as an effective requirement for stepping up into any technically specialized industry. You can also get the valid certification and skills before moving into any industry end experience its benefits.

• Fill technical knowledge gaps

Technical knowledge gaps should be filled when you are actually planning for IT sector. Certifications in IT sector can help do it well. Many times it happens that we cannot focus on all of the technical areas but the certification courses help cover them all vibrantly. Whatever the field you are lacking in, the certification courses in Information Technology is a great boon for us. It is another main reason why we need to get technically certified in 2018. You can experience its benefit this year and also in the upcoming years. If you are lacking behind in any terms, these technical certification courses may cover up all your gaps. They would develop the effective technical skills in you and would enhance it more often.

• Build up your confidence

Looking up further for another reason behind getting technical certified in 2018, we can say that confidence build up is a big cause. In whichever field you are, confidence is required more than anything. Skills can only be presentable when you hold up a higher level of confidence. Hence, the certification in technicality is going to serve you with a confidence build-up. These certifications are the massive achievements that are going to take your confidence to the next level in a profound way. Technical field serves with vital issues arising every day and to present our unique ideas we need confidence. It’s not necessary that this certification is going to serve us this year only but also beyond that. We would experience it benefits for long-lasting periods in our work.

• Find various opportunities for recruitment

Another main reason behind opting for the certification courses in a technical field is that they offer several options for getting selected. If one is having a certification as an IT professional, he/she stands a chance for getting in various technical fields. Well getting a job in any of the IT fields is an awesome opportunity we get; here one may get great earning, a lot to learn and, moreover, fun experience. Hence, if you are not certified yet than go for it as they are very benefiting. Looking further towards an upcoming technology, it is actually important that we get certified this year in 2018. The upcoming era is going to bring lots and lots for us where we would require these certifications.

• Become a reliable employee

Technical certification is about the valid documentation in specialized IT field. It is a matter of developing more and more IT professionals for the future. We all are well familiar with the fact that the world is becoming digital in every form. Whether we are looking for long terms software, cyber terms or for any other technicalities, certifications are necessary and effective. If we are getting certified this year, it is very reliable for us and our job. Not only this year, are we going to experience its benefits for a long way out. We can say it reliable because it does not hold any negative points. Instead, it offers billions of positive benefits only.

How is it benefiting? Well many of us have this question in mind. It is benefiting if we are getting certified as soon as possible. It coherently instigates our skills and enhances it. They are a great way to the source through which one can switch their normal job and move to technical fields.

• Present your certifications for justifying your costs

Yes, these certifications are actually required as an approval that you have skills to deal with your customers. Without validation, any employer is not going to employ you. They won’t even consider your skills but when you hold valid certifications you stand 99% chance to get selected. It has been seen that the people working technically hold valid certifications in specialized fields. This develops up confidence level among them and offers them deal with their costs. If you are well certified in an appropriate field you can show up your skills to your customers. One who has managed to earn up a valid certification is going to reach very high in the technical world. It is actually a matter of approval where you may get the opportunity to prove yourself on your costs.

• Get self-satisfaction

Certifications may deliver you self-satisfaction which lacks in you while working in not so interesting fields. Once you are specialized in a particular field you get away where you understand that you can proceed further. Self-satisfaction always matters while working in any specific field and IT industry is a place where you would fill with skills, joy, and opportunity as well.

• Have a fun

Well yes, the technical certifications always have proved to be fun. Do you know how? A tight schedule, overtimes and excess workload are seemed to be hectic rather than fun. Here we are with few facts about the tech credentials, which may prove that it’s a fun to opt for it.

It is an effective way of fun as it offers us various opportunities where we can understand how technology has come up. Also, we may come to know what all benefits we can experience through the ongoing and coming up technology. The tech certifications offer us to understand our technology deeply which is actually fun. They are available in short-term courses that are longtime valid. If we get so much of benefits with simple achievement than it’s obvious we may consider it as fun.

Conclusion

What is waiting for? If you are interested, you can simply fetch for your course online where you may get several benefits. Although these courses are available both online and offline as well but online is best. It is convenient where you need to sit and study at home and pass an online exam. Once you clear it, you would get certified in the specialized field you had opted for. All of the free of cost certification courses are very much benefiting for the people. The best part is that they are available for various specialized fields in IT industries.

Certification courses are largely available. Yes, now it has become easier to get certified as there are various courses in IT terms that are available online at a low cost. It happens that recruiters and employers may not have much regard for free online courses and one would therefore be better positioned with a verifiable certification from a highly reputed institute.

Sitting back home and doing regular not so interesting job should not be your fate. Here when you get certified, you are going to stand lots and lots of chances to get the best jobs. The outgoing fact about certifications is that you start getting noticeable in various platforms. It delivers an unmatched satisfaction and raises your confidence level to step out in the IT industry.

Are certifications worth it? The answer is yes for many types of careers. In this article, we explore what professional certifications are, how valuable they can be, and when it makes sense to pursue them.

What is Considered a Professional Certification?

A professional certification is a credential that verifies someone’s knowledge, skills and abilities to perform a specific job. Certifications are typically awarded by a professional association after a candidate completes an assessment of some kind.

After earning a certification, an individual typically can then start using a designation after their name. For example, someone who earns the Certified Safety Professional® designation can begin using “CSP®” after their name. Many certifications have ongoing requirements to maintain that designation.

Finally, it’s important to note the difference between certifications awarded by professional associations and certificates awarded by educational institutions.

• A certificate – awarded by an educational institution – recognizes a student who finishes a focused, industry-specific training within an academic setting.
• A certification – awarded by a professional organization – recognizes a working professional who has completed an assessment that evaluated their ability to do their job.

How Valuable is a Certification?

Before pursuing a certification, evaluate how valuable it will be and if it will help you achieve your goals. The value of a certification will depend on several factors.

1. DIFFICULTY

Requirements for getting certified can vary. Some certifications simply require paying a fee and taking a test. Others may require having work experience and other eligibility requirements. Also, many certifications require you to take a test periodically to maintain your certification. Difficulty is an important factor, but don’t avoid certifications that are more difficult to earn and maintain – or require more experience – as they may be more valuable long term.

2. REPUTATION

Just about any organization or individual can create their own certification program. Certifications that are widely recognized by an industry are more helpful than ones that aren’t.

For example, two leading certification providers for human resources professionals are the Human Resource Certification Institute® and the Society for Human Resource Management. Also, there are many kinds of certifications in occupational safety and health, but the Board of Certified Safety Professionals is a recognized industry leader. Certifications from well-known organizations like these demonstrate an elevated level of knowledge in your field. A company’s name recognition can also increase the perceived value of a certification. For example, Google Ads Certifications are recognized by marketing professionals due to Google’s brand recognition.

3. YOUR EMPLOYER OR RECRUITERS

The usefulness of certifications also depends on your employer or prospective employer and at times it emerges as an essential requirement in the recruitment process. Some organizations may require their employees to be certified – and even pay for them – while others might not see any value in them at all. Job descriptions may mention certifications, but candidates may also be able to overcome such requirements if they are strong in other areas.

Should You Get Certified?

So, how do you decide if getting certified is worth your time and money? Before pursuing certification, ask yourself the following questions.

1. ARE OTHER PROFESSIONALS IN YOUR INDUSTRY GETTING IT?

Observe whether other professionals in your field are getting certified. Do people with certifications appear to have higher salaries or desirable positions? Talk with others who have gotten certified as well as hiring managers to get their opinion on the value of their certification.

2. WILL IT HELP STRENGTHEN YOUR KNOWLEDGE AND CAREER?

The process of getting certified can also help you gain more knowledge as you study and prepare for the test. Good certification programs aren’t just about getting a piece of paper or a designation after your name.

A high-value certification ensures that you maintain a high level of knowledge and skill in your profession. Certifications also help show that you are committed to mastering your skills and knowledge in your field.

3. DOES IT HELP YOU DEVELOP AND SHOWCASE A COMPLEMENTARY SKILL?

Some certifications can help you develop a skill related to your field. For example, a Salesforce certification can be helpful for a salesperson looking to work for a company that uses Salesforce for lead generation, or a Microsoft certification might help an IT specialist interested in finding employment with organizations that use Microsoft products.

The Value of Certifications

Earning certifications is generally useful and recommended as many employers will view them as a sign of commitment to your profession at the very least. Studies in industries like occupational safety and health also show that workers who invest in certifications tend to earn higher salaries.

Workers often don’t realize that the skills they have for one job can be easily transferred to another — nor do employers. Take food servers who lost their jobs due to the pandemic. More than 70% of them have the skills needed to succeed in customer service, which is currently one of the most in-demand jobs on LinkedIn. Had servers and people hiring for customer service specialists known they already had many of the required skills, we may have seen a significant shift of out-of-work food servers into in-demand roles instead of seeing those positions go unfilled.

Evaluating employees and new hires based on their skill sets instead of their work history can help level the playing field — and help companies realize the talent they already have. It also makes talent pools more diverse and often makes hiring more effective. This is the future of hiring and development. To get ahead of it, companies need to start weaving learning into their company cultures. Organizations slow on the uptake will be left behind and forced to deal with unsatisfied and unmotivated employees and significantly less innovation overall. At a time when talent is the number-one commodity in business, companies can’t afford to remain stuck in old mindsets.

Here are three ways companies can upskill and reskill their existing workforce and take a skills-based approach to hiring new employees.

Support new career paths for your employees

Many large enterprises around the world have viewed the need to upskill their current talent as urgent for the last few years and have invested millions — and in some cases, billions — in “future proofing” their employees, arming them with the skills required to adapt to changing work. For example, JPMorgan Chase added $350 million to their $250 million plan to upskill their workforce. Amazon is investing more than $700 million to provide upskilling training to their employees. PWC is spending $3 billion to upskill all of its 275,000 employees over the next three to four years; the mantra of the program is “New World, New Skills.” The pandemic accelerated this need for companies of all sizes, as many needed to retool their employees quickly to fulfill changed business priorities.

If your company is unable to support a structured learning program, encourage managers to find out what other areas of the company their employees are interested in learning about and help them participate in cross-functional meetings and projects. Allow them to spend 10% of their work time on that cross-functional work.

You shouldn’t have to switch companies to get ahead — creating and supporting these learning programs not only shows your employees that you’re invested in their future, but they also open different pathways for growth internally and can evolve into new career paths. In Northrop Grumman’s Pathways program, for example, employees do three 12-month stints in different roles before choosing the path they’d ultimately like to follow.

Don’t wait for the next crisis to begin the process of reskilling employees for critical roles. Employees who see good opportunities to learn and grow are 2.9 times more likely to be engaged. Creating internal programs that identify and address skill gaps not only helps prepare for future disruptions but also helps your strongest and most dedicated employees feel secure.

Give employees learning time and rewards

According to a June 2020 survey conducted by Glint, a human resources software company owned by LinkedIn, an overwhelming number of employees — 97% — want to expand or at least continue the amount of time they spend learning. What’s more, opportunities to learn and grow have emerged as the strongest driver of work culture.

Executives and managers should make it clear that ongoing education is integral to personal career growth and can be done on company time. To help foster a learning culture, encourage employees to block out calendar time for learning each week or month — and do the same. If managers have dedicated learning time, employees will be more likely to follow suit.

It can be stressful to juggle learning with looming deadlines or client needs. Remind yourself and your team that the investment in learning will pay off for their careers and the organization, and give specific guidance in employee growth plans. For example, an employee can make it an end-of-quarter deliverable to spend four hours each month on learning courses, then discuss their learnings during their annual review.

Some businesses promote their learning programs with contests and incentives. Rewards, whether monetary or internal kudos, can boost employee participation considerably. Executive and manager participation is a must — it’s crucial for us to lead by example. Even putting the most recent course you undertook below your email signature signals to employees that it’s a priority for you.

Shift to a skills-based approach when hiring

In the past year, LinkedIn has seen a 21% increase in job postings advertising skills and responsibilities instead of qualifications and requirements in the U.S., and the number of positions that don’t require a degree increased by nearly 40% in 2020 compared to 2019.

Taken together, we can see companies are starting to be more intentional about hiring for a candidate’s future potential, not their past history. But it’ll be a long road. Our traditional recruiting processes still place an emphasis on certain types of education, experience, or personal referrals that can lead to a homogenous workforce.

Start by rethinking your job descriptions. Focus on the results you’d like to see, rather than the type of qualifications that you think could deliver them. Highlighting the desired skills — the candidate’s ability to perform certain tasks — gets to the same results without creating an unnecessary barrier to entry, like a requirement for a four-year degree.

Of course, the job post is one of the earliest steps in your hiring process. Once you’ve removed unnecessary barriers to entry, you’ll still need a skills-based way to assess candidates and find your finalists. If you’re looking beyond education and experience, what should you evaluate?

Stay focused on skills — and the assessments that can measure them. From hard skill evaluations like coding tests, to innovative soft skill assessments, to “job auditions,” there are plenty of ways to gauge a candidate’s ability to perform without relying on their education or experience as proxies. Even asking unexpected interview questions can let you see how a candidate processes information and problem-solves in real time. It’s also never too early to discuss learning commitments during interviews with candidates — it may even make you more attractive as an employer.

The payoff? A wider, more diverse talent pool and perhaps stronger retention: Employees without a traditional four-year degree stay at companies 34% longer than those with such a degree, according to LinkedIn data. While this could be a sign that it’s more difficult for them to find their next job, it could also be a sign that they’re simply more engaged and feel like the company is betting on their success. As LinkedIn’s 2018 Workplace Learning Report showed, 94% of employees said they would stay at a company longer if it invested in their career.

By taking a skills-based approach to the hiring process, diplomas and titles can sit alongside assessments, certifications, endorsements, and other alternate methods for determining the capability and fit of a candidate. What’s more, by focusing on skills, employers can increase the size of their talent pools, allowing them to pinpoint quality applicants for hard-to-fill roles. Once you’ve hired them, keep your employees engaged and your company ready to adapt to changing demands by creating a culture of learning. It’s how we’ll start hiring and developing talent for the future, not the past.

Employees are generally more engaged when they believe that their employer is concerned about their growth and provides avenues to reach individual career goals while fulfilling the company’s mission. A career development path provides employees with an ongoing mechanism to enhance their skills and knowledge that can lead to mastery of their current jobs, promotions and transfers to new or different positions. Implementing career paths may also have a direct impact on the entire organization by improving morale, career satisfaction, motivation, productivity, and responsiveness in meeting departmental and organizational objectives.

Background

In the early part of the 20th century, career choice and career progression were dictated by tradition, socio-economic status, family and gender. For most men, career choice—and status within those careers—was determined by what their fathers and other male family members had done before them. For women, the career choice options were even more limited by convention and social mores. Career progression and career ladders were almost nonexistent.

In the immediate post-WWII world, the corporate organization became the driving force in U.S. business. Both employers and employees operated under an implied contract: Employees would be loyal, and in turn, employers would provide employment until retirement.

In the latter part of the 20th century, however, this traditional trajectory of a person’s career at one employer became a thing of the past. From the late 1970s onward, the U.S. economy experienced several boom-and-bust cycles, causing many organizations to undergo massive layoffs and restructuring, and to be reticent to re-staff at pre-bust levels even when times were good. Also during this period, the shift away from a manufacturing to a knowledge economy caused a decline in union membership, further diminishing the once-implied contract of employee loyalty for lifetime employment. The organizational structure became much flatter, reducing or eliminating middle management layers. To get ahead or to make more money, employees often had to look elsewhere.

Thus, a new paradigm emerged in which individuals are in charge of their ladder, where they place it, how long they leave it in place and how high they want to go on it. Traditional career ladders still exist in the 21st century, but they operate in an environment where:

• The labor force sees continuous, dramatic changes.
• The way work is organized and performed continuously evolves and changes.
• Traditional career paths will continue to wane.
• Jobs are broken down into elements, which are then outsourced.
• Employees are working alongside a nonemployee workforce that does not have career paths or logical career progressions and may be harder to motivate.
• Workers value job enrichment, flexibility and career development more than job security and stability.
• Work is redesigned to accommodate increased demands for flexibility, where employees want the choice to work from wherever and whenever they want.

Business Case

Many factors influence the need for an organization to embrace formal career paths and career ladders, including:

• Inability to find, recruit and place the right people in the right jobs.
• Employee disengagement.
• Employee demands for greater workplace flexibility.
• Lack of diversity at the top.
• A multigenerational workforce.
• Limited opportunity for advancement in flatter or smaller organizations.
• Organizational culture change.

Perhaps the biggest selling point to executives for creating formal career paths and ladders is the talent crunch.

A 2021 Verizon survey conducted with 2,001 female U.S. workers found 62 percent who plan to re-enter the workforce after the pandemic said they will look for a position in a field that offers more opportunity for skills development and advancement.

MAKING EMPLOYEE DEVELOPMENT A PRIORITY

Although most CEOs understand the importance of employee development, most admit that they do not devote the necessary time and resources to this activity. In a study by global staffing firm Randstad, 73 percent of employers said fostering employee development is important, but only 49 percent of employees said leadership is adhering to this practice.

Most organizations could benefit by increasing efforts to establish clear strategies for how talent will be grown from within. Career paths and ladders can be effective strategic tools for achieving positive organizational outcomes. They can be a means to ensure an organization’s continuing growth and productivity.

BENEFITS TO THE ORGANIZATION

Aligning the employee’s career goals with the strategic goals of the organization not only helps the organization achieve its goals but also helps the organization in the following ways:

Differentiate itself from labor market competitors. Research by WorldatWork shows that organizations that do not invest in training and development of their human capital lose valuable employees to their competition. Employers can easily differentiate themselves from competitors by investing in their employees’ career development. Even a relatively small employer investment has a positive impact on loyalty.

Retain key workers. Managing employee perceptions of career development opportunities is a key to enhancing engagement and loyalty among employees. Organizations should identify workers who are central to the execution of business strategy and then develop or update retention plans to meet the needs and expectations of these employees. Critical workers include those who drive a disproportionate share of key business outcomes, significantly influence an organization’s value chain or are in short supply in the labor market. Providing identifiable career paths is an important aspect of retention plans, along with coaching and mentoring employees with high potential and moving proven performers into new roles that fit skills developed over time.

Keep younger workers. Employees’ views of work and growth opportunities vary by generation. For example, Generation Y workers (those born between 1981 and 1996) are the least likely to be interested in pay increases and most likely to be interested in learning new skills. They are also more likely to value a career path than any other generation. Randstad also found that high percentages of Generations Y and X (those born between 1965 and 1980) want pathways to personal growth. See Generation Z Seeks Guidance in the Workplace.

Decrease turnover after an economic downturn. When the economy recovers from a downturn, employers should be concerned about losing critical and high-potential talent. A spike in voluntary turnover typically occurs after a recession, and we’re experiencing it during the COVID-19 pandemic as well. The cost of voluntary turnover can be significant, and it includes loss of productivity, lost institutional knowledge and relationships, and added burdens on employees who must pick up the slack.

A July 2021 poll conducted by Monster found that:

• 86% of workers feel that their career has stalled during the pandemic.
• 79% feel pressure to push their careers further as the pandemic ends.
• 29% of workers named lack of growth opportunities as their reason for wanting to quit.
• 80% of workers do not think their current employer offers growth opportunities.
• 49% of workers expect their employer to play a part in career development.

Experts say that employees who believe their employers make effective use of their talents and abilities are overwhelmingly more committed to staying on the job.

HR’s Role

HR professionals have new and varied roles to play in developing and implementing career paths.

HR professionals no longer have a captive base of employees with control over their climb up the ladder. Additionally, HR is no longer able to promise a position on the ladder, or a climb to the top. Recognizing that there is a new paradigm for career progression in the 21st century, HR should encourage employees to take control of their own ladders. Though an organization can provide resources and tools to assist employees in developing their skills and abilities, the organization is no longer the sole option that employees have.

The challenge to HR is not only to continue to provide career opportunities to employees but also to provide job enhancement and job enlargement opportunities. Training and development should be focused on preparing the employee for a lifetime of employability versus a lifetime of company employment.

The ambition and drive to follow that path belongs to each individual, but the guidance and support needed to navigate the way comes from managers. Managers are responsible for incorporating the organization’s definition of success into employee feedback, evaluations and development plans. Helping managers develop career paths for their employees is another area in which HR professionals can take the lead. HR professionals should help managers view employees not as their exclusive resources but as organizational resources. When managers think this way, they are more apt to encourage employees to develop themselves in areas outside their existing departments to the benefit of the entire organization. When employees move up internal career ladders through internal promotions, HR can contribute to the process of moving an employee up the career ladder by:

• Establishing fair, workable and consistently administered promotion policies and procedures. This includes establishing policies for posting—or not posting—available positions and the content and timing of promotion announcements.
• Facilitating promotions within their organizations by providing employees with career coaching, helping managers develop clear selection criteria and cushioning the blow for those not selected for promotion.
• Helping newly promoted employees make a smooth transition.
• Helping nonselected candidates continue to strengthen their skills in expectation of future opportunities within the organization.
• Although HR professionals have many responsibilities related to designing and implementing career paths and methods for employees to grow and advance, they must also receive guidance themselves in navigating and advancing their own careers.

Developing Traditional Career Paths and Ladders

Corporate-wide initiatives around career planning can be as simple as role-playing with managers on how to discuss career interests or use career mapping with their employees. More complex initiatives involve developing formal career paths for all positions within the organization. Traditional career ladders are based on the assumption that the individual wishes to continue to climb the ladder as long as he or she is able to and that the employer continues to provide opportunities.

CAREER MAPPING

A tool that managers and HR professionals can use during career planning discussions with employees is career mapping. Career maps help employees think strategically about their career paths and how to meet their career goals within the organization rather than leave it to move ahead.

Career mapping involves three steps:

1. Self-assessment. A manager engages with the employee to explore his or her knowledge, skills and abilities, as well as past experiences, accomplishments and interests.
2. Individualized career map. Creating an individualized career map involves identifying other positions within the organization that meet the employee’s interests. The position may be a lateral move into a different job family or a promotion. In either case, the position should capitalize on the employee’s past experiences, interests and motivation while at the same time requiring the employee to develop a certain degree of new knowledge, skills and abilities (KSAs) to give him or her something to work toward and stay engaged.
3. Exploring other opportunities. The final step in career mapping is to explore other job opportunities within the organization as they become available.

For managers and employees to successfully practice career mapping, HR must develop the necessary resources to facilitate the process.

TRADITIONAL CAREER LADDERS AND CAREER ADVANCEMENT STRATEGIES

In a traditional career ladder system, the person is hired and, through a combination of experience, education and opportunity, is promoted to levels that encompass additional responsibility and concomitant compensation. This progression within an organization continues until the individual leaves the employer for another opportunity, retires, reaches a level at which no further promotional opportunities exist, chooses to decline subsequent promotional opportunities or is terminated.

Bowling Green State University’s Business Career Accelerator program examples of career paths, including these attributed to EY and FedEx:

EY Career Ladder

FedEx Ground Career Paths

A report from Catalyst shed light on the effectiveness of various career strategies. The report suggested that career advancement requires that individuals do “all the right things” to get ahead. “Ideal workers” are those who:

• Seek high-profile assignments.
• Rub shoulders with influential leaders.
• Communicate openly and directly about career aspirations.
• Seek visibility for their accomplishments.
• Let their supervisors know of their skills and willingness to contribute.
• Seek opportunities continually.
• Learn the political landscape or unwritten rules of the organization.
• Are not afraid to ask for help.

COMMON CHALLENGES WITH TRADITIONAL LADDERS AND PATHS

Within a traditional career ladder, several issues are likely to arise, including the following.

To manage or not to manage. In many organizations, the first of several steps on an individual’s career ladder is that of an individual contributor. An inherent difficulty in many organizations, however, is that once a person reaches the level of the most experienced individual contributor, he or she must move into first-line supervision to “get ahead.” If the individual is interested in making this next step and is capable of gaining supervisory and management competencies, this progression is fine. If, however, the person does not want to move into management but still wants to receive additional compensation, then there is a problem. When this situation occurs, a typical reaction is for the individual to seek employment outside the company to earn more money. Obviously, if the person is a strong performer, this move is not to the organization’s advantage. In response to this scenario, some employers have developed dual career tracks, which are discussed in the next section of this article.

In the traditional career ladder organization, individuals may be pushed into management without the desire or the skill to do the job. Not only does the individual become frustrated with new challenges for which he or she is ill-equipped, but the organization is frustrated because it has someone in a position who is not working to potential.

No desire to climb. For some individuals, the rung at which they enter an organization is the rung at which they desire to stay. Someone who is happy at his or her current level does not aspire to advance and is a solid performer should not be pressured to climb the ladder. Encouraging supervisors to have periodic career discussions with employees is important to evaluate the current and future aspirations of all employees and will help identify those who would like to remain in their positions and those who are looking for the next step on their career ladders.

Obstacles. Career plateaus and career stagnation can also occur in the traditional career ladder and can block a person’s ability to climb the ladder. A career plateau occurs when employees reach a level in an organization in which they are either perceived to have reached their limit of progression or the organization does not provide for opportunities for future advancement. This situation may cause the employee to look outside the company for other, higher-level opportunities. Career stagnation occurs when a person is no longer psychologically engaged in his or her or job and, consequently, becomes less effective. A person who has experienced a career plateau may encounter stagnation if he or she does not actively do something to move off the plateau.

Nontraditional Methods of Career Progression

When organizations are unable to advance all employees up traditional career ladders due to low turnover, limited growth or financial constraints, other kinds of development opportunities offer ways to retain and engage employees, including job redesign, job rotation, dual career ladders, horizontal career paths, accelerated and “dialed down” career paths, and encore career paths.

JOB REDESIGN

As organizations have experienced downsizing, new technologies and demographic changes, the result has been flatter organizations that provide less opportunity for career advancement via promotions. Job redesign is an important ingredient in continuing to challenge employees to do their best work. 

Job redesign can provide increased challenges and opportunities for employees to get more out of their jobs while staying on the same rung of their ladders. Commonly used job redesign strategies are job enlargement and job enrichment. 

Job enlargement involves broadening the scope of a job by varying the number of different tasks to be performed. Job enrichment involves increasing the depth of the role by adding employee responsibility for planning, organizing and controlling tasks of the job.

These strategies can be used to add variety and challenge to a job while also allowing the individual to learn new skills and to further refine and develop existing skills to better prepare for advancement opportunities when they do occur. However, when jobs are enlarged but not enriched, motivational benefits are unlikely. Although the distinction between job enlargement and enrichment is fairly straightforward, employees may not correctly perceive the changes as enrichment or as enlargement.

JOB ROTATION

Job rotation is an effective method to provide job enrichment from an employee’s perspective. It involves the systematic movement of employees from job to job within an organization. Typically, formal job rotation programs offer customized assignments to promising employees in an effort to give them a view of the entire business. Assignments usually run for a year or more. Rotation programs can vary in size and formality, depending on the organization.

Job rotations are not new, but they can be highly effective. Low-level workers in job rotations can gain variety and perspective, so they do not get bored. For managers, rotations are typically designed to broaden their expertise and make them better prepared to move to the next level. As middle management jobs have disappeared in recent years, rotations for managers have become more important.

But there is a downside to job rotation programs. Such programs may increase the workload and decrease productivity for the rotating employee and for other employees who must take up the slack. In addition, line managers may be resistant to high-performing employees participating in job rotation programs. Finally, costs are associated with the learning curve on new jobs.

Preparation is a key to the success of any job rotation program. By carefully analyzing feasibility, anticipating implementation issues, communicating with and ensuring the support of senior and line managers, and setting up realistic schedules for each position, both large and small organizations can derive value from a job rotation program. 

DUAL CAREER LADDERS

A dual career ladder is a career development plan that allows upward mobility for employees without requiring that they be placed into supervisory or managerial positions. This type of program has typically served as a way to advance employees who may have particular technical skills or education but who are not interested or suited to management. The following is an example of a dual career ladder, as provided by TalentAlign OD:

Advantages of dual career ladders are the following:

• They offer employees a career path in lieu of traditional promotions to supervisory or managerial positions.
• They can potentially reduce turnover among valued staff by providing expanded career opportunities and pay raises.
• If well managed, this type of program can encourage employees to continually develop their skills and enhance their value to the organization.

Dual career ladder programs are more common in scientific, medical, information technology and engineering fields, or in fields that typically exhibit one or more of the following characteristics:

• Substantial technical or professional training and expertise beyond the basic level.
• Rapid innovation.
• Credentials or licenses.

To be effective, a dual career ladder program must be well managed, as the program can become a “dumping ground” for lower-performing managers. Additionally, there may be resentment from employees not chosen for the program or from managers who feel the dual career employees are receiving similar pay as managers without the added burdens of supervising staff. 

HORIZONTAL CAREER PATHS

The concept of horizontal career paths (also called “career lattices”) was introduced in many large organizations in the mid-to-late 1990s. In organizations with limited number of management and leadership positions, employees are encouraged to think of career paths both horizontally and vertically. 

The potential benefits of formal horizontal career paths include the following:

• For a business with many distinct functions, employees can find challenging and rewarding work, broaden their skills, and contribute in new ways when they move laterally.
• For the organization, key positions can be filled with demonstrated performers.
• Horizontal paths can help employees who want to experiment in a related field. Structured programs also help employees quickly understand how their job fits into the overall success of the organization and how they can meet their professional goals at their current workplaces.
• Lateral career paths may help attract and retain employees from younger generations.

A career lattice strategy has to be understood by both managers and employees, and appropriate incentives need to be in place to reinforce the desired behavior. Organizations with successful lateral career programs share several common characteristics, including:

• Employee development is part of the culture and beyond training courses to include rotational assignments or temporary assignments in other functions, roles or locations.
• Compensation is not reduced from the current level, but employees in developmental roles may not receive the same bonuses or merit increases when making a lateral move. Well-developed competency models lay out the skills and experiences needed to be successful in more senior roles.

ACCELERATED AND “DIALED DOWN” CAREER PATHS

A few organizations have recognized that employees want a voice in tailoring their career paths to their life stages and as to whether they want to be on an accelerated path or a “dialed-down” path at a particular stage.

Some organizational projects require high intensity and others do not, but all are important to the organization. An employee who is in a stage of acceleration may have a better success rate on high-intensity projects, such as a mergers-and-acquisition project that requires a lot of hours and travel. On the other hand, if someone is in dial-down mode for personal reasons, then a lower intensity project would be a better fit.

In the accelerated or dialed-down career path model, the workload dimension should be indexed to compensation. Thus, if an employee has dialed down to 80 percent of the normal work time, the compensation should be lowered to 80 percent.

Implementing accelerated and dialed down career paths may result in:

• Improved employee satisfaction in career/life fit.
• Increased expectations for future satisfaction of career/life fit.
• Reduced stress knowing the option is available.
• Retention of top performers.

ENCORE CAREER PATHS

The concept of purpose-driven work in the second half of life has only recently become an issue. An encore career is the opportunity for an individual to do work that has a social impact after midlife work. Experts suggest that the impact of encore careers may be similar to that of women moving into the workforce in the 1960s and 1970s. 

Many older workers not ready for full retirement are looking for jobs that can provide them with “means and meaning.” These individuals primarily have held professional and white-collar jobs, have at least a college education, often work 40 or more hours a week, and usually live in or near cities. This survey’s findings provide evidence of a growing social phenomenon that poses opportunities for nonprofits.

Many nonprofit organizations have traditionally relied on older individuals to perform volunteer or part-time work that came with only modest stipends. These opportunities will be less appealing as people live longer and traditional retirement plans disappear. HR functions in the nonprofit sector should consider adapting hiring policies to employees interested in encore careers. Moreover, nonprofit employers may want to reshape job descriptions to offer part-time and flexible work options, use online resources to make finding encore jobs easier, and provide education and training to meet new job requirements.

Career Paths Outside the Organization

In the last few decades, corporate restructuring and the recession have periodically resulted in the loss of hundreds of thousands of jobs in some industries, flatter organizations with less promotional potential and the creation of new types of jobs in other industries. These changes have led to the increase in the number of consultants and significant expansion of the “contingent workforce.”

CONSULTING

Large consulting organizations have been around for many years, and they have provided career ladders and promotional opportunities much the same as any other company. A new type of consultant has emerged, however, who has previously worked within the corporation. This exit from the organization can occur for a variety of reasons, including lifestyle and family considerations, lack of challenge and internal career progression, early retirement, corporate downsizing or personal choice.

Regardless of the reason, the independent consultant is someone who has expertise in a defined area and who markets that expertise to potential clients, primarily the previous employer. Generally, this type of consultant operates using a business model based on a limited size organization and in a limited geographic area. Although the consultant role itself may not provide a career ladder, the move from an organizational to a consultant role is a move on a career ladder that many people find both personally and financially satisfying. 

CONTINGENT WORK

The “contingent workforce” includes individuals who work as temporary workers, contract workers or project workers. All these roles are designed to provide needed work to an organization for a limited time. The reasons people elect to pursue contingent work are as varied as the work settings in which the work is performed. Some people see it as a route to permanent full-time employment. For others, it is a lifestyle decision that allows them to work when they want for as long as they want. For still others, contract work provides variety and challenge as they move from worksite to worksite. 

For the contingent worker, the traditional employer-employee relationship no longer exists, and people are self-employed in the sense that they control when, where and how they will work. This change in work patterns requires skills portability and lifelong learning as individuals are challenged to maintain their marketability in the business marketplace. From a career ladder perspective, individuals in the contingent workforce choose where they place their ladder. Although they have restricted ability to climb their ladder, they have made the choice that they would prefer to move their ladder from time to time rather than keep their ladder in one place and climb it.

Communications

Managers and HR professionals must be effective in their communications to employees about the organization’s career paths and career opportunities. Employers must handle conversations about the following potentially “tricky” topics carefully and honestly and without creating expectations or making commitments that the organization may not be able to fulfill:

• Gauging an employee’s interest in promotion without promising a specific job.
• Telling an employee he or she is a high-potential employee.
• Letting an employee know he or she is not considered a high-potential employee.

Employees should know how they are regarded so they can decide whether to go for a promotion when a job opens up. An individual should be given accurate and constructive information about the perception of his or her performance or readiness for particular roles.

Legal Issues

Employers and HR professionals should be aware of potential legal issues that can arise in the context of career paths and career ladders, including gender stereotyping, discriminatory promotions and pay discrimination.

GENDER STEREOTYPING

Women sometimes face obstacles in the workplace because of gender stereotypes and a culture that rewards behavior and strategies used primarily by one gender. In addition to the risk of lawsuits or unwanted media attention, gender stereotyping may cause valuable talent to leave the organization in pursuit of other options. 

Employers and HR professionals should consider questions that can shed light on women’s advancement opportunities in their organizations, including:

• Are the skills, knowledge and experience of recruits evaluated differently if the candidate is a woman or a man?
• How can or should individuals communicate their expectations, and how is this information collected so organizations can update their talent profiles to shape succession planning?
• How can talent management practices be redesigned to minimize the impact of gender and stereotypes of other protected groups on hiring, development, advancement and compensation decisions?

DISCRIMINATORY PROMOTIONS

If not many women or minorities fill high-level positions in an organization, HR or legal counsel should look at the corporate ladder to see when a disproportionately lower representation of one gender or ethnicity occurs. This factor can be especially important if a company promotes from within because it would suggest that the underrepresented gender or ethnicity does not understand or have access to the organization’s career paths.

Lean In’s 2021 Women in the Workplace survey found significant underrepresentation of women in leadership. 

To avoid discrimination lawsuits in promoting employees, employers need to have a reasonable rationale for every promotion. Moreover, employers should give careful consideration to how promotion opportunities are posted—specifically, whether to do it internally and externally at the same time. As with all HR policies, promotion policies and practices should be clear and consistent. 

PAY DISCRIMINATION

If an employer’s positions have defined pay bands, then employees who are not promoted may reach the pay maximum for the job. Usually, women and minorities are paid approximately the same as others within similar positions, but there might be few minorities and women promoted to higher paying jobs.

Indicators of pay inequities between the pay for members of the majority group and members of other protected classes go beyond pay disparities in the same positions. Other tip-offs to potential pay discrimination may include:

• Significant turnover in a department.
• Retention that is significantly lower among minority groups or gender groups after one, two or three years.
• Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) charges affecting a certain department.
• Significant differences from overall pay benchmarks at other employers.

One step to avoiding pay discrimination is to take a critical look at promotions. This should include a review of the rate of promotion for protected classes and the organization’s mechanism for providing information on promotions. EEO-1 reports can also be useful to determine underrepresentation of certain categories of employees.

Metrics

HR professionals should analyze key metrics related to career progression programs to determine the return on investment (ROI) to the organization.

One way to calculate the ROI for career progression programs is to determine how these initiatives affect organizational turnover or retention rates and then to quantify their impact in financial terms. For example, an organization that has higher-than-average turnover rates for employees with three to five years of tenure with the firm may decide to develop individualized career maps as a way to boost retention. If the program reduces turnover rates, then the savings from replacement costs, such as recruiting, orientation and lost productivity, can be calculated. 

The final step in calculating the ROI is to compare the cost of developing and implementing career progression initiatives in terms of staff time or consultant fees to the savings resulting from reduced turnover. To illustrate, if the cost of a career progression initiative was $45,000, but the efforts yielded a savings of $75,000 in turnover costs, then the ROI was $30,000. 

Global Issues

Global HR professionals deal with many of the same talent management challenges as do domestic HR practitioners, but generally on a larger scale. Global research shows that individuals tend to stay with organizations that are seen as “talent-friendly” and progressive—that is, organizations with leading-edge work environments and people practices. 

Global leveling—the process of systematically establishing the relative value of jobs and their corresponding pay ranges worldwide—is providing a framework for multinational organizations to implement talent and compensation management effectively across borders. The primary objectives for evaluating jobs and implementing a global grade structure are to support the development and career paths of employees and to facilitate the implementation of a global pay or rewards program.

A training needs assessment (TNA) is an assessment process that organizations use to determine performance requirements and the knowledge, abilities and skills that their employees need to achieve the requirements. There are three key areas that are considered accurate assessors of those needs:

• Skill proficiency of employees
• Employees’ frequency of skill usage
• Level of employees’ skills crucial to job performance

One of the outputs of the training needs assessment is a list of who needs what kind of training. For instance, your company may find that the IT department is failing to keep up with the industry standards and needs to undergo training that increases their knowledge about the latest technological innovations. Or maybe the IT interns are coming on full-time and require mentoring to become a competitive and productive part of the company. TNA aims to answer some familiar questions: why, who, how, what and when. Here’s a look at the descriptions of the questions and what analysis can to answer them.

• Why conduct the training: Organizations typically conduct trainings to tie the performance problem to a working need and make sure that the benefits of carrying out the training are greater than the problems. To answer this question, you have to conduct two types of analysis: feasibility analysis and needs versus wants analysis.
• Who is involved in the training: A training typically involves appropriate parties to solve the performance problem. To determine the target participants for the training, you have to conduct a target population analysis. This type of analysis allows you to learn as much as possible about the people who are involved in the deficiency and how to tailor a training program to engage them.
• How to fix the performance problem: Conducting training can help fix the performance problem. But you have to look for another remediation if training is not appropriate. To identify what skill deficiency to address, you must conduct a performance analysis. This type of analysis investigates how your company or department is performing as a whole.
• What is the best way to perform: There is a preferred or better way to do a task to get the best results. To identify the best way to perform, you must conduct a task analysis. This type of analysis gets down to the fine details of exactly what your employees are doing in their individual roles.
• When to conduct the training: Because holidays, work cycles, etc. affect the participants’ attendance at the training, you must determine the best timing to deliver training. You may conduct a context analysis to answer logistics questions. Context analysis is a method to examine the environment in which a business operates.

Training needs assessment levels

There are three levels of training needs assessment. These include the following:

Organizational level

The training needs assessment at the organizational level is a macro-level assessment that helps you determine areas where your employees lack the necessary skills or knowledge and provide need-based training. It aims to answer the following questions:

• Where is training most needed?
• Is the training needed for a specific department or a group of employees?
• Why is the training program recommended as a solution to the current problem?

TNA at the organization level helps you clearly define measurable outcomes for training, allowing you to improve the chances of success of the training program.

For instance, your insurance company’s claims processing department constantly gets poor feedback from customers, so you want to improve its customer service rankings. An organizational-level assessment reveals the problems in claims processing and determines the need for training employees involved in claims processing. It can also explain why the training program is necessary and how it can help you achieve your goal of improving your company’s customer service.

Operational level

At the operational level (also known as task or job level), TNA determines what kind of training do your employees need to achieve a specified level of proficiency. It involves task analysis, which determines the knowledge and skills required for specific tasks and correlates these requirements to the actual knowledge and skills of your employees. The gaps or problems revealed in this analysis can be used to determine the kind of training your employees need.

TNA at the operational level aims to answer the following questions:

• How is the job performed?
• What are the performance standards for the job?
• What are the knowledge, skills and abilities needed to complete the job successfully?

Some of the data sources that you can use to conduct TNA at the operational level include the following:

• Job specifications
• Job description
• Work performance standards
• Information from small and midsized enterprises (SMEs)
• Analysis of operational problems

Individual level

At the individual or personal level, the TNA determines how each employee performs his or her role. The difference between the actual performance and the expected performance helps you determine if there is really a need for TNA at the individual level.

TNA at the individual level gives you a complete picture of your employees’ performance and whether their performance meets expected standards. TNA at this level aims to answer the following questions:

• What is the expected performance?
• Do your employees possess the necessary knowledge and skills?
• What is the gap between the expected and actual performance?
• What impedes your employees to perform efficiently?
• What training program must be provided to your employees to meet expected performance standards?

How to conduct a training needs assessment.

There are four steps you should take to successfully conduct a training needs assessment. These steps include the following:

1. Determine desired outcomes
2. Identify problems or specific points of pain
3. Determine desired knowledge, skills and behaviors
4. Set training timelines and priorities
5. Choose training needs assessments and formats

1. Determine desired outcomes

Determine where things are not working the way you need or want them to, and what success in those areas would look like. For instance, you may want to improve customer retention by about 5%, reduce support call time to under three minutes or increase new customer acquisition by 10%. To establish the metrics for success of your training program, you have to meet with your team leads, supervisors, managers, directors and other stakeholders. Once you have identified what your goals are, you can easily determine the behaviors that must be changed in order to reach those goals.

2. Identify problems or specific points of pain

The next step is to match your desired outcomes with the improvements in information, actions and abilities that support them. To do so, you have to break down duties and processes inherent to the outcomes so you can determine specific problems or points that need to be addressed.

For instance, if you want to decrease the volume of calls your customer support receives, you need to examine what causes the volume of calls you are currently receiving. The problem may lie with the information customers receive about your product or services, with how calls are recorded and followed-up on, with the frequency and level of proactive communication between customer contacts and account managers or with a combination of all of those.

There are a number of ways to identify areas that require improvement. Here are some of the most common and effective:

• Observation and assessment: This requires your team leads, supervisors, managers or external specialized organizations to assess employees in order to establish the gaps in skills.
• Surveys: This method requires you to ask employees about which areas they would like more training, support and resources. You have to make sure, however, that they write down their specific needs. Team-building or communication are such broad training needs, as an example, that you would need to conduct another training needs assessment on each of these topics. Some examples of specific training needs include how to resolve a conflict, how to effectively and deeply listen to a coworker or how to give feedback to colleagues.
• Data evaluation: This requires you to analyze HR records to determine if there are common errors, issues or inconsistencies that the training can address. HR records can include exit interviews, job competencies, job descriptions, performance evaluations, accident and safety reports and other company records such as sales, cost and production records. For instance, if one of your company’s departments has a dramatic increase in workplace accidents, you may review accident reports as part of your gap analysis before conducting training about safety practices and procedures.
• Individual interviews: You may also interview your employees, supervisors and clients to identify problems or gaps. If your company is providing safety training, for instance, interviewing the employees who have experienced or witnessed an accident would be advisable. Also, interviewing employees who have never had an accident could be useful in developing a training program that includes safe practices and procedures. If the accidents involved equipment, you may need to interview the company that serviced or manufactured the equipment. The information you can gather from your interviews can help you identify gaps that your company needs to address.

3. Determine desired knowledge, skills and behaviors

Once you have identified the specific problems you need to address, you can match training topics to the identified skill gaps. To do so, you should first come up with a list of knowledge, skills and competencies each trained employee needs to attain the established objectives. Then, you must have a way to determine if training has been successful at the individual level—the way to measure if the identified competencies and skills were achieved to the level required. These metrics for success are usually expressed as a series of learning goals tailored to each problem and the desired business outcome.

4. Set training timelines and priorities

Once you have determined the knowledge, skills or behaviors that your employees must develop to achieve established goals, it’s now time to develop the full training agenda. To do so, you must first determine the targeted end date for the initiative, and then rank priorities for individual sessions and groups and put them on a schedule. You should determine priorities based on their urgency (how quickly you need to see results from employees) and sequence (training that must occur before other training can happen).

5. Choose training needs assessments and formats

Now that you know who your target participants are, what training is necessary, what your goals are and how quickly the training program needs to be complete, you can choose how you want to administer the training. Some good options include virtual or in-person instructor-led sessions, self-guided audio and video programs, computer-based simulations and online training. Your Learning and Development resource—consultancy or in-house—can help you choose the right course suitable for your company and project.

Modern technology has made our world convenient. Yet, it has made it more demanding as well. Continuous learning and acquiring new skills is a must if you want to be on top of things in your industry. Modern jobs need new skill sets that weren’t required in the past. In fact, many professions that exist today we had never heard of 10 years ago. Moreover, some studies suggest that 65% of children entering elementary school these days will be working in professions that we know nothing about yet.

Most Popular Jobs 10 Years Ago

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the fastest growing jobs from 2000 to 2010 included:

• computer software engineering and applications,
• network and computer system administrators and specialists, and
• healthcare professions.

These trends have continued into the new decade. As a result, they introduced new occupations that didn’t even exist 15 or 20 years ago. For example, popular careers in 2009 involved:

• healthcare occupations,
• engineers,
• genetic counselors,
• a variety of government positions,
• mediators,
• training specialists, as well as
• service sectors jobs like firefighters, librarians, and hairstylists.

Rapid technological advancements needed employability skills to evolve, as well. It became obvious that workers needed to continually develop. They had to learn skills beyond those required for their job position to prove themselves in the competitive, fast-developing work environment. Workers had to multitask, improve their work method, and successfully solve problems. Otherwise, they couldn’t succeed.

Top Jobs and Work Skills in 2018

As per the BLS, professions that dominate 2018 high-demand jobs list include:

• software developers, and
• healthcare professionals.

Software developers, cloud computing specialists, and app developers are occupations that didn’t exist a decade ago. Yet, they became some critical careers in our modern life due to the development of digital technologies. There are also many new occupations that we couldn’t imagine 10 years ago. Some of them include hi-tech jobs such as:

• social media manager,
• app developer, designer, and manager,
• cloud computing specialist,
• Uber driver,
• virtual assistant, and
• sustainability manager.

So, what are the most important skills that you need to develop if you want to thrive in the modern workplace?

1. Technological Literacy and High-Tech Expertise

The top-notch jobs today require high-tech expertise. Thus, workers who want to work in these fields must continuously update their technological knowledge. They have to attend professional conferences and seminars, and stay up-to-date with the latest developments in the field. Modern technology covers so many aspects of our daily lives. Thus, companies need workers who can design, program, and test these technologies.

2. Customer Service Skills

Many modern jobs involve selling a product or service. So, advanced customer service skills are a great asset. Whether you work as a freelance writer, an Uber driver or a millennial generational expert, your interpersonal skills will benefit you in your profession. They include attentiveness, patience, positive language and communication, as well as the knowledge of a product/service.

3. Time Management Skills

Modern jobs are no longer restricted to traditional working spaces or hours. Therefore, many people today have the freedom to control their work schedules and environments.

Yet, this independence can easily become a trap of wasted time with little to none productivity. So, you need to build your time management skills to thrive in your business.

4. Emotional Intelligence (EQ)

EQ represents our ability to recognize, understand, and manage our emotions. It is also our ability to understand other people’s signals and react to them appropriately. Self-regulation, self-awareness, motivation, and social skills are skills often found in excelling and highly efficient employees. 

Best Jobs for the Future and the Skills You Will Need in 2030

According to some estimates, by 2025, over five million jobs will be lost to automation. Developments in artificial intelligence and robotics will put forward jobs vastly different from those we know today. They will also make significant changes in the fields of medicine, learning, and farming. Some fields like factory production will most likely be fully automated. But, robots won’t completely take away our jobs in the future. Instead, future professions will involve a lot of mental elasticity, creativity, innovation, and problem-solving skills. According to predictions, some of the new jobs by 2030 may include:

• alternative energy consultant
• trash engineer
• medical mentor
• commercial space pilot
• body part maker 
• classroom avatar manager

Here are some skills you will need to develop and keep up if you want to succeed professionally in the future.

1. Critical Thinking

Future jobs will need workers to continually analyze various situations and possible solutions. Because of that, employees will have to make decisions based on logic and reasoning.

2. Mental Elasticity and Creativity

Further technological advancements will most likely bring new challenges. These will require the ability to think out of the box, create original content, and come up with ground-breaking solutions. 

3. EQ and Interpersonal Skills

Learning how to manage emotions and people is essential in the workplace today. So, if you want to thrive in the future job market, start working on your EQ and people skills.

4. STEAM and SMAC

As technology develops, science, technology, engineering, arts, and math jobs will grow. Thus, your STEAM skills will have advance if you want to land a job in one of these fields. Learning social, mobile, analytical, and cloud (SMAC) skills will be vital for future jobs, too. Fast-developing work environment requires a continual skill and knowledge acquisition. Because of rapid technology development, many jobs have been replaced with new professions in the last 20 years. 

Types of Certification

In Generally, there are three kinds of professional certification including corporate (internal), product-specific and profession-wide. Corporate or internal certifications are company specialized and are designed to meet purposes unique to an organization’s requirements. This certificate has limited portability because of that it has a small value outside of the company, which provided the certification. Product-specific certifications are more compact than corporate certifications and more valuable. Product-specific certification is prevalent in the information technology (IT) industry where professionals can become certified on versions of industry-specific hardware and software platforms, for example, Cisco Certification and Microsoft Certification. The most important type of certification is profession-wide. This sort of certification is created to be portable across a whole industry that makes the holder of this certificate qualified to work in the profession, not just for one segment of the industry or a particular employer. Some need to be renewed periodically or may be valid for a given period as a part of a complete renewal of certification; it is common to show proof of constant learning — often termed continuing education — or earning continuing education units (CEU).

Benefits of Certification

Nowadays professional certifications have found its way into every industry as it helps employers evaluate potential hires, select contractors, analyze job performance, market services, evaluate employees and motivate employees to enhance their skills and knowledge. Certificate holders get the benefit too as it gives recognition of competency; show commitment to the profession, and helps with job advancement. It also makes them more in line with the next promotional progression in their role and demonstrates their employer that are a valuable member of the team and that they willing to learn new things.

As technology, management and science methods change at an ever-increasing rate; a gap formed among the foundation given by an academic study and the technical and management competencies required in now professional and business environment. The Professional Certification Programs were established to bridge this gap. It is founded in almost every industry today. Finance (CPA), Human Resources (SHRM), Supply Chain (APICS), Information Technology (ITIL), Project Management (PMI), are few from a wide range of professions certifications that have voluntary and mandatory certification. Professional Certification benefits are many as employees gain practical abilities for the job focusing on the knowledge and skills at the same time.

Moreover, it realizes maximum benefit from a wide range of expertise areas. In addition to learning all aspects of a particular type of career pursuance, while also providing the industry with a standard of assured excellence from these professionals. It efficiently integrates these career pursuits into one’s particular work setting. Finally, Professional Certification can be Prestige for individual as certification holders get respect via public and also held in high esteem by their peers within the functional community, who see them as part of an elite group. 

If you did not get an after graduation certification yet at any level, I advise you to start looking for one that attracts your interests and helps you in your career development. If you already certified, I invite you to seek a higher-level certification. Embrace certification for yourself, for your profession, but most important, embrace it for the public we serve and protect.