Reduce Your Hiring Costs, Upskill and Certify Your Existing Workforce Instead.

3 Simple Strategies to Promote Upskilling in Your Organization

Upskilling and certifying your team has and will always be the most vital part of keeping your team productive and at the forefront of change.
We’ve rounded up some of what we believe to be the three most important strategies to implement to secure a constant pool of talent in your organization, some of these you already know too well but sometimes we just need a friendly reminder:

1. Encourage your team to create their personalized upskilling plan

It sounds simple but by encouraging your team to challenge their learning journey you help them become responsible and autonomous in their own learning and development. The Nanolearning trend—a miniature version of microlearning—is at an all-time high as attention spans decline, screen fatigue increase and more organizations move to a more distributed workforce model. Professionals across all spectrums are taking control of their learning by adopting just-in-time learning methodologies to support their curious minds. Help your team set their learning goals and help them to create a structured learning plan that will support a positive direction with definitive outcomes that meet the needs of both the individual and organizations’ goals.

2. Focus on role-based skills

What skills will your team use regularly? Focus on that. But also remember to consider what roles your team plays within the organization. For instance, a junior software developer may want to focus on improving their proficiency in a different or new stack instead of limiting their trajectory by only focusing on their knowledge of a single stack. Allow your team to create a list of experiences and skills that they would like to acquire, use that as a guide and update it annually.

3. Continuously evaluate your teams’ skills

Discover creative ways to evaluate the skills your team have achieved and encourage them to apply these new skills in the workplace, this will do wonders for building a capable and motivated workforce especially in fields of technology and will help make your organization more competitive. There are many approaches to evaluating your teams including observation, simulation, questioning and testing.

Proactive Upskilling Turns the Flywheel

According to the Pluralsight State of Upskilling report, only 41% of technologists reported levels of proficiency of expertise before using online skills development tools pivoting to 65% after using such tools. In 2021, 94% of employees reported that their companies facilitated opportunities for them to develop their technology skills.

So, at Knowledge Pillars we conclude that upskilling is not about learning as many skills as possible instead it is about mastering specific skill sets in a certain area, validating those skills and benefiting from them in the real world.

So, Do You Reduce Costs by Upskilling Your Workforce?

Yes. The cost of upskilling your workforce is significantly smaller than hiring and training a new employee. Investing in your existing workforce can help you create a more well-rounded, cross-trained workforce that will undoubtedly increase your team’s effectiveness and retention rates.

What Gallup referred to as—a fixable problem that cost U.S. businesses one trillion dollars—shows an organizations’ cost of replacing an individual employee ranging from one-half to two times the employee’s annual salary. In other words, hiring someone new to fill a role that earns $100,000 a year could cost the organization up to $200,000. Their research further shows that more than half of existing employees (51%) said that in the three months before they left, neither their manager nor any other leader spoke with them about their job satisfaction or future with the organisation.

According to Udacity for Enterprise data, a multinational telecommunications company, Telenor has saved over $9 million to date by upskilling its internal talent. Telenor improved their efficiencies and reduced it’s need for contractors or third-party consultancies.

In the latest article by Udacity—Why Upskilling Your Workforce is Your Best Option—they said “When employees feel like their jobs are secure, and the company they work for truly cares about their well-being, they’re likely to do much better work. Upskilling your employees shows that you don’t view them as just a commodity, but an integral part of your company’s success.”

Final Thoughts

According to the 2020 salary survey by CertMag, 49.4% of the IT professionals surveyed use skills learned or enhanced through certification several times a day at their current jobs they further indicate that achieving certification is not only about short-term gains. The report shows that 48% have been working in a job role that directly utilizes one or more of their certified skills for longer than ten years.

Adopt a continuous learning culture in your organization, focus on role-based skills, and continue to evaluate and validate your teams’ performance through accredited certifications. Consider the Knowledge Pillars coding and web editing certification exams to validate your teams’ specific coding skill-sets or align them to your recruitment strategies. With its combined linear and live-in-the-app testing methodology you will start to build a motivated workforce, save costs and see your business thrive.