How micro-credentials are helping small businesses fight the skills gap

The COVID-19 pandemic has seen small businesses around Australia buckling under the pressures of serious labour shortages. Sickness, uncertainty, and a lack of skilled migrants entering the country have resulted in unfilled job roles and unhappy customers.

Even before the pandemic reared its head, skills shortages were a huge issue across a range of small businesses. Rapidly changing technology in the world of retail, digital marketing, web design, and UX has left many businesses unable to find staff with the right skills for the job.

Existing employees are willing to learn, but are often left without guidance about how and where to look for education. A study by Gartner found that 58 per cent of employees felt that they needed new skills in order to successfully do their work. Plus, technology is moving so rapidly that many traditional university or TAFE courses can
be out of date before they’re even published.

Filling the skills gap

Thankfully, micro-credentials are starting to step in where more traditional training has failed. Micro-credentials are bite-sized chunks of education that employers can provide to new or existing staff members, without stepping foot in a ‘traditional’ university or higher education setting.

Whether via an online course, bootcamp certificate or apprenticeship, specialty provider, or online learning platforms such as Learning Vault, micro-credentials and short courses are fast becoming a vital addition to CVs across a range of industries.

Unlike a full university degree, micro-credentials are flexible, adaptable, and often can be completed in a student’s chosen time frame. Online learning programs allow both students and teachers to track students’ progress through the course material, with clear goalposts and tasks along the way. Subjects can range from broad topics such as coding, to more narrow focuses such as how to train your staff on a particular piece of software.

For small businesses, micro-credentials provide a fast, convenient solution to the skills shortage without breaking the bank. They’re also a great way to upskill existing or more junior staff, removing the added cost of finding a new hire.

Awarding digital badges

When it comes to micro-credentials, verifying skills has traditionally been a challenge. How can employers trust the legitimacy of the wide range of courses, or tell the difference between a one-day course and one that took several months to complete?

Small businesses don’t have the luxury of a large HR team. Often, business leaders are left in charge of hiring, which they must complete in between the mountain of other tasks they have to complete each day.

Imagine how much faster it would be if busy small business owners could instantly prove that a potential hire has done what they say they’ve done, or automatically filter by candidates with the skills they need.

Increasingly, digital badges are stepping in to bridge this gap. Digital badges are a virtual acknowledgement of an earned credential, demonstrated skill or professional achievement. They’re a simple, secure way to share verified achievements or activities with businesses, employers, organisations, or through personal social media accounts.

When a student completes a short course and is awarded a micro-credential, certificates can be stored in their very own digital passport, or ‘backpack’, which is a digital portfolio containing an individual’s earned credentials. Credentials can then be shared confidentially with businesses that need to know, or publicly via social media, email, or text message.

With so many small businesses desperate for high-quality talent, the case for short courses and micro-credentials is clear. With the right training and tech in place, it’s high time small businesses closed the skills gap for good.