Worker “Prior Learning Assessment” – Documenting Cumulative Work Skills and Knowledge Acquisition

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

Older workers, boomers, generation X’ers and Millennials, have either encountered or seen the point on the horizon when they may be separated from their job and need to sum up the training, education, skills and experiences of the last years, or lifetime to date, in a one or two page resume as they hunt for the next open position. How does one accurately and adequately summarize 5, 10, or 40 years of experience so the next potential employer can recognize the value and determine the fit to their organization’s needs? Can a person profile their life experiences and skill acquisition in a way that is complete and compelling?

For the last 20 years, many employers have used a “key-word” search filter to scan resumes, disqualifying millions of potential workers for not knowing the right words to match the key-word to explain their experience. Now that a vast majority of employers have realized the deficiencies of resume scanning programs – disqualifying well-qualified candidates for one – they are back to looking for substance in the resume to be substantiated at the interview. Being able to succinctly and completely summarize one’s education, training and work experience is more important than ever as more qualified people compete for fewer quality jobs.

The new generation of high school graduates will encounter the same challenge, but unfortunately have less content to draw upon. But from the moment they enter the workforce they are adding value to their personal portfolio for every seminar they attend and every job for which they obtain and apply new skills and master new tasks. For every type of worker this “accounting” represents their value to their current and future employer and vital to maintaining their place in the economy.

For many, they have yet to take an inventory of their personal worth and “intellectual capital,” and have failed to clearly detail it for anyone else to accurately sense the same value. Many have never even thought about it until pushed to take an inventory or explain their worth through job loss?

We can all ask ourselves this: “If I was put on the spot to sum up my life experiences and skills attained to justify to my current employer why they should retain me, or a new employer why they should hire me, could I do it? Try it. Where does one begin? Someone with 20-30 years of experience in a job classification probably could write the book on tasks they have mastered, the skills they have acquired and their experiences. Yet they might struggle to come up with one page’s worth because, through the process of becoming an expert, they have filed away long ago the nuances of the work they perform; they are on “automatic.” Drawing that detail out takes an effort, to be complete.

More and more employers, workforce development agencies and elected officials are recognizing the importance of documenting “prior learning experience.” Prior Learning Assessment efforts are emerging world-wide as a supplement to the credential driven world of traditional education. Employers see the value in this as they see a lot of highly educated and degreed displaced workers competing for the same job classifications as the highly experienced but lacking formal education workers. Workers with high experience but lacking in credentials might be overlooked and true talent and value lost.

Since its inception in 1987, Proactive Technologies’ PROTECH© system of managed human resource development has addressed the value of not only prior learning and experience but newly gained skills and task mastery through employment, as well. This is one of the building blocks of the managed human resource development approach – measuring the value of structured on-the-job training added incrementally to the employee or trainee’s overall capacity on a continuous basis.

In order to be able to do this effectively and credibly, first a job/task analysis is performed for the job for which the trainee has been hired. The job analysis takes an inventory of the tasks that the new-hire will be expected to master and perform. The task analysis breaks each task into its best practice procedural steps, additional requirements, and KSAs (“knowledge, skills and abilities” necessary to master the task; achieved either prior to this job or acquired while learning the task). The PROTECH©  software has a library of codified skills and abilities, with definitions, ranging from the core skills and abilities to advanced skills and abilities – making comparing jobs to jobs, people to jobs and jobs to people easy.

Obviously some decision was made that the transferable skills the new-hire brings to the job exist. So, the first step after hiring is corroborate this by taking an inventory of which tasks for the job classification the individual has mastered prior to hiring, which can be proved through performance observed by the subject matter expert. An employee file is setup in the PROTECH software for each employee and each task mastered is flagged in the employee’s file. Since the job classification has already been analyzed, for each task flagged it is now known which core and advanced skills and abilities are being utilized and, therefore, the employee possesses so far. At this initial assessment time, the employee is asked to provide other information such as pre-hire work experience and pre-education, which is added to their file.

We perform this same inventory on incumbent workers to find out which tasks they mastered and which they have yet not had a chance to learn and master. Often the “unused capacity” represented by unmastered tasks starts at the 50-60% range, a clear indication of untapped potential and labor costs that do not match the expected capacity. We ask incumbents to provide pre-hire work experience and education, as well, to set a “baseline” and “grandfather” them into the structured on-the-job training program.

We then generate for both cohorts a customized structured On-the-Job Training Checklist binder which starts the structured on-the-job training experience for employees going forward. We follow them through internal job transfers and temporary assignments to ensure all tasks mastered and skills demonstrated or earned while employed are documented. We continue to add new classroom and training courses completed to their file in addition to other significant events and accomplishments, such as credentials awarded and awards received.

Both groups are driven to the same level of “full job mastery.” Upon reaching full job mastery, a certificate signed by the employer’s top management and by the educational and training partners, and a portfolio summarizing the employee’s complete development to date (including definitions of core and advanced skills to make it easier for the reviewer to understand the value), is conveyed.

We have noticed that both the employee and employer are greatly interested in the portfolio content, and employees take pride in being able to now explain their cumulative value and experience. We have noticed that it has shown improvements in morale and personal self-worth after they have been able to step back and review their life accomplishments.

With the benefit of the PROTECH system, this approach can be setup for graduates of educational institutions, dislocated workers, veterans and disadvantaged youth. No matter where any potential worker is in their life cycle, there is something to document that expresses value. We all have to start somewhere. Being able to take a moment to inventory prior learning and prior experience makes it easier to add to it as new skills and experiences are developed.

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