Workday Podcast: The Benefits of Skills-Based Hiring for Businesses and Employees

Carrie Varoquiers: Workday  deeply believes in the adage, "Talent is everywhere, but opportunity is not." And it has driven Workday to develop career pathways, or what we call Opportunity Onramps, for individuals from diverse backgrounds for the past decade. It's also a saying that calls attention to the business value of harnessing untapped talent as part of the rapidly growing skills-first hiring and mobility movement. I'm Carrie Varoquiers, chief philanthropy officer at Workday. Today on the Workday podcast, I'm excited to discuss this topic with two people who understand it intimately: Elyse Rosenblum, managing director and founder of Grads of Life, and Celia Soriano, a Year Up program graduate and now a senior associate program manager at Workday with our Digital Customer Success Team. We're having this conversation inside our Workday Forever Forward bus, parked near the Horizons 2024 Power of Us conference, which is hosted by Jobs for the Future in Washington, DC, where we are also screening Workday's new skills-focused documentary film “Untapped.” I couldn't be more thrilled to be here. Elyse and Celia, welcome. So, Elyse, could you start by sharing your background and how those experiences motivate

Elyse Rosenblum: Thanks, Carrie. It's great to be here with you today on the bus. My background, actually, I'm a lawyer by training and had observed that we have a huge opportunity divide here in the country and wondered what would be possible in terms of bringing employers to the table to help solve that opportunity divide. So I founded Grads of Life about a decade ago. We sit inside of Year Up, which is a best-in-class workforce training program that has trained more than 40,000 young adults across the country over the last 20 years and partnered with companies like Workday to place young people in internships. So our mission jointly is to close the opportunity divide. And we do that by working both with employers and with amazing talent.

Varoquiers: Great. Year Up is a treasured partner of the Workday Foundation. Thank you, Elyse. Speaking of Year Up, I'm happy to introduce Celia, who interned at Workday through the program. Celia, could you tell us how you got involved with Year Up and how it paved your way to a position at Workday?

Celia Soriano: Absolutely. Thank you for having me, Carrie and Elyse. I'm Celia Soriano. I am now a full-time employee at Workday, but everything started with the opportunity of attending Year Up. Really, it started during the pandemic. I was attempting to do a traditional college degree and, at the same time, try to support myself. At the time, I was fully independent as a teen, and I really wanted to have something that would really train me and provide me the skills to break into tech. I had always dreamed of something like that for myself. And when I went through Year Up, I did the app development pathway, and they really did train me. They coached me. They saw so many opportunities for me in the future. And so when I matched with Workday, I can't even describe the feeling of just goosebumps where I was like, "I'm so excited. This is so big for me. I never even imagined myself in a corporate setting, but this company is big." And so when I went into Workday, I went in as a software developer. And as I was interning, the managers, my colleagues, they all came from different walks of life before they came to Workday, but they loved their jobs. And they took the time to really coach me, let me shadow, let me make some errors as I was trying to learn something. And it just really told me that this is a place where I can grow as an employee, and this is a place where I can start my career.

Varoquiers: I really appreciate how both of your backgrounds’ highlight the impact of the skills-first movement. Elyse, could you elaborate a little bit on how this talent strategy is really shaping the future of work?

Rosenblum: Absolutely. So sometimes we talk about skills-first talent management. Sometimes we talk about skill-based talent management. But they're really one and the same. And it's an approach that asks employers to focus on skills when thinking about who can be part of your talent solution rather than a traditional four-year degree or job histories or job titles. And I think, actually, in listening to Celia's story, you really understand. She brings to life how important it is for employers to focus on skills and give people who have the skills that you need a chance to get a foot in the door like Workday has done with Celia.

So I think it's also important to mention, skills-first strategies, they're not anti-college. I mean, we all know that the research is very clear. Obtaining a four year degree over the course of a lifetime does pay dividends. And so, certainly, Grads of Life and Year Up, we're not anti-college by any means. We know college is a critical bridge to upward mobility for people in the country, but we don't want it to be a drawbridge.  We don't want it to be the only way people can get a foot in the door for good jobs like the one that Celia has today at Workday. And so it's important, I think, for employers to think about their skills-first strategies, actually, in particular, thinking about internal mobility and creating internal career pathways where people can continue to obtain skills and grow and maybe move laterally and then advance inside their organization. And when companies do this well, it does deliver business benefit.

We have seen in our work with employers that skills-first talent management practices increase your hiring pool, so you're going to dramatically expand your access to talent by maybe 10 times. So it's a pretty big move. If you're an employer that has trouble finding talent, skills-first can really help you there. It can increase by 8 times the number of women in your talent pool for fields where women are underrepresented. So that's a way to really increase your diversity and remain competitive. For other employers, the problem is around retention, and skills-first can really help with your retention because employees see, "Oh, this is a company that's going to invest in me, that's going to create mobility pathways for me." So you will see increased retention rates for employers that are adopting skills-first strategies.

So there's no one-size-fits-all business case around skills-first, but depending on the business problem you're solving, we definitely see impact. Recent research suggests companies that use skills-first strategies are 98% more likely to retain high performers. That's a big deal. You want to do that as an employer, so definitely pays business benefits. And companies that are furthest along, I would say, in their skills-first journey and really digging in on the data-- Walmart, for example, has been doing this for a number of years. Obviously, a large retail employer with a huge frontline workforce, but they're finding, their stores that really lean into their skills-first practices, the top third of those stores have a 23% higher NPS score with their customers. That's money in the bank for Walmart. So definitely can pay business benefits to adopt these skills-first practices.

Varoquiers: Awesome. Thanks so much for sharing those statistics. And Celia, can you provide a real-life perspective on how these insights that Elyse just shared translate at the personal level? How does a skills-first strategy work to help people like you and others at Year Up land an opportunity at a company like Workday and how continuously developing new skills has helped you succeed in your role?

Soriano: Like Elyse said, education is so vital for someone like me who's a minority, who's first-generation. And I couldn't do it at the moment because of economic instability. And so, now that I am now a full-time employee at Workday, I've been able to go back to school. I'm currently still pursuing my college degree. And now, I'm really proud to say that I'm also on the board of a local nonprofit in Atlanta that serves underprivileged Latino students like myself. And so I think that Workday, as a company, and Year Up, as an organization, doesn't just care about what the person can produce and work. They really want to pour into what makes the person, what makes them tick, what fuels them. And so I wouldn't have been able to do all these things, return to pursuing my degree, be an advocate in my community without the structure of them really seeing me as a person. Not just for seeing, "Oh, she's a minority. She doesn't have a degree at the moment. She doesn't have experience." They said, "We can work with this. There is potential here." And I feel like I'm very grateful to my current manager because she has really taken the time to build me up. She has poured so much into me, and Workday has poured so much into me, and that's why I'm so happy to be here to be a testament to what Year Up can produce and what Workday has built up. And now, I get to bring it back full circle.

Varoquiers: Yeah, you're a perfect example of the skills, aptitude, and ability that companies can tap into if they expand the talent pool and the funnel that they're hiring from. So we are here at Horizons 2024, the Power of Us Conference, which is hosted by the Jobs for the Future, where we're currently recording this podcast. So Elyse, which discussions at this summit are you most excited about?

Rosenblum: Well, I think, I mean, it's a jam-packed agenda. And I'm really excited that Horizons is so focused this year on both skills-first as a theme and also the power of AI. They've really made a big bet on AI and how that may-- I mean is changing the future of work and work as we know it. I'm excited to dig in on some of the sessions that really bring those two themes together because I think, done well and done thoughtfully, AI can play a role in accelerating adoption of skills-first talent management. When you think about some of the things that make that hard today, redoing job descriptions, screening your talent. Right now, we don't have an easy alternative proxy for a four-year degree. I think AI is going to really help move us towards that solution. And so I'm excited to hear what people are talking about in that domain.

Also, just taking a bigger step back, it's an amazing opportunity for people in what is now a field that didn't exist just five or six years ago to come together and really share what they're doing, what they're learning, what some of the challenges are. This morning, I was at a breakfast narrowly focused on measuring the impact of adopting skills-first talent management. It's amazing to me that there's a whole conversation about that little slice of the work. It's also an opportunity, I think, for employers to talk to each other and really hear what's working well for them in adopting skills-first talent management. They don't often have an opportunity to talk to each other about this. And at Grads of Life and our work with employers, we know hearing from each other is one of the best ways for them to understand what works well. And I mean, just hearing Celia's story is so inspiring, of course. And for her to be able to talk about her experience, and then for employers to be able to learn from Workday, "What are you doing differently? How are you partnering with Year Up? What kind of contributions is Celia making?" is really compelling for employers that may be earlier in this journey. So those are some of the things I'm excited about for Horizons.

Varoquiers: Yeah, I'm also really glad to see such a focus on the intersection of AI and the skills-first movement at this conference. Also at the Horizons conference, Workday will be hosting a screening of Untapped, a feature-length documentary film about the skills-first hiring movement, which is scheduled to debut on Netflix this fall. This film is aimed at hiring managers everywhere in every industry, and it delves into the skills-first hiring and mobility movement and aims to unlock opportunities for the vast pool of untapped talent that surrounds us. Celia and Elyse, what are your thoughts on the film? Why is it vital to bring these stories to the forefront of people's awareness?

Rosenblum: I am so excited about the Untapped film. It's incredible to have an opportunity to really bring the stories to the broad public. And today, I would say the skills-first movement exists within a small circle of employers.

Varoquiers: But growing.

Rosenblum: Small but growing. Small but mighty. But what the film does and what's so incredible is it's going to take these critical messages about the power of untapped talent, about how employers can change their hiring practices directly to hiring managers in their living rooms. And that's something that has never happened before. And it's going to be really, I think, a game-changer, frankly, for this work and open up opportunity dramatically. The other thing I really love about the film is it focuses on real people and their stories, like the story we've heard from Celia. And this is about something that's good for business, but ultimately, it's about creating opportunity for people who have been locked out of that opportunity. And I think, for most people in this country, that's a core value. That's deeply rooted in our values as a country. And so I think, for hiring managers to begin to understand, they have the power to increase access to opportunity for people just by thinking differently about where they look for talent and how they screen their talent and do their hiring processes. That's really exciting. So I could not be more excited about the film.

Soriano: And for me, watching the film really filled me with hope that these conversations are being seen at this high level, that diverse voices are being seen and heard. And watching the film, seeing them be excited, be nervous about the training, and them having their confidence built up, and even that moment where they hold their breath as they wait to hear who they're matched up with, what company they're going to be interning at, I held my breath with them. I remember that moment of like, "Who am I going to be? Where am I going to be learning?" And so I just feel so hopeful for them and so identified with them because that was my journey as well: going to class, but still having a troubling life at the same time, but having this aspiration to be more, to achieve more. And I'm just so happy that this film is happening, and I hope that inspires other students like me to believe in themselves. And I hope it inspires employers to see what their one decision to see someone from an untraditional path and give them a chance-- to see their impact is just much bigger than that one decision to give them a chance, so…

Rosenblum: The film is incredibly moving and really does bring in that personal narrative, which I think is the thing that will bring more and more people to the table. I'm curious, Carrie, how you all at Workday think about your role in the skills-first movement and just to hear a little bit about how you stepped into thinking about this film as a way to grow the movement and help close the divide in the country?

Varoquiers: The Workday product has always focused on skills, and those products and services have grown in sophistication and breadth exponentially with the introduction of ML and AI. But as the Chief Philanthropy Officer, I want to focus in on our social impact programs. So we began by launching our Opportunity Onramps hiring program in 2014, aimed at providing untapped talent with an onramp to a thriving wage career through paid three-to-six-month internships at Workday. We began with Opportunity Youth, partnering with Year Up, and then expanded the program over time to include military veterans and returners. We piloted and incubated that program on the social impact team, but it was so successful that it grew and moved onto our HR function and just became a standard part of our overall talent strategy, which is awesome.

And then in 2015, we launched Workforce Week as a way to get more of our employees involved in the skills-first movement. So we hosted job seekers from a wide variety of skills training programs in our offices around the world, and our employees conducted mock interviews and resume reviews and helped answer job-seeker questions and connected with them to provide professional social capital that's often needed for a successful job search. We just had our 10th Workforce Week in June, which I'm super proud of.

In 2018, we hosted the first Opportunity Onramps Conference in San Francisco, where we gathered business and nonprofit leaders together to discuss skills for strategies and approaches that could be replicated at scale to kick open the doors of opportunity for more job seekers. And at that time, there wasn't a lot of discussion happening in the business about the skills-first talent imperative. And then, of course, the Workday Foundation has been supporting this movement for a decade now by investing in nonprofit training organizations like Year Up and others that are moving people from unemployment or low-wage work into thriving-wage careers within 6 to 12 months.

We really remain steadfast in our commitment to creating career pathways that unleash human potential and ensuring that we work tirelessly to close the opportunity gap because we really believe it's good for business, it's good for our economy, and it's good for individuals and families. So thank you for giving me that time. I could easily spend the entire day chatting with you two. As we end the podcast, what is the key message you would like our listeners to take away? I'll start with you, Elyse.

Rosenblum: I think the key message is, "Talent is everywhere," and for hiring managers across the country to really think about your role and how you can change how you find, recruit, hire, retain, and advance talent. You have that power. The skills-first movement is here to support you in changing how you operate, and I think the film is going to just be a game-changer in this work across the country.

Varoquiers: Thanks. Celia?

Soriano: I have two things to say. For someone like me, two years ago, I would want to say, "Believe that you can. Believe that things are changing, and that there's somewhere out there in the corporate world that will see you, and that you can be of value through skills, training, and to pursue your education." And then for managers, like I said, that one decision to call someone back and not dismiss an untraditional employee can be life-changing for you, for the company, for your own personal development. It's just immense, the impact that one decision can make, and you can make that. So I would encourage managers everywhere to be more open-minded and really believe in skills-first.

Varoquiers: And that is a great note to end our conversation on. Thank you for being here. I really appreciate your time and the insights that you've both shared. We've been speaking with Elyse Rosenblum, Managing Director and Founder of Grads of Life, and Celia Soriano, a Year Up alum and, now, a senior associate program manager with our Digital Customer Success Team at Workday. Remember to follow us wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts. And remember, you can find our entire catalog at workday.com/podcasts. I'm your host, Carrie Varoquiers, and I hope you have a great workday.