LinkedIn: Skills trump qualification and experience
PETALING JAYA: LinkedIn’s ‘Future of Talent’ report revealed that Malaysian companies prefer to hire candidates with skills over qualifications like education or experience.
It found that skills will continue to pave the way for economic recovery and growth – and will eventually become the new currency for workers in the future world of work.
It stated that local companies are willing to tap on existing talent to fill open roles, on top of hiring externally and many companies have a dedicated training program to help their employees learn new skills.
The report also found that human resource (HR) played a bigger role during the pandemic, such as taking the lead in training employees. In the post Covid-19 era, the professional network opined that HR is set to be at the forefront of company strategy.
“Last year, we saw skills rise to the fore – workers were starting to pick up new skills, and organisations began to practice skillsbased hiring,” it said.
Moving forward, this trend is set to continue, as it reported more companies in the country prefer to hire candidates with technical skills (38%) and transferable skills (28%) over traditional qualifiers like education (10%) and minimum years of experience (12%). In fact, 67% of companies stated that they are open to hiring employees from another industry if the skills they possess match the job requirements.
With the shift towards skills, the report stated that companies are able to plug vital skills gaps while reaping the rewards of a more diverse and adaptable workforce.
To meet demand, it also found that companies are becoming more open to tapping on talent within the organisation to fill open roles, as 85% of companies in Malaysia are willing to hire internally as they can leverage existing employees’ insider’s perspective (72%), provide a sense of progress to employees (65%), and encourage loyalty (56%).
Consequently, it revealed that Malaysian companies seek out problem solving skill, communication skills, and strategic thinking when hiring internally, with the first being the most sought after at 46% compared to other markets in the Asia-Pacific.
With the pandemic, LinkedIn AsiaPacific’s talent and learning solutions’ vice president Feon Ang observed the creation of new roles as well as the evolution of existing ones and hiring talents with the right skill set for their roles is more important that traditional qualifications or industry experience.
“Going forward, we can expect to see a skills-based economy take shape, with skills becoming the new currency for workers in the future world of work,” she said in a statement.
Likewise, HR leaders have tapped on the power of data and insights to implement skills based hiring processes.
The professional network stated almost nine in 10 Malaysian companies understand the importance of data-driven insights in the hiring decision.
The report found local companies (55%) lead the region in using data very frequently for mapping skills with open position requirements, particularly in identifying skills needed in the future (57%), top technical skills required for a particular role or profile (55%) and measuring employee performance (52%).
Ang highlighted that since skills are the current and future engine of growth it is critical that HR and business leaders are equipped with advanced tools like data analytics.