Skill Valuation Prize

jordangiali

This prize would challenge teams to create a real-time, easily accessible indicator measuring the “value” of a given hard or soft skill. This tool will provide vulnerable workers with crucial information on what skills to invest in when making their future career plans. It would also encourage their employers to invest in training and upskilling programs. With better information, vulnerable workers would be able to match their aptitudes, interests and current life situations to the skills that are likely to be in demand in the future. Teams would be required to develop the tool/platform, then successfully implement it in order to win.

NickOttens

@karchopra, @JayeEspyMD, @tjforsyth, I'd like to ask your opinion on this idea for an XPRIZE competition.

Specifically, if you think it would be audacious - but achievable - in order to help low-skilled and low-wage workers?

tjforsyth

@NickOttens - thanks for the mention and happy to offer some preliminary thoughts on the idea.

First, indicators like this as a proxy for "value" are definitely doable and some already exist - some come in the form of an index, "Salary Boosting Skills", and / or their actual dollar contribution. Some might argue that the wage / salary is already a rough measure on a required skill set.

Second, the design of the indicator would really depend on the definition of "value". And you would want to be careful in how you define that - stability of the skill over time, return on salary, return on expected salary + demand growth, transferability to other occupations, necessity, projected growth etc.

Third, dynamic capability should be a core consideration as you wouldn't want your definition or indicator design being mapped to attributes of the past. Something that can evolve in real-time with the labour market - both supply and demand - will be important. This is one of the things we do at FutureFit AI in terms of bringing together supply and demand side data points together in measuring a FutureFit Score of occupation based on multiple dimensions that are tracked in real time.

Ultimately, skills and their value are very subjective to the context and audience interpreting the indicator, so a flexible and comprehensive design will be critical. Maybe a skill gap analyzer between any two occupations that provides a measure + ranking system on those skills personalized to the individual, occupations, and location?

Happy to chat more on this if helpful.

ramdhanyk

From a worker stand point, skill recognition/mobility will be of a high value as it allows them to charter their career path in rapidly changing nature of work.

HeatherSutton

@tjforsyth - WOW! Thank you so much for these great considerations. Would love to dive deeper into this with you and I'll reach out to you shortly to see if we can't get another chat on the books Sincerely, thank you!

HeatherSutton

@ramdhanyk - I absolutely agree! I'd love to have a tool like this at my finger tips! And imagine the benefit to employers as they are onboarding new employees. A tool like this could really help chart their first 30/60/90 days on the job to ensure a successful probation period.

ukarvind

just want to add to the ongoing discussion -- that skills/courses intended at "learning to manage change", "how to learn lifelong" are probably more useful in these circumstances than any solution that aims to meet some transient market demand (eg: AI) as a way to develop a skilled workforce. Technological innovations and rapid changes/evolutions will make "change management" an important tool in the arsenal and i believe such a tool should be accessible to all, regardless of skill-level or wage-level. Only then can we cultivate a "growth mindset" to enable and empower workers across strata. I havent seen courses like this offered generally, so i think this should be part of ongoing discussion. Another course that affects everyone is "financial literacy", something very rarely taught even in advanced programs.