Through programs like the Google Project Management Certificate, a professional online certification course offered for free through Coursera, Google is changing traditional methods of hiring staff.
Google is one of the most popular companies in the world for employers, according to a study by Universum, which also has some of the most talented employees in the world.
But it's not just the tech giant's name and reputation that are attracting candidates. In fact, it is the company's requirements for various positions, or rather, the lack of them.
Candidates no longer need to have great CVs, cover letters and years of work experience. Google is discovering top talent who don't have any degrees or work experience. Google's approach is similar to Elon Musk's "two-handed test" to find the best talent, without the need for degrees. Google's method is more special, as it also eliminates the need for work experience.
Through programs like the Google Project Management Certificate, a professional online certification course offered for free through Coursera, Google is changing traditional methods of hiring staff. After completing the certification course, Google gives interested students the opportunity to engage in one of the project management positions.
Instead of screening candidates by their education or experience, the company measures ability by results from the training course. Through this way, Google is discovering not only the best project managers in the world, but project managers who have the necessary skills to help the company's teams reach the next level.
Google is democratizing how to hire, using three key elements to find the best talent. Almost any business can use the basic framework behind the genius strategy of the $1 trillion-plus company to build better teams.
Discover innovators from a larger pool of candidates
Google's free project management certification course is effectively helping to open up project management positions to anyone.
By removing standard restrictions, such as higher education or direct experience, the company is casting a much larger net over the pool of potential candidates.
In reality, many occupations do not need a degree to be completed. If companies do not consider candidates without a degree in a particular field, or even those without a degree at all, this could be detrimental to finding the most suitable people for a particular role within the organization. The same is true, in many cases, with direct experience.
There are times when it is to the advantage of the employer that the candidate has no previous experience in this field. This is especially true for innovative teams or organizations that don't want things to be done the way they've always been done, or when businesses try to differentiate themselves from competitors by doing things differently.
Lack of experience offers the opportunity to have new perspectives and ideas. In fact, according to Fast Company, one company found that employees with no sales experience outperformed those with 10 to 15 years of sales experience.
Prioritize skill assessment
Getting as many applications as possible is not an end in itself. The goal is to find the best candidate for a given role.
Thus, the high number of applicants would not be of value to Google if there was no way to filter candidates and assess their suitability. The reason why the free online training course is a genius idea has to do with the fact that it serves as a portfolio for the applicants.
This means that Google has an incredible volume of information about each applicant, after collecting the answers to the tasks completed by the applicants. The result of this approach is that each applicant is able to provide a portfolio that demonstrates their work, thought process, leadership and communication skills.
And, most importantly, the course effectively mimics the real job position, showing the candidate's skills to fit into that job.
Invest in employee training
Formal education, like previous experience, does not necessarily mean that one is ready to enter the labor market. Every business operates differently, so regardless of the position you're recruiting for, employers should invest in employee training.
By having candidates who possess the right skills, the employer eliminates the need for them to meet specific requirements for education or experience. Understandably, the average business is not in a position to create a free online certification course like Google. However, there are many ways to improve the hiring process by prioritizing skills rather than education or experience.
One of the fastest ways to achieve this is by putting more emphasis on training new employees to make them work the way you want them to work, not the way their former employer trained them.
After all, if you want to stand out from your competitors in the market you operate in, you'll need to do things differently.
This means finding new talent, with a high level of skills and a different perspective. Limiting your candidate network to only those who have a formal education and many years of experience in the field is a quick way to limit the team's ability to be innovative and reduce the business's opportunity to differentiate itself in a very large market. /INC/monitor/
