iDatafy LLC today announces the launch of end-to-end skills-based hiring tools in the SmartResume Talent Marketplace to help employers attract and discover qualified job seekers. This skills-first talent discovery marketplace is designed to unlock hidden talent by maximizing trust, minimizing barriers, and empowering better recruiting practices.
Employers can now:
These features build upon the marketplace’s infrastructure for verifiable credentials and Learning and Employment Records, enabling a seamless and trustworthy hiring process.
Skills-based hiring is transforming the recruitment landscape. By prioritizing demonstrated skills and competencies over traditional proxies like degrees and work experience, companies can:
Traditional hiring practices often rely on outdated proxies for skills, such as degrees or years of experience, which fail to capture an individual’s true capabilities. This shift toward skills-first hiring enables companies to focus on the qualities that matter most: agility, problem-solving, and job-specific expertise.
"While skills-based hiring emerges as a powerful strategy to attract top talent, the tools employers and job seekers use to discover each other remain trapped in an old paradigm. Skills are the common currency that qualify individuals for jobs and career advancement, but for years we have used work experience and education as a proxy for skills rather than making the skills explicit in the hiring process."
– Dave Wengel, Founder and CEO of iDatafy
This new set of employer tools and skills-matching features was developed in partnership with Arizona State University through a SkillsFWD grant.
“Our Work + Learn team is redesigning the student employment experience from end-to-end. Through our work helping students articulate their skills, we realized that employers have significant expectations for resumes even for entry-level jobs. We need a new set of tools to focus on skill matches, not how ‘good’ the resume is or how they perform in an interview. These tools help us do that, and we’re excited to pilot them and see if they help students who may otherwise not have been considered for jobs land those jobs.”
– Brandee Popaden-Smith, Director of Work + Learn, Arizona State University
Many job descriptions rely heavily on arbitrary requirements like years of experience or irrelevant credentials. These practices often exclude qualified candidates.
“We say we want to evaluate candidates based on their actual capabilities, but our job descriptions are still obsessed with proxies like degrees and years of experience that tell us exactly nothing about someone's ability to do the work. Here's a wild idea: maybe, just maybe, describing jobs like they're shopping lists of random credentials ('must have 5-7 years experience in a tool that launched 3 years ago') isn't actually helping anyone. The real problem isn't that candidates can't understand our job descriptions - it's that most of them are perpetuated by an industry that measures success by how many requirements we can cram into a single posting. If we're serious about skills-based hiring, we need to start by articulating what skills actually matter, not what credentials we assume might indicate them.”
– Matt Charney, Chief Marketing Officer, Employer.com
SmartResume’s tools empower employers to redefine how they articulate talent needs, fostering a more inclusive and effective hiring process.
Employers can create detailed Talent Profiles that outline the skills required for specific roles. Key features include:
SmartResume’s enhancements extend to credential-issuing organizations, which can leverage the platform to:
“At Junior Achievement our workforce strategy centers on empowering young adults with the skills they need to prepare for meaningful careers. Through our partnerships with Accredible and SmartResume, we make these skills formally visible and help students uncover skills they wouldn’t otherwise think to include on their resume. The evolution of the SmartResume Talent Marketplace to make skills explicit in the recruiting process is a game changer that enables employers to more efficiently recognize and value the talent of the young people we serve.”
– Holly Garner, Vice President, Head of Workforce, Junior Achievement
“As an employer myself, I know firsthand how important it is to be able to trust the skills candidates present on their resumes. At Bioscience Core Skills Institute, we specialize in validating skills through rigorous, authentic, performance-based assessments. I see immense value in a platform that integrates VC-verified skills with a broader self-attested skills profile. This combination provides employers with the confidence they need while offering a more comprehensive view of the candidate’s potential. This will streamline hiring. And with resumes being drafted by AI programs, we are going to sorely need tools like SmartResume.”
– Angela Consani, CEO, Bioscience Core Skills Institute
SmartResume’s new suite of tools combines the strengths of the Learning and Employment Record ecosystem with straightforward tools for employers and job seekers to engage with each other using skills as the primary language.
With this common language as a foundation:
Ready to transform how you hire?
Visit SmartResume.com today to explore the Talent Marketplace and start building your skills-based hiring strategy.
To view our privacy policy, click here
We are thrilled to share that SmartResume is part of two of the six winning SkillsFWD proposals announced today in Bentonville, Arkansas. The SkillsFWD initiative is designed to catalyze a skills-based future powered by Learning and Employment Records. SmartResume is a core team member of both the Accelerate Montana and Arizona State University winning proposals.
Junior Achievement students will be able to create digitally verified SmartResumes showcasing their accomplishments and easily connect with trusted Junior Achievement employer partners through the new platform
Entrepreneur Of The Year celebrates ambitious entrepreneurs who are building bolder futures
SmartResume and Learning Economy Foundation (LEF) have partnered to help individuals tell their unique story amid an increasingly crowded and complex labor market
