“Market Research

From June through October 2019, the DCL team engaged in market research to uncover insights in order to answer three critical questions: (1) Who is our target audience, and what do they need, want, and value? (2) Which skill gaps represent the best opportunity space for our learners? (3) What does the competitive landscape look like?

The process began with a survey of the existing landscape as well as an analysis of labor and job demand data. This provided a foundation for ethnographic interviews with both frontline workers and hiring managers regarding how they approach learning new skills, as well as their up-skilling and re-skilling needs. By exploring market models, trends, competitive strategies, and engaging the voice of the learner through quantitative and qualitative research, the DCL team sought clarity on the micro-credentials market to create more accessible and workforce-aligned solutions for future learners. Specific strategies employed to conduct the market research included:

Competitor Profiles. The DCL team mapped the 2019 landscape of micro-credentials and pro- filed 60-plus competitors, spanning higher education, industry, indirect competition, platforms, and enablers, to learn what initiatives were succeeding, which were less successful, and what problems were being solved and created for learners in the market today.

Competitive Analysis. Using qualitative data collected through competitor profiles, the DCL team was able to complete a competitive analysis of micro-credential providers by their cost and catalog (market focus) to identify market trends and areas for opportunity.

Case Studies. The DCL team focused on employers who were tackling re-skilling needs internally, as well as novel approaches by higher education and adjacent fields to meet re-skilling needs externally in order to better understand approaches to the micros market.

Skills Gaps Analysis. Focusing on both national and regional skills gaps, the DCL team worked with EMSI, a labor market data and research firm, to identify opportunities for micros to fill skills gaps and analyzed the contextual requirements of those skills gaps.

Ethnographic Research. Partnering with Kotsonis (2019) from Storyline, a research firm in Exeter, NH, the DCL team interviewed frontline employees and hiring managers across the country to identify pain points, wants, and needs from higher education, and reactions to the concept of micro-credentials (Kotsonis, 2019).

Jobs to be Done Analysis. Analyzing types of learners by the job to be done allowed the DCL team to further understand prospective learner wants and needs, and how micro-credentials could solve for their jobs to be done (Christensen Institute, 2021).

Findings from the market research work stream were synthesized to generate an understanding of the voice of the learner, voice of the employer, and opportunity spaces for micro-credentials.

Voice of the Learner

Through an analysis of national educational attainment statistics, and from both qualitative and quanti- tative data about adult learners, the DCL team found that learners who are most likely to adopt micro- credentials today are those who are more educated and who have successfully navigated higher education at some point already (Institute of Education Sciences, 2018). Learners who have a high school diploma or some college are looking for learning solutions that are accessible and immediate, and which are tied to the workforce (Institute of Education Sciences, 2018). Despite the need, their lack of experience navigating educational systems, and significant anxiety around student loan debt, are blocks to seeking the education needed by these learners (Kotsonis, 2019).

Ethnographic research by Kotsonis (2019) revealed that frontline employees need learning solutions that are low-risk and high value. Frontline employees are looking for solutions that give them control over when, where, and how they learn. They want learning that is flexible, shortened, and user- friendly. They want to make sure that any financial investment in their education will have direct results on their economic mobility in the short-term, and they would like options that can serve as pathways into degrees, should they choose to pursue that at a later time. Any solution for these learners must seamlessly fit into their lives without major disruptions.

Based on the synthesis of these findings, the DCL team identified three central jobs to be done for learners for which micro-credentials were a potential solution:

Help me step it up: Workers who are feeling pressure within their existing career path to get those skills that will help them manage a looming milestone or get to the next step. Frontline employees will be most impacted by automation, they may not seek micros but may eventually be forced into re-skilling.

Help me extend myself: Those workers looking for opportunities to advance their careers and challenging themselves by learning emerging or adjacent skills. Driven by intrinsic motivation.

Help me get back in the game: Displaced workers and those at risk of displacement, including the underemployed. Micros offer these learners pathways to opportunities. This audience is financially needy and requires transparent and tangible links to opportunity.

The business industry demands significant shifts in re-skilling and up-skilling. Time to program completion and the financial constraints of traditional degree programs are becoming more significant and difficult for working learners. Employees are seeking solutions that deliver the precise skills needed, with a shortened time to completion, and low economic risk. Later feasibility studies and pilots enabled the DCL team to pressure test these findings against multiple audiences, validating market research find- ings and revealing additional avenues for exploration (see Internal Studies and External Pilots section).

Skill Gaps and Voice of the Employer

The ecosystem of working and learning is shifting; where once learning and working were siloed and independent endeavors, there are emerging signals of the necessity of integrating working and learning (Leopold et al., 2018). Beyond tuition reimbursement benefits, employers now connect their employees/ learners with up-skilling opportunities, and learning is aligned around on-the-job experiences. Major national employers, such as Amazon, are investing billions of dollars in re-skilling their [current] workforce to meet new demands in industry innovation and automation (Shuetz, 2019).

The exponential growth of automation across major industries will force broad re-skilling efforts. Employers across international economies surveyed by the World Economic Forum (Leopold et al., 2018) estimate that, “by 2022, no less than 54% of all employees will require significant re-skilling and up-skilling” (p. 25). Employers will not be able to replace their entire workforce as skill mismatches increase, and employees will not be able to devote years to gaining a new degree. Human Resources managers will need to match jobs to employees through skills, both those already held and those that can be quickly attained.

Ethnographic research by Kotsonis (2019) revealed key findings for hiring managers:

Hiring managers are burdened by pressure to “not hire the wrong person”

Hiring managers identify a lack of professional skills in applicants, and aren’t prepared to train for them

Hiring managers encounter challenges in finding the right solution for training employees.

Hiring managers have opposing viewpoints on micro-credentials because there is apprehension that this will be another industrialized solution to add to their already over-burdened plate. These managers would like to utilize micro-credentials to detect any skill gap problems early to help connect the right candidates with the jobs. Hiring managers want employees who are motivated to use their soft skills to improve the business and note that micro-credentials would be one way to credibly illustrate their soft skills during the hiring process, replacing existing complex vetting practices.

The DCL team identified signals that employers are looking outside of higher education for up-skilling and re-skilling needs (Caminiti, 2018; Fain, 2019; JP Morgan Chase, 2019; Leopold et al., 2018). These indications could be a result of the inability of higher education to develop training programs fast enough to keep pace with industry up-skilling needs. Later external pilots with partner organizations enabled the DCL to test development processes and design principles of contextualized skills training through micro-credential pilots (see External Pilots: Pilot #2 section).”