Skills Q&A

What are skills and how can you make the most of them

Do you have a library of skills?
Yes, we have 1000s of skills organised into categories from Leadership to Health and Wellness, Software Development and much more.

Can we manage skills and skills categories?
Absolutely! We give you full control. Toggle skills and skill categories on and off as you wish.

You can add skills including descriptions and associated skills either manually or via importing a CSV. Add your own categories to group skills.

Do you have roles within the system? Can we customise them?

We have a module built in the system which allows you to add your own roles and associated skills. So for example for a UX designer, they may need to know design principles, Adobe, Sketch, Colour design, User Experience etc.

We don't have a database of skills as we know each business may have different skills and different naming conventions so we've left this to you. Contact us at success@learnamp.com if you'd like roles enabled in your account.

How do learners select the skills they're interested in?
Learn Amp see skills as a core part of the system. Learners are prompted to select their skills when they first join, via the onboarding flow.

They can select from our default categories (based on popular general business skills) or you can select which skill categories to show or not. Existing learners can update their skills at any time via their profile, or the 'My skills' widget through a quick and easy search.

How do skill interests inform content recommendations?
The skills that learners select feed directly into recommendations. So for example, if I select 'Social Media Marketing' if there is content to match, I will get a channel of recommended content on my 'Discover' page.

We keep our library tags up to date so that any content we upload has the relevant tags. We also work closely with third parties and where possible, we include their tagging system. Finally, when uploading your own content, you can tag it with the relevant skills so that it feeds directly in.

A selection of 3 skills tags surface on this discover page and are randomised to show different skills each visit. On this same page there are also some other channels to best surface content including:

What's trending: What is everyone in the account consuming.
What's new: Newly added content to the account.
Top rated: Which content across the account has high ratings.

How do Learners rate their skills?

Skill ratings are on a scale of 1-5, from Novice to Expert. Each rating has guidance so that it is clear what the appropriate level to rate is. Learners can:

Rate themselves: Give themselves a rating for each skill, that can be updated at any time.
Set a target: Whilst a learner may currently be at a 2, they may be happy once they reach level 3 so they can set a target and track against this.
Request a manager rating: Learners can ask their manager for a rating.

These allow learners to track their own ratings over time, compare them to their target or compare them to their managers in order to improve.

How do Learners track + get insights on their skills?
Learners have a tab on their profile called 'Skills'. From here they can view 'My skills' where they can go to see all of their skills, update them and request ratings. There is also a widget that can be added to a Learners dashboard which shows all of their ratings and makes it easy to update them.

The 'Report' page gives the learner various insights into their own skills including:

Your rating vs target: For a set of 8 skills, learners can compare what they have rated, vs their target. This gives them a sense of how far they have 'to go' to achieve their targets for example a new role or project.
Your rating vs Manager rating: For a set of 8 skills, learners can compare to their managers rating. This gives them a clear sense of where their perception may differ to their manager. This may help them to have productive conversations or work out where they may still have a little to go to reach the level they thought they were at.
Skills comparison: Learners can see how their rating compares to the average, their managers rating and the top rating (anonymised) for that particular skill.
Top skills: The learners top skills, based on the volume of content they have been consuming. This helps inform them of skills they may not have realised they've been developing.
Recently rated skills: This makes it easy for the learner to see the skills they've recently updated in case they need to access them again.

How can we see where our skill strengths and development opportunities are as a business?

We have various reports that help you as a business to understand how skills are distributed across your business, helping you to identify skill strengths and opportunities for development:

Total skill ratings: This is the number of skill ratings across all skills.
Total skills rated: This is the number of unique skills, that have a rating - giving you a sense of the distribution of skills.
Average skill rating: Across all skills, what is the average rating.
Skills frequency: Plots the number of ratings of skills, against the average. This helps you to understand which skills are strongest in terms of both strength and depth.
Skills distribution: View skills on a line from 1-5. It shows the highest and lowest rating for that skill, as well as the average. This again gives a sense of the strength of each skill.
Highest rated with...: Select a target skill and see who the highest rated are with that particular skill. This allows you to see which people have a strength in a skill you need.
Skills visualiser: Get a visual snapshot of users and their skills. Using a Spidergraph, you can select up to 8 skills you want on each point of the Octagon and select the users you want to visualise. This helps you to see similar skills or complimentary skills for projects or hiring.

Note: The rating used for these charts, is the 'managers rating' where possible, if not the users own rating is taken.

Can we do full succession planning within Learn Amp?

Learn Amp is a People Development platform. With this in mind, our primary focus is on helping you to develop your employees.

If you want to identify skills gaps in order to inform your hiring, the various tools listed above can really help you. The skills visualiser in particular helps you see a set of skills related to a role and compare your current employees.