What Your Next Great Hire Can Actually Prove

This is the fifth post in our series on the new LER briefs. Catch the intro post here if you missed it.

Every resume you read makes claims: "data analysis," "project management," "cross-cultural communication." But a bullet point doesn't tell you what someone actually did, how it was assessed, or why you should trust the claim in the first place.

Research on hiring practices has found that employers consistently ask four questions about any candidate:

• What skill is being claimed?

• What did the individual actually do?

• How was that skill assessed?

• Why should I trust this claim?

A resume rarely answers any of these well. And the problem is getting worse: as AI-generated applications become the norm, hiring teams are facing hundreds of polished, plausible submissions that are nearly indistinguishable from one another. The result is longer interview cycles, more reference checks, and more cost, just to get basic confidence in a candidate.

What a UMBC-verified microcredential actually answers

Since 2015, UMBC has issued verified digital credentials across research, internships, leadership, and service-learning — now more than 200 active credentials. Each one is built to directly answer the four questions above:

• The skill maps to specific competencies informed by labor market data, aligned with the terminology your recruiting team already uses.

• The evidence shows what the student actually did: the project, the task, the deliverable, not just a course title.

• The assessment is published and consistent: criteria are set in advance, applied the same way to every student, with no ambiguity or grade inflation.

• The issuer is UMBC. The credential is digitally verifiable and can't be self-reported or fabricated.

In practice, that means when a candidate shares a badge, it links to a record showing the specific competency, what they did to earn it, how it was evaluated, and who's standing behind it. That's a meaningfully different signal than three resume bullet points. For example, a hiring manager evaluating two candidates with similar resumes may gain additional confidence from a credential that shows exactly what work was completed and how it was assessed. 

Why this is picking up speed

Skills-based hiring is now standard practice for the vast majority of employers worldwide, and the infrastructure to support it at scale is still being built. Congress held a bipartisan hearing this past December specifically on Learning and Employment Records, and legislation introduced this spring aims to build state-level talent marketplaces around verified credentials. UMBC was selected as one of 25 institutions nationwide for the inaugural LER Accelerator cohort, and Maryland had more institutions represented than any other state.

Where employers fit into building this

Credentials designed with employer input are more trusted and more useful in practice. When employers help define what skills matter and how they should be demonstrated, the credential becomes something your team can actually act on. A few ways to get involved, with minimal time investment:

• Join a focus group on skills-based hiring to help shape which competencies UMBC credentials measure.

• Review a draft credential aligned to roles you hire for and give feedback.

• Co-design a credential pathway tied to an internship or other work-integrated learning experience.

• Join an advisory conversation on how verified skills data could change your hiring process.

You already know UMBC students. This is a chance to help shape what they can show you before they ever walk through the door.

Want the full brief? Read it here.

Questions? Submit a support ticket or reach out to the DCI team directly.