Three years ago, the office of the Iowa Auditor of State (AOS) was having trouble finding enough skilled workers for its open accounting positions, so it turned to a new strategy: skills-first hiring.

At the time, the accounting jobs required a four-year college degree. In an effort to expand its hiring pool to attract more candidates, the AOS started accepting applications from job seekers with associate degrees. The strategy was a success.

While it started with the accounting jobs, that was just the beginning.

Opportunity@Work, a nonprofit championing workers Skilled Through Alternative Routes (STARs), such as community college, military service, or work experience – has released a case study detailing how Iowa Auditor of State was able to fill those crucial jobs and expand skills-first hiring to other roles.

“Enthusiastic about the quality of the job candidates, AOS partnered with Opportunity@Work (O@W) to recommend additional positions where bachelor’s degree requirements could be removed,” according to the case study which says that 60% of workers in Iowa are STARs.

It adds, “In Iowa and across the country, college degree requirements are often impediments to attracting employees for public sector jobs.

“In many instances, these requirements limit the pool of applicants, locking out workers Skilled Through Alternative Routes (STARs), even though their skills and work experience make them an excellent fit.

“Opportunity@Work’s analysis showed 28 positions, which included roles in six difference job series, where the State could expand eligibility and improve its talent pipeline.”

Lessons Learned: How to Initiate Skills-First Hiring in Your State

Opportunity@Work is sharing the case study of the effectiveness of the skills-first hiring strategy adopted by AOS in an effort to encourage other states to embrace the idea to drop college degree requirements for certain positions.

How to Get Started Tearing the Paper Ceiling in Your State Government: Learnings from Iowa’s Auditor of State details how AOS and Opportunity@Work successfully approached expanding the skills-first hiring strategy through a five-step process.

Here are the high-level steps they took to uncover opportunities to hire more STARs:

• Size up the opportunity
  • Examine data on STARs, jobs, and skills to understand the potential opportunities for STARs in the State
• Establish criteria for evaluating roles
  • STARs face a steeper climb to higher-paying jobs than than workers with degrees for some roles
• Review roles that meet the criteria
  • Examine the roles for exclusionary requirements
• Communicate the results of the evaluation
  • Help state agencies understand the findings and what they mean for state hiring efforts
• Continue to explore opportunities to expand access
  • Move beyond job requirements to identify other opportunities for inclusion

You can explore the details of how they applied these steps in the full case study here: How to Get Started Tearing the Paper Ceiling in Your State Government: Learnings from Iowa’s Auditor of State

What is Tear the Paper Ceiling?

According to Opportunity@Work, “the paper ceiling is the invisible barrier that comes at every turn for workers without a bachelor’s degree.”

Launched in September 2022, the Tear the Paper Ceiling campaign, led by Opportunity@Work and the Ad Council, has been working to shine the light on the talent of more than 70 million working-age adults with valuable job skills but no college diploma.

WorkingNation is among the dozens of national organizations supporting the campaign championing skills-first hiring.