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The Skills-First Difference

The Skills-First Difference

What is Skills-First?

What is Skills-First?

For decades, hiring and promotion has worked the same: interview candidates, and assess them based on experience, education, and a few other factors.

Skills-First is a different way of looking at talent. It prioritizes a worker’s actual, demonstrable skills, knowledge, and abilities. Candidates are sometimes called STARs: Skilled Through Alternative Routes.

Cornbread Hustle workers carrying boxes at a warehouse

STARs can include:

  • People in recovery from substance use who did not complete college or have resume gaps while battling addiction
  • People who didn’t finish high school, but learned skilled trades while following their passions, such as auto repair or home remodeling
  • Formerly-incarcerated people who studied skilled trades while in prison, like HVAC service or plumbing

Backgrounds for all workers successfully placed by Cornbread Hustle

Criminal Backgrounds

Great Workers Come From All Backgrounds.

In our surveys, we find no strong correlation between the type of charge and the worker’s on-the-job performance. In fact, those with a violent criminal past are slightly more likely to succeed after we place them in the right job.

The strongest mark of success was related to environment: employees at workplaces where they were nurtured by caring, supportive management were better performers, and stayed with their employer longer.

Get Started With Your Custom Skills-First Hiring Strategy Today.

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