HR keeps telling businesses they need to become skills-based—but here’s the thing: HR hasn’t done it themselves.
This week on Freeformers Unplugged, I was joined by Calli Adamson Bakken to challenge whether HR and L&D teams are actually practising what they preach. If we’re going to push organisations towards a skills-based future, we need to start with our own function first.
The hypocrisy of HR’s skills-based agenda
Let’s be blunt: HR teams keep saying they want to help businesses become skills-based, but they’ve made zero effort to do it themselves.
I can’t take HR seriously when it says, “We’re going to lead the organisation in this shift,” if HR is still operating the same way it has for decades—locked into rigid job roles, traditional hierarchies, and outdated ways of measuring success.
HR keeps saying we need to help organisations become skills-based, but they’ve made zero effort to do it themselves!
Calli put it even more directly:
“HR is barely an expert in HR. So why do they assume they’re the best-placed people to guide a skills transformation?”
And it’s true. HR needs to prove it can apply skills-based thinking to itself before trying to reshape an entire business. Otherwise, it’s just empty words.
HR’s blind spot: underestimating what real skills look like
In the chat, Matthew Collington shared a perfect example from his safari trip (as you do).
He got cocky after a few drives and tried to list the skills needed to be a ranger. He came up with off-road driving and spotting animals in trees. But when he asked the actual ranger, the reply was:
“Five years of study and sixteen years of experience.”
This is exactly where HR goes wrong—we oversimplify what skills actually mean in different roles. We’re quick to map skills and create frameworks, but do we really understand the depth of expertise required? Probably not.
HR is still afraid of data
Another huge problem is that HR has resisted using real data for far too long.
Calli put it brilliantly:
“HR has moved from ‘we can’t use data, it’s not people-centric’ to ‘okay, I guess I have to use data now.’ But the progress is painfully slow.”
We see this all the time. Instead of focusing on real business outcomes, HR measures:
📊 Training hours instead of skills gained
📊 Engagement scores instead of performance impact
📊 Number of hires instead of quality of hires
And that’s if we’re measuring anything useful at all.
Then Bob Williams threw in a thought-provoking idea: should we even be skills-based? What if we focused on a value-based model instead?
“What about value-based? What value do we need from the person? Train to that. Hyper-relevant and agile to move with the company strategy.”
That’s the kind of thinking HR needs to lean into—how do we measure and train for value, not just for a list of skills someone wrote in a competency framework five years ago?
Other functions have evolved. Why hasn’t HR?
One of the biggest reasons HR is struggling to lead this transformation is that we haven’t changed ourselves.
💡 Other functions have evolved, why haven’t we?
- Marketing constantly adapts based on customer insights.
- Sales teams use real-time data to refine their approach.
- Product teams use agile methodologies to stay flexible.
Meanwhile, HR is still operating with the same job titles, structures, and hierarchies it always has.
“Other functions already speak the language of business and impact. HR is still talking in HR terms. If they can’t change that, they’ll struggle to lead skills-based transformation.”
If we want a skills-based future, we need to stop looking at other departments as our “customers” and embed ourselves within them. Recruitment and sales are basically the same thing. Internal comms and marketing share the same skill set. HR can’t sit on the sidelines anymore—we need to be in the game.
The challenge ahead: breaking the system to rebuild it
The challenge ahead: breaking the system to rebuild it
If we’re serious about building a skills-based future, then HR has to change first.
🛠️What needs to happen?
✅ HR & L&D must apply skills-based models to themselves first.
✅ We need to integrate more closely with other functions.
✅ Measurement must shift from participation to actual impact.
✅ Data and skills-mapping should replace outdated job structures.
“HR isn’t the best function to lead a skills-based transformation—yet. But it could be, if it actually did the work itself first.”
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