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SkillScan

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SkillScan is a career development tool that helps individuals identify their skills and strengths to make informed career decisions. It is an online assessment that measures an individual's transferable skills, which are skills that can be used across a range of industries and job roles. 

The SkillScan assessment is completed by responding to a series of statements about skills and abilities. The responses are then used to generate a personalised report that provides a list of the individual's top transferable skills, as well as suggestions for careers that align with those skills. The report also includes strategies for developing and utilising those skills in the workplace. 

SkillScan is often used by career counselors, coaches, and individuals who are exploring new career options or seeking to make a career change. The tool can help individuals to gain a better understanding of their strengths and how those strengths can be applied in different work environments. Additionally, it can provide guidance on potential career paths and help individuals to make more informed decisions about their professional development 

We trialled this with a sample of postdocs at the University of Liverpool alongside myIDP/ImaginePhD, a free skills analysis test which had been tailored specifically for researchers. 

The UoL postdocs who trialled SkillScan rated it as most useful for identifying your skills (Average score = 3.5/5). They also found it useful for identifying skills development needs and interests (Average score = 3.2/5). In general, the sample of UoL postdocs that trialled SkillScan recommended it mostly as an exploratory tool and less as a useful prompt for career planning. 

Although the UoL postdocs criticised the tool for not being academic-oriented during the trial, they also recognised that this might also be an opportunity, enabling considerations about ‘broader career development’ (UoL Humanities postdoc) and opportunities beyond academia. In general, comments from the trials suggested the complementary role of SkillScan to a more academic-oriented and discipline-relevant tool (like myIDP or ImaginePhD) and suggested the use of both tools as useful for different reasons. 

Using both tools in combination was particularly useful for postdocs in their early years:

It’s worth bearing in mind that SkillScan’s suggestions can cover a broad range of career pathways, so this tool could be used as a good starting point from which to start a more targeted exploration. We provide this caveat given that a UoL Biochemistry postdoc pointed out that since SkillScan:

The colour-coded report output was also a positive feature for the postdocs who trialled the tool, as was the ability to download it for revisiting their results. As one UoL postdoc from Health and Life Sciences put it: