HRCI Digital Badges: The New Symbols of HR Mastery

Digital badges, such as those provided by HR Certification Institute® (HRCI®) to validate and promote certification holders, are becoming the new symbols of professional excellence and continuous skills development.

Digital badges provide instant recognition of educational and professional achievements, such as earning an HRCI certification to demonstrate mastery of HR knowledge and skills. There’s more. If you’re an HRCI certification holder, HRCI Digital Badges allow you to compare your salary against HR salary benchmarks. You can also explore matches to HR job opportunities based on your specific skills.

The use of HRCI digital badging is growing daily. HRCI officially introduced digital badges for certifications in January 2015. Today, more than 45,000 certification holders have taken advantage of HRCI Digital Badges, such as the one demonstrated here for a holder of the Associate Professional in Human Resources™ (aPHR™).

What Are Digital Badges?
Digital badges are visual, online representations that acknowledge achievements, experiences, learning outcomes, skills acquisition and/or demonstration of competencies in a profession or area of expertise.

Enhancing Your Professional Reach
While framed degrees and paper certificates are collecting dust in your study or office, digital badges are constantly working to enhance your career and professional brand. HRCI works with Acclaim to provide HRCI Digital Badges that benefit certification holders in several ways:

• Expand your professional brand as an HR leader. When someone clicks on an HRCI Digital Badge image, they get immediate information about your HR mastery ― the skills, experience, knowledge and competencies that your earned HRCI certification demonstrates. You can easily display a digital badge on websites, emails and social media sites.
• Provide a verified and more transparent view of your HR expertise. With your HRCI Digital Badge, you provide employers and others with an immediate link that verifies your HRCI credentials, including details about the skills, knowledge and competencies associated with your certification.
• Get immediate access to HR salary comparisons and HR job openings. With an HRCI Digital Badge, you are linked to Acclaim’s labor market insights. This service allows you to match your credentials with current HR job postings ― by job title, location, employer and salary range. Plus, you can compare your HR competencies with real-time data points on salary benchmarks and the HR skills most in demand.

A More Holistic Picture of Professional Commitment

"Today’s economy necessitates a workforce that educates itself beyond formal degrees," according to EDUCAUSE, an association of higher education technology professionals. "Badging documents skills gained through various learning and engagement opportunities via professional organizations and communities in a way that was not possible before."

Christina M. Sax, Associate Provost and Dean of Academic Outreach and Innovation at Shippensburg University, points out that current and potential employers, peers and other viewers also benefit from digital badges. They gain a better understanding of a professional’s capabilities, they get a snapshot of a person without the noise of text-heavy resumes, and they can more quickly target professionals for relevant skills, knowledge and competencies.

Digital badges are a win for professionals, helping them distinguish themselves as experts in their fields. And they are a win for employers, who seek evidence beyond degrees of employability. The use and applications of digital badges is certain to continue to grow and evolve.

HR is at the center of the digital badge revolution. Today’s HR professionals are heavily involved in social and professional networks. They use various tools, such as LinkedIn (recently purchased by Microsoft), to promote themselves as well as to hire the right people for the organizations they serve.

HR practitioners live in a highly connected world. HRCI Digital Badges provide you with unique ways to make connections and visibly showcase your accomplishments, skills and knowledge in the digital world.