For Employers - WorkKeys & Career Readiness - Workforce

As an employer, you need new hires to hit the ground running. Oklahoma's 1.5 million workers are widely recognized for their strong work ethic and consistently rank among the nation's most productive.

Chances are the people you hire will work hard. But will they work smart? Do they have the skills needed to keep your business moving forward? And what about your current employees; are they truly performing at capacity, or could you boost productivity? Wouldn't it be great to know for sure?

That's what WorkKeys ® and Oklahoma Career Readiness Certificates are all about: an assessment and certification process that measures skills that employers across the nation believe are critical to job success. These skills are valuable for any occupation, skilled or professional, and at any level of education.

Companies across Oklahoma are using this type of assessment and certification process to hire new employees, assess incumbent workers, and increase salaries or position responsibilities.

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Frequently Asked Questions

Stay tuned to this page because more questions will be added as necessary to ensure we cover all the bases. Need an answer to a question that's not here? No problem, contact Susan Kuzmic, 405-809-3582.

Q: What is Oklahoma's Career Readiness program?
A: Designed by ACT, the company that developed the ACT assessment college entrance exam, Career Readiness measures workplace literacy. With a database of more than 12,000 job profiles, Career Readiness identifies skills needed on the job, assesses an individual's skill level, and helps identify training needed to close any gaps.

Q: What is the Career Readiness job profiling component, and how does it tie in to the overall efficiency of a company or organization?
A: The Career Readiness job profiling service offers a concrete way for businesses to analyze the skills needed for specific jobs and to describe those needs to educators, students, and job applicants. By comparing job profile information with individuals' scores on the Career Readiness assessments, businesses can make reliable decisions about hiring, training, and program development.

Q: Why use Career Readiness?
A: Over the past 10 years, Career Readiness has become a widely accepted common language for skills definition among employers, educators/trainers, and potential/incumbent employees. The strength of Career Readiness comes from its:
• Objectivity--skill levels are easily and universally understood, unlike school grades.
• Simplicity--skill levels are described in terms of single-digit numbers with clearly defined meanings.
• Compliance with federal law (ADA, EEOC).
• Legal defensibility.

Q: What are the core areas or skills being assessed, and why those particular skills?
A: The following Career Readiness assessments are used:
• Reading for Information--measures the skills used when people read and use written text to do a job. Texts include memos, letters, directions, signs, notices, bulletins, policies, and regulations.
• Locating Information--measures the skills people use when they work with workplace graphics such as charts, graphs, tables, forms, flowcharts, diagrams, floor plans, maps, and instrument gauges.
• Applied Mathematics--measures skills used when applying mathematical reasoning and problem-solving techniques to work-related problems.

Of the thousands of jobs profiled nationally using Career Readiness, about 80 percent of them use these three core areas.

Q: What is the difference between the Career Readiness Certificate program and WorkKeys?
A: The WorkKeys assessment system is a national program locally branded as Oklahoma's Career Readiness program.

Q: What are Oklahoma Career Readiness Certificates?
A: Oklahoma Career Readiness Certificates are portable credentials that show an individual has certain fundamental skills needed in the workplace. The Career Readiness assessment system is used to determine those skill levels. Depending on their scores, potential or incumbent employees receive one of the following certificates:
• Gold--awarded to those who score at or above a level 5 in each of the core areas.
• Silver--awarded to those who score at or above a 4 in each of the core areas.
• Bronze--awarded to those who score at or above a 3 in each of the core areas.
Certificates come in two different formats--an 8 by 10 inch certificate signed by the governor and a wallet-sized version.

Q: Can an employer use the CRC exclusively and no other tools to hire for their company?
A: If the employer has had his company's specific job position profiled the answer is yes. If the employer is using a general profile not specific to their company, the answer is no. The job profiling component of the WorkKeys system is designed so that, when appropriately used, WorkKeys assessments will be job-related and meet the validity and fairness requirements described in the federal government's Uniform Guidelines on Employee Selection Procedures (1978) and enforced by the EEOC.

Q: How can Workkeys be used if a company is using a generic profile?
A: Using the WorkKeys library of occupational profiles rather than profiling the employer's specific job is appropriate and legal when the employer also uses additional hiring tools such as an interview, background check, application, resume review, etc. on the job candidate as part of the hiring decision. When using the generic profiles Workkeys cannot be used as the sole tool in making the hiring decision.

Q: What types of training will be offered?
A: Skills upgrade training will be provided using ACT approved curriculum. Also, OKWorks and Adult Education in Oklahoma will offer ACT approved curriculum for skills upgrade. Core areas include:
• Reading for Information - measures the skills used when people read and use written text to perform a job. Texts include memos, letters, directions, signs, notices, bulletins, policies and regulations.
• Locating information - measures the skills people use when they work with graphics such as charts, graphs, tables, forms, flowcharts, diagrams, floor plans, maps and instrument gages.
• Applied Mathematics - measures skills used when applying mathematical reasoning and problem solving techniques to work-related problems.

Career Readiness Works: Testimony from the Front Line

Bill Weldon, superintendent of schools for Wynnewood Public Schools, has seen many programs come and go with little real impact. However, Career Readiness, he says, brings together education and business in unprecedented ways.

"…in the 34 years that I have been a public school educator, Career Readiness may be the only thing that I have seen that will bridge the gap between schools and the working world…" Weldon says in the June edition of Community Developer.

To find out how Career Readiness can work for your business, organization, and agency, follow this link: Community Developer.

Become a Career Readiness Champion Today

To ensure a well-trained workforce, the state needs Career Readiness Champions--businesses, educators, and anyone interested in making Oklahoma a place of prosperity.

As a Career Readiness Champion you:

Recognize the Oklahoma Career Readiness Certificate as a hiring and promotion tool;
Become an advocate through participation and spread the word to professional organizations and civic and social groups.

Please take a few moments to read more detail in Governor Brad Henry's letter, and then complete the one-page Career Readiness Champion form.

Companies across Oklahoma are using WorkKeys and the Career Readiness Certificate to hire new employees, assess incumbent workers, and increase salaries or position responsibilities. Find out which businesses are Career Readiness Champions.

Oklahoma Career Readiness Employers