Energizing Certification Program Growth with Collaborative Partnerships & Expert Input
Holmes Corporation
Delivering Innovative Solutions to Advance Professionals and Drive Partner Growth.
Hi there! 👋 Welcome to the Building Career Pathways Newsletter. Each month, HC experts will chime in and explore the trends, challenges and opportunities facing today’s workforce, as well as tips for creating lasting impact with education and training programs.
Powering Certification Program Growth Through Strategic Partnerships
Author: Leigh Johnson
Partnerships are an important strategy for any business, helping drive revenue, opening new opportunities, and fostering innovation. The same holds true for professional associations and the growth of their certification programs.
A solid partnership results in mutual benefit, so the trick is to find partners with goals that converge with yours. Your certification department wants to build awareness, demand, and adoption of your programs locally, nationally, and even globally. What other entities are invested in helping professionals elevate their skills and career potential?
Three types of partnerships have been proven to make a positive impact on certification program growth: education, corporate, and industry partnerships. Let’s explore how these partnerships can grow the market and serve the interests of your association and the respective partner.
Education Partners
A wide variety of organizations’ business models focus on delivering education. The ones most aligned with your certification goals are your association’s chapters, college and university continuing education departments, consultants, and independent training organizations around the world. Offering certification preparation courses through education partners can be an excellent source of ongoing revenue as candidates enter your program.
Here are a few ways education partners and your association can benefit from working together.
Your Association’s Benefits
- Promotion of your certification to new audiences such as alumni and business partners
- Third party promotion and endorsement of your certification validates its credibility
- Local advertising speaks to local needs and reflects local culture, which is especially important for global expansion
Education Partner Benefits
- Expand their course catalog for broader reach
- Access turnkey student and instructor training materials, developed by subject matter experts, that require less resources from their institution to execute
- Elevate their brand in your industry through association with your certification and organization
Recommended by LinkedIn
Decoding 6 Common Subject Matter Expert (SME) Personas
Author: Chad Dykoski
Ready to take the next step toward a successful certification program? Last month we explored some key strategies to create a body of knowledge (BOK) from the ground up. So, once you have your BOK in hand, what’s next? Building a community of subject matter experts (SMEs) from across the entire scope of your industry to help guide and craft the content.
To ensure the state of the profession is accurately captured, it’s imperative to regularly solicit feedback from SMEs who are typically volunteers from the association’s membership. Here at HC, we’ve worked with countless SMEs over many years, so we’ve have learned a thing or two on how to get the best, and most effective, feedback.
Since these experts are often volunteers, they need to be carefully guided and inspired to capture this expertise. When working with SMEs, the most important thing to do is to establish a sense of gratitude for their contributions early and often. They are busy people who do not need to be doing this after all. Also, because they are the experts, give their opinions sufficient weight while keeping the needs of the project in mind. If you need to limit scope or otherwise say no to a change, explain the reason clearly to all SMEs and indicate what you can do to accommodate their feedback. Let the team come to a consensus and be open to further modifications within the given constraints.
The best SME teams will be well-balanced and represent the profession’s diversity. Here are some common types of SMEs, and our tips on how to get the most out of each type:
The Overachiever
With good SME screening, hopefully you will have at least one go getter on the team. These professionals are eager to advance the profession and will provide ample feedback. To get the most out of these SMEs, work with them to ensure their feedback is specific and directive. Help them understand that the best feedback is directly related to their expertise. This reduces the risk of vague suggestions being misinterpreted or SMEs who focus more on grammar than substance.
WHITEPAPER: Why Your Certification Program Isn't Growing
Author: Holmes Corporation
Your association set up a certification program to establish the standard of knowledge, skills, and abilities required of professionals in your industry.
As you envisioned your certification program, it would generate revenue for the professional association, elevate the profession, and advance the careers of professionals in your field. But perhaps your certification program hasn’t been working – or, at least, it isn’t growing in a way that meets your expectations.
Did your ears just perk up? Yes, we’re talking to you.
So, what’s keeping your certification program from meeting expectations? In this guide, we dive into common roadblocks to growth and offer specific actions you can take to remedy the situation.