This has been a long time coming - our patent filed a about 4 years ago was finally awarded today by the USPTO. Some details below.
United States Patent 10,102,774
Bahree , et al. October 16, 2018
Systems and methods for organizing and presenting skill progression
In any organization, the skills collectively possessed by individuals of the organization can determine the capabilities of the organization as a whole. Previously, there was no centralized method or system for managing skills which are complex and wide-ranging. There was also no effective way for individuals to review skills they possess and to discover other skills which they can cross-train and leverage—either to enhance their existing roles and responsibilities, or possibly change skills and get involved with another area and thereby grow their career. The limited visualizations of skill sets offered to the individuals were static and non-interactive, which is not ideal.
When organizations grow and begin hiring new technical employees, this tremendous influx of new resources and talent makes the overall skill set of the organization increasingly difficult to comprehend. The challenge gets increasingly difficult over time. Further, to allow such companies to both retain and attract talent such companies want to ensure that they can provide a clear path for employees to manage their careers and talent growth effectively. Such companies are also challenged to be able to efficiently allocate technical resources, and to visualize technical areas in which their current employees are strong, and areas in which their current employees need further training (or new employees need to be recruited) to help the company compete in the marketplace.
This patent represents a subset of our work on cohesive systems, methods, and devices for presenting and managing interrelated sets of skills for a person. We used a map interface to represent a set of interrelated skills to a user, and which allows the user an opportunity to strategize regarding how best the related and advanced skills may be acquired to advance on a career path.
The convergence of Tech Trends - in the past Mobility, Big Data, and Cloud (and today #DataScience, #ModernEngineering, #AI, #ML, and #Cloud) helps the creation of modern skills management systems. The solution at the heart of the patent is help address this and we deem to have wide applicability across industry domains, industry sectors, and vertical industry segments.
Since filing the patent, and awarding today - elements of this we have adopted at Avanade and rolled it out globally to our workforce across 20 countries allowing them to help manage complex skills, advance career and help establish a 3D career path.