For years, the LER (Learning and Employment Record) movement has put much of its energy behind digital credential wallets. The idea seemed promising: give individuals a secure digital place to store badges, certificates, and verified achievements, and suddenly the labor market would become more fair, more transparent, and more skills-based.

But today, adoption remains low.
And it’s not because people don’t want better ways to prove what they can do.
It’s because a wallet, by itself, does not create opportunity.

It only holds whatever someone puts inside it.

As we look across the failures of early implementations and the unrealized promises of the LER ecosystem, we believe something fundamental:

Credential wallets were a necessary phase — but not the destination.
The future belongs to Universal Talent Passports.

Here’s why.

---

1. Credential Wallets Feel Like… Wallets. Static. Passive. Limited.

Most credential wallets launched between 2018–2023 behaved like digital filing cabinets. They stored badges, certificates, or PDFs, but they didn’t help people use them.

A wallet:

• Doesn’t explain what your credentials mean
• Doesn’t help translate them across industries
• Doesn’t help you tell your story
• Doesn’t guide you toward opportunity
• Doesn’t make it any easier for employers to understand your skills

People don’t wake up thinking: “I need a better wallet.”
They think: “I need a better future, a better job, a better path.”

Credential wallets didn’t solve that problem.

---

2. Badges Were Too Simple — and Too Isolated

Digital badges were a breakthrough in their time, but by 2023 they had hit a ceiling.

Badges were:

• Often low-context (a logo and a title)
• Issued in closed or proprietary ecosystems
• Difficult for employers to compare side-by-side
• Not rich enough to represent deeper skills, experiences, or capabilities

They were a step, but not the scaffolding needed to support lifelong learning or workforce mobility.

People’s lives are made of experiences, skills, growth, wisdom, and potential — not just badges.

---

3. Credential Wallets Didn’t Deliver the Vision of the LER Ecosystem

The original vision of the LER ecosystem was powerful:

• Individuals fully own their data
• Skills become portable
• Hiring becomes more fair
• Learning becomes more personalized
• Opportunity becomes more accessible

But the systems built so far mostly gave individuals a box to store files in, without giving them:

• A language that translates skills across contexts
• Tools to make sense of their experiences
• Ways to turn their data into actual opportunities
• Support for navigating a complex labor market
• A living record that evolves as they grow

The container existed.
The ecosystem did not.

---

4. People Don’t Need Storage — They Need a System That Opens Doors

A credential wallet is only as useful as the credentials you manage to upload.

If you don’t already have the right badges…
If your skills aren’t captured in formal credentials…
If you’re still figuring out who you are and where you’re headed…

A wallet can’t help you.

And for millions of people:

• Their skills aren’t credentialed
• Their capabilities aren’t visible
• Their potential isn’t documented
• Their story isn’t being told

A Universal Talent Passport changes that.

---

What We Believe (2023)

We believe the next phase of the LER movement must go far beyond wallets.

A Universal Talent Passport must:

✔ Represent the whole person — not just their badges

Formal credentials are only one slice of human capability.
The future system must represent experiences, projects, skills, growth, and potential.

✔ Give people a way to build their story, not just store it

People need tools to express and organize what they know, not just upload files.

✔ Be interoperable across every organization in someone’s life

Schools, employers, workforce programs, and governments must all be able to understand and contribute to the same record.

✔ Be active, not passive — helping people navigate opportunity

This means intelligence, guidance, translation, and meaningful context.

✔ Help employers understand talent clearly and fairly

Skills must be described in a shared, structured way — or the hiring market will stay broken.

✔ Make the LER ecosystem real, not theoretical

That means delivering something people actually use, every week, because it helps them move forward.

---

The Universal Talent Passport Is the Next Iteration

In 2023, we are making a clear statement:

Credential wallets were the beginning, not the end.
Universal Talent Passports are the evolution the ecosystem has been waiting for.

Where wallets store credentials, passports create mobility.
Where wallets hold data, passports make data meaningful.
Where wallets are static, passports must be alive, adaptive, and user-first.

This is the foundation we intend to build.

A system that doesn’t just hold your achievements —
but helps you become who you are capable of being.