For: Skills admins, and the employees and managers who add skills in Career Hub

Summary

Keep employee profiles in Career Hub limited to skills from your skills taxonomy, so skill data stays consistent for Talent Design and reporting.

What is Inhibit free-text skills?

Free-text skills are skills on employee profiles that aren't defined in your skills taxonomy. With this feature on, employees can only see and select skills from your taxonomy when they add skills in Career Hub. Eightfold turns the feature on for your account when you request it.

Why it matters / Benefits

• Consistent skill names. Every skill an employee adds matches a skill in your taxonomy, so the same skill isn't recorded under different names.
• Reliable reporting. Skills reporting, including Datahub exports, works from standardized skills.
• Trusted input for Talent Design. Talent Design uses skills from employee profiles, and those skills follow your taxonomy.

How it works

1. An employee starts to add a skill. The employee types in a skill field, for example on the profile's Experience tab or in a skills assessment.
2. Career Hub suggests skills from the taxonomy. The dropdown shows only skills from your taxonomy. By default, it can also show Eightfold standard skills, unless your account limits choices to your own taxonomy. Career Hub removes duplicate suggestions.
3. The typed term isn't offered on its own. If the term doesn't match a skill in the taxonomy, Career Hub doesn't offer it as a skill to add.

The restriction applies across these places in Career Hub:

• The Experience tab of the profile, while manually adding skills or using skill suggestions for skills, work experience, projects, education, and courses
• Edit Assessments in Skills and Performance, including a manager's assessment of a direct report
• Skill you want, in Career Interests or Goals
• Onboarding, for experience, education, skills, and goals
• Development plans and development plan templates
• Skill-based projects in the project marketplace
• Mentorship requests, while manually adding expert skills or using skill suggestions

FAQs

What happens to skills that are already on profiles?

They stay on profiles. The feature doesn't delete or clean up existing free-text skills.

What if an employee needs a skill that isn't in the taxonomy?

The employee asks HR or a skills admin to add the skill to the taxonomy. Career Hub has no in-product way to request a new skill.

Does the feature affect Talent Design or Talent Acquisition?

No. It applies only to Career Hub.

Can free-text skills still reach a profile?

Yes, from sources outside the Career Hub entry points, such as course and HRIS updates in Profile Assistant, specialized skills, candidate profiles if synced, and skills added for a demand from resource management

Can the feature be turned off later?

Yes. Employees can then add free-text skills again.