Digital skills recruitment challenges in small enterprises: the role of blockchain

ABSTRACT

Industry reports estimate blockchain can potentially generate around $3.1 trillion in new businesses by 2030. These latest digital technologies present more opportunities for all sizes of enterprises to grow. However, they also create new challenges for the small enterprises in adopting such technologies for their individual business needs. While the growth of digital technologies and their impact is explicit, it is also evidenced that small enterprises struggle to recruit and train the digital skills required to effectively use these innovations. This study conducted a literature survey to analyse how blockchain can contribute to small enterprises benefits. Based on the blockchain social ecosystems’ analysis, this study proposes a National Digital Skills Recruitment Chains (NDSRC) model that explicates how blockchain characteristics (digital trust, data immutability, privacy, and security) can play a role in addressing the digital skills recruitment challenges in small enterprises.

KEYWORDS:

• Blockchain
• digital skills
• small enterprises
• recruitment model
• ecosystem
• social innovation

Introduction

The hyper-dynamic ABCD (Artificial Intelligence, Blockchain, Cloud and Data Analytics) revolutions cause value chain transformations across many industries (Airbnb, Uber, and Amazon). The ABCD innovations are also enabling small enterprises (SEs) to effectively connect and engage with their local customers and grow globally. However, most of the SEs have neither the skills nor the financial resources to recruit and train the digital skills required to leverage the constant changes delivered by these technologies. Traditionally, SEs have sourced the required digital skills from external suppliers. Though suppliers can mitigate this need to a certain extent, recruiting the right person who can address one SE’s specific business needs is a complex issue. This study aims to address this issue with a proposal for a Blockchain-based digital recruitment model for the SEs.

Kandaswamy et al. (2023) predict that blockchain could generate as much as $3.1 trillion in new business value by 2030. Blockchain is a digital ledger that became popular due to Bitcoin, the first cryptocurrency. Bitcoin is a cryptocurrency application that illustrates how trusted financial exchanges can be realized between peer-to-peer transactions, without the traditional channels (financial institutions) and compliance rules (Government regulatory authorities). Despite a crowded marketplace of cryptocurrencies, the knowledge about how Blockchain can contribute to social value creation (in education, health, or human resources management domains) is scant. Blockchain is described as a foundational (Iansiti & Lakhani, 2017) mechanism that can transform the value exchanges between the two parties in many situations. The trust, data immutability, confidentiality, accountability, and consensus features of Blockchain guarantee digital exchanges between peer-to-peer transactions. The mainstream adoption of blockchain is expected to unlock greater value and benefits (like cloud computing adoption) through reduced cost of verification and networking activities (Catalini & Gans, 2019). Since Blockchain offers data security with crypto encryption, it can be a reliable mechanism for ensuring the privacy of data in a peer-to-peer network.

Scholars have illustrated that technology-driven platforms assist human resource managers to be ahead, by recruiting the right and relevant talent. Recent studies showed how blockchain can be used to manage training evaluations effectively with reduced cost and time and support organizational transformations. Within a single firm, scholars have proposed a blockchain-based HR management framework that can reduce the gap between available and required skills in the workforce. Blockchain scholars are also exploring how to transform human resource (HR) practices by ensuring that all linked data related to employees are accurate and the details related to potential employees are dependable However, these analyses investigate specific transactions with the use of blockchain. These explorations do not include how blockchain can be a foundational tool to transform the recruitment ecosystem for SEs.

Literature review

Many researchers have generally analysed how blockchain technology could be applied in human resources management. Researchers have compared blockchain systems’ function related to the centralised human resources management system and have presented their findings on how the blockchain system adds more value to human resource management activities. A review of the blockchain applications use in the human resource management activities has been conducted initially. Yi et al. (2020) reported that in the digital era, human resources face difficulties in screening, verifying credentials, and checking backgrounds in reducing the likelihood of poor recruitment and it is a time-consuming process as well. This is because it has become a necessity for recruiters to connect the profile of candidates from different channels and so hiring resume verifications has become a bottleneck. Yi et al. (2020) also reported that Melanie Swan the founder of Blockchain Science Institute has predicted that blockchain technology will undergo three phases, 1.0 for currencies, 2.0 for contracts and 3.0 for science, government, health, culture, and art. Thus, blockchain technology is expected to be widely used in non-finance and across all functions, businesses, and industries. Onik et al. (2018) reported that Industries 5.0 requires intelligent hiring of employees and a management system across all functions. In support of this argument, Andrew Spencer a UK-based HR technology researcher claimed in 2019 that the four areas of application of blockchain are credential verification, worker payments, identity management and work matching platforms. Yi et al. (2020) concluded from their research that blockchains give privacy and a screening method for non-biased users, blockchain development is a real-time application and future researchers need to address the technical and cryptographic challenges associated with it. In support of this, Kisi (2022) reported that blockchain has emerged as a powerful tool in reducing the fraud risks, time, and cost in finding and hiring the right skills for businesses. The researcher has analysed the opportunities, challenges, and prospects for blockchain adoption in recruitment by conducting a structured literature review based on exploratory research. Their findings report that blockchain-based recruitment increases the speed and reliability of the transactions and reduces the cost and human efforts. The research also suggests that the technological, organizational, and environmental challenges need to be addressed and the application of blockchain in recruitment is to be a gradual process.

Rhemananda et al. (2021) developed the e-HRM concept in which the blockchain system could be implemented specifically in the selection and recruitment process for screening of best candidates by validating accurately their skills, experiences, and knowledge. They discussed that blockchain could be used as a recruitment tool for registering prospective employees, administering selection of prospective employees, faster decision making and placing the employees in the right position and field. The researchers have highlighted that the next step could be to make prototypes for developing proof of concepts to target high-value cases. At the same time, Ghonim and Corpuz (2021) have studied a new digital system for competency-based learning through blockchain and badge technologies to improve the quality of practical sessions in applied programmes to promote the digitalization of competency-based education and student e-portfolios in applied education. Their findings reveal that the digitalization of skills and competency-based credentials need improvement to incorporate knowing-by-doing and practical capabilities and to support recruitment and the professional development process. The researchers further recommend that this should be extended to digital batches, micro-credentials, and artificial intelligence. Al Hamrani and Al Hamrani (2021) also analysed the application of blockchain technology in the recruitment process of the People of Determination platform model. Their objective was to develop a model in supporting the recruitment process of people of determination by improving the chances of them getting hired by different organizations and have proposed an architecture. They have recommended that future research can focus on the empirical and analytical methods for evaluating blockchain and smart contract performance. Sharif and Ghodoosi (2022) examined the areas of HR operations such as recruitment and selection of employees, internal processes such as compenzation using smart contracts, retention and motivation using shared leadership and conflict resolution using network-based dispute resolution and performance management. They have concluded that the application of blockchain technology in HR processes can create a more ethical work environment; however, an extensive examination of ethical implications and careful implementations is required.

The four emerging digital innovations, such as artificial intelligence, blockchain, cloud and data analytics, were analysed by Akter et al. (2022). They investigated the operations and value propositions of these different but increasingly converging technologies and have shown the diverse applications and practical implications of these new technologies. The application and prospects of blockchain technology in the context of the diffusion of innovations theory have also been discussed by Mishra and Joshi (2020). Their research has concluded that creating a block-chain-based corporate framework ensures fast, secure payment processing services, but also real-time verifications and secured transactions are possible. Saif and Islam (2022) in their systematic review and bibliometric analysis identified the two theoretical themes; employee-systems interaction and blockchain framework for HR to become the prime movers for adopting and implementing blockchain in the domain of HRM. They concluded that these two frameworks add tremendous theoretical contributions to the existing body of knowledge in the fields of blockchain and strategic HRM. Mallick et al. (2022) also analysed the recruitment effectiveness in Industry 4.0 using blockchain technology. They reported that blockchain-based technology improves recruitment and selection processes and helps in employee evaluation. The researchers have also developed the idea that Blockchain-based technology improves recruitment and selection processes compared to the existing recruitment system and helps in employer evaluation. They have concluded that their developed concept based on Blockchain-based technology improves recruitment and selection processes compared to the existing recruitment system and helps in employer evaluation. They also have argued that their models can confirm and store recruitment and other HRM-related data, resulting in a low-priced solution that eliminates the necessity for middlemen. Finally, they concluded by reporting that organizations are busy finding methods to return to the past normal and now is an excellent time to accelerate process digitization, with blockchain appearing to be a promising option for the whole HR gamut of services.

Hamilton (2021) states that the six latest recruitment methods needed for small businesses are social media, mobile recruitment, digital advertisements, applicant tracking systems, video interviewing and artificial intelligence and automation. The researcher has suggested that small businesses need to use AI and automation for artificial intelligence-driven writing tools for digital advertisements, collecting and analysing applicant data, candidate matching, resume screening, sourcing and chatbots. Uzialko (2023) descrited the 14 best practices for employee recruitment and stated that identifying the vacant jobs, determining the skills needed, developing a job description, advertising, analysing the internal skills, developing a pool of skills, holding interviews, extending the offer, employee onboard process, defining employee brand and have reported that employee recruitment is very critical for small businesses looking to grow. The technology expert Vitic (2022) in his article, how to recruit and retain digital talent has addressed the changes in the recruitment space and has advised the use of technologies in the recruitment process for better matching the required and expected skills. This researcher reported that the challenges faced by hiring managers such as fake resumes, lack of skilled applications, time consumption and inefficient work by hiring from third parties could all be eliminated by using blockchain technology and suggested a prototype for blockchain application in recruiting.

An HR supply chain model, which basically is an input-process-output model, has been proposed by Fachrunnisa and Hussain (2020). Information regarding the workforce competence needed by the companies has been provided as input to the model. The corporate training centre processes this information in cooperation with the industry community develops the training programme and executes the training. The resulting output of the training programme is the competitive workforce for recruitment by the industry. The model is to be applied separately for industries in specific sectors. Thus, the specific industry requirements are communicated to the corporate training centre by that industry community. The entire working process is as follows. The professional association of a particular industrial group collects information related to skills requirements from the industrial community. The participants from the industry provide feedback related to the skills gap to be addressed in the industry. These industry experts are the blockchain participants who will rank all the feedback received from the industry community. Using the blockchain consensus process, consensus is achieved by the ranked skill competencies. The corporate training centre selects the highest-ranked skill competencies and develops the training curriculum. The aim of the prosed framework is to facilitate a platform to share the required skills for a specific industry sector. The corporate training centre develops the curriculum and can use consensus to set the regulations. Blockchain technology has been used as a platform to collect data accurately and safely and to create consensus on the required skills. The researchers have set up a consortium database based on blockchain technology which is open to the members of the industry group. Blockchain technology enables transparency, trustworthiness, and auditability. Ethereum has been used for developing the blockchain platform. A pseudonymous identity has been given to each participating member so that the feedback provided is secure and traceable. The platform stores all the complied suggestions in the form of blocks. The industry experts then rank all the skills presented by the consortium sequentially. The blockchain platform then ranks the top-rated skills required for the industries. The researchers have not included measures to incorporate training effectiveness in their study. Jain et al. (2021) formulated a blockchain-enabled training effectiveness measurement model using a qualitative approach. However, this study has focussed on micro and small business enterprises where the HR function is either internally managed by the owner or operational managers. All these studies illustrate how blockchain can be part of novel solutions to manage selected transactional activities in the HR management function. Hence, a more holistic and ecosystem solution is necessary for leveraging blockchain for small enterprises.

Methodology

Blockchain application in digital skills is at an incredibly early stage and is starting to evolve in small and medium enterprises. A systematic search for blockchain applications in SMEs was carried out for a literature review. This study has implemented literature analysis to get deeper insights into the application of blockchain in small and medium enterprises. The theory review method has been adopted for the systematic literature review (Campbell et al., 2014; Thomas & Tee, 2022). A comprehensive review was conducted on three aspects: digital skills requirement in small enterprises, blockchain for digital skills recruitment in small and medium enterprises and the role of blockchain in a generic eco-system. Blockchain for digital skills recruitment in small and medium enterprises and the role of blockchain in a generic eco-system are relatively new compared to digital skills requirements and so the availability of the published literature is somewhat limited compared to the concept of digital requirements in small and medium enterprises. The broadly used databases such as Google Scholar and Science Direct have been used to extract the literature published on the researched topics. Inductive and deductive approaches were adopted to identify the relevant concepts. The first phase was analysing the research on digital skills requirements in small and medium enterprises. The second phase was to analyse the use of blockchain for digital skills recruitment in small and medium enterprises. The features and capabilities of blockchain and blockchain as a foundation for social value creation were analysed. The third phase was to study the role of blockchain in a generic ecosystem. Based on the systematic search of the blockchain-based ecosystem models, this study proposes a blockchain-based National Digital Skills Recruitment Chains (NDSRC) model. Figure 1 presents the systematic theory review approach. The proposed model explicates how the digital trust, data immutability, privacy, and security characteristics of Blockchain can be leveraged to ease the ABCD digital skills recruitment transactions for all Small Enterprises.

Figure 1. A systematic theory review approach.

Digital skill requirements in small and medium enterprises

As of June 2022, Small business jobs increased by 0.3 percent year on year (Xero, 2022) in Australia. Traditionally small businesses have been hiring most employees in the Australian New Zealand region. A McKinsey study (Manyika et al., 2015) described how online talent platforms (LinkedIn, Seek, etc.) eased the process of searching and selecting employees with digital aggregation. Despite these utility services, recruiting a digitally skilled employee or contractor is still a major challenge for many small businesses. The challenges arise from two factors: (a) the issue of the digital divide (Sahut et al., 2021) between small business and digitally savvy job seekers and (b) their inability to keep up with the hyper-dynamic growth of the ABCD digital technologies. Scholars have argued that 2020 has not only accelerated the digitalization of economies but has also highlighted the disparity in digital services in businesses and society. Globally governments are guiding (Ex: Infocomm Media Development Authority in Singapore) Small business to improve their operations with special funding programmes (Ex: Go Digital). A reskilling revolution has been launched and the platform aims to equip with better skills through training initiatives such as the Closing the Skills Gap Accelerator Model. Rupeika-Apoga et al. (2022) analysed the support needed by small businesses and reported that SMEs will not be able to cope with digital transformation without staff training and mentoring the workforce. They explicated that (a) significant differences in the support needed to be based on the nature of small businesses and (b) policymakers, managers, and practitioners need to identify different forms of support to maximise the impact of digital transformation in small businesses. Bagale et al. (2023) reported that the product and the process have become more automated in digitalization which has resulted in increased quality and demand. They also suggested that considering the high scope of development, the SME sector has more room for new technologies to be integrated. Drydakis (2022) studied improving the firm’s digital competencies through business app training and the analysis revealed that business app training was positively associated with the entrepreneurs’ attitudes towards technology and willingness to change and that training was positively associated with the organizations’ digital competencies related to communication, networking, social media, customer relationship management, payments and project management operations. Based on the well-known resource constraints of small businesses, a novel model that can make effective use of blockchain to address digital skills recruitment for all small businesses is required. It is also required to explicate how blockchain can be considered as a foundational mechanism for change, its inherent features, and its value propositions to be considered as a social utility service.

Blockchain for digital skills recruitment in small enterprises

Blockchain – features and capabilities

Blockchain is a foundational mechanism due to the utility values (Security, privacy, transparency, reliability, versatility, and disintermediation) it offers. Decentralised consensus, Smart contracts, decentralized applications, storage and computing and decentralised artificial intelligence are the enabling features that allow blockchain’s use to create value in many situations (Angelis & Da Silva, 2019). Since data can only be added and cannot be altered in a blockchain network, it is considered immutable. The inherent controls of these features allow blockchains to allow for trust-evoking, network-facilitating and innovation-facilitating capabilities (Seebacher & Schüritz, 2017) for all its users.

Barcelos (2021) has shed light on the fact that blockchain can ease HR activities like recruitment and background verification. He continues in his article ‘Why Blockchain can be a revolution in the recruitment industry’ stating that blockchain could result in faster identity checks and verification, validating the resume, decentralizing recruitment, fast employee contracting, data security, easier and effective onboarding, better employee experience and increased productivity. This study has also presented that the digital ledger is incorruptible and impossible to steal so the recruiter could have complete, accurate and instant access to the relevant details. The researcher justifies his argument bypositing that millennials tend to change jobs every 2.8 years so blockchain hiring is the best solution for recruiters. Faster employee contracting and wider reach for the underrepresented candidates are its added benefits. Ramachandran et al. (2023) reviewed the role of blockchain technology in the process of decision-making in human resource management. The researchers focussed on key issues such as regulation, staffing and development and change management. They highlighted the major implementation of blockchain technology in HRM and developed a framework for implementing blockchain in the decision-making process of HRM. Atay and Terpstra Tong (2022) studied the impact of blockchain technology on human resource management. They have presented the advantages of blockchain application by presenting a model for the application of blockchain technology in HR Management. Yi et al. (2020) conducted a critical review of the benefits and use of blockchain technology in human resource management. Their findings report that verification of credentials using blockchain reduces costs and delays and increases efficiency. They further report that background checks on shortlisted applicants are easier and faster. The findings presented by Fachrunnisa and Hussain (2020) also report that businesses are undergoing the challenge of fulfilling the workforce requirements in complying with the industry standards and presented blockchain-based human resource management practices for mitigating skills and competencies gaps in the workforce. They have reported that in the longer run, this will enable the match between the requirements and the available skill set. Rhemananda et al. (2021) analysed how blockchain technology supports employee recruitment and selection. Their findings reveal that blockchain technology can improve the selection and recruitment process by identifying the appropriate skill sets.

Blockchain ecosystems review

In this section, a high-level summary of specific eco-system models is presented first. These models describe the stakeholders, activities and that make novel use of blockchain features and provide new capabilities to the business value chain networks. It starts with a generic blockchain ecosystem (Figure 2) to describe the different blockchain services and providers needed for any blockchain ecosystem. Then the key stakeholders of the blockchain ecosystem are given in Table 1. The transactional activities for key social ecosystems (finance, health and education) are synthesized with details in Tables 2–4.

Figure 2. Key stakeholders of a generic blockchain ecosystem (Riasanow et al., 2018).

Table 1. Blockchain roles for small enterprises.

Group	BC roles	Primary reasons	SE implications
BC consumers	Consumer, community, consulting	The consumers create the demand for utilizing the data stored in the specific blockchain network.	All SEs can take the consumer role. The digital savvy SEs can be prosumers of their participating network
BC providers	Infrastructure, platform, application, token community platform providers, Miners,	The service provides all the necessary hardware, network, business logic and application services required by BC service consumers	Considering the extended network of technical SE networks, all digitally savvy SEs can play the role that aligns with their value propositions

Table 2. Blockchain-based accounting ecosystem.

Tasks and data	Peer-to-peer stakeholders	Scope of smart contracts	BC capabilities
Individual’s health diagnosis data	Patient and GP, patient and specialists	Create medical records, grant access to GP/specialists	Evoking digital trust
Individual health tests data	Patients and labs	Grant access to labs Revoke access to labs	Facilitating networking
Individual routine check-up data	Patients and GP	Append real-time patient data	Facilitating innovation
Individual ongoing treatment data	GP and specialists GP and patients	Append treatments data Append diagnosis data Revoke grants	Reducing transactional and networking costs

Table 3. Blockchain-based health ecosystem.

Tasks and data	Peer-to-peer stakeholders	Scope of smart contracts	BC capabilities
Individual’s health diagnosis data	Patient and GP, patient and specialists	Create medical records, grant access to GP/Specialists	Evoking digital trust
Individual health tests data	Patients and labs	Grant access to labs Revoke access to labs	Facilitating networking
Individual routine check-up data	Patients and GP	Append real-time patient data	Facilitating innovation
Individual ongoing treatment data	GP and specialists GP and patients	Append treatments data Append diagnosis data Revoke grants	Reducing transactional and networking costs

Table 4. Blockchain-based education ecosystem.

BC enabled tasks	Peer-to-peer stakeholders	Scope of smart contracts	BC capabilities
Academic Credentials	Students and Universities	Validation across universities	Privacy, security, Networking
Developing twenty-first Century Skills	Students and Universities	Skills evaluation and validation	Privacy, Security, Immutability
Job applications	Employers and Students	Skills validation	Networking, Privacy
Student Identification	Students, Universities	Authentication	Privacy, Provenance
Industry Certifications	Professionals and Training Institutes	Skills evaluation, validation, and verification	Networking, Immutability, Privacy
Student funding and payments	Students and Universities, Students and Scholarship sponsors	Transaction validation, balance verification	Security, Privacy

Munir et al. (2022) explored the environmental and social effects of blockchain and presented emerging trends with technological developments and success factors. Their findings reveal that blockchain will not only improve economic sustainability but will also lead to achieving environmental and social sustainability through smart contracts, efficiency, and fraud prevention. Friedman and Ormiston (2022) explored the scope of blockchain technology for sustainable contribution transformations in businesses. Their findings have revealed that blockchain technology is used in businesses not only as a sustainability tool and as a philosophical mindset for addressing sustainability challenges. Parmentola et al., 2022 used a systematic review approach and meta-analyses protocol to identify how blockchain technology can affect environmental sustainability. Their study has presented that blockchain contributes to environmentally sustainable goals from various points of view such as improving efficiency and supporting the creation of secure and reliable smart transactions. The researchers have reported that blockchain has no negative effects on the environment that need to be considered. Lustenberger et al. (2021) proposed an extended Blockchain Adoption Model based on the technology-organization framework with the novel idea of ecosystem readiness as a crucial factor for blockchain adoption. The researchers have argued that blockchain adoption is driven externally such as a large ecosystem scope and stakeholders. Corsini et al. (2020) adopted a science mapping technique to study the circular economy with blockchain technology. Their findings suggest that more work on how blockchain can support the development of measurement tools for providing information to stakeholders and assisting in decision-making is essential. Kondrateva et al. (2021) conducted an exploratory analysis on the application of blockchain technology in co-creation ecosystems. Their findings report that the lack of operating rules, trust and traceability could be resolved by the potential benefits of blockchain technology applications in small and medium enterprises. Geroni (2021) has presented an overview of the blockchain ecosystems. The researcher stated that blockchain ecosystems refers to a group of elements capable of interacting with each other to create an environment with desired features (smart contracts) which is a governance structure. Each governance structure presents acceptable behaviour, funding, data ownership, entrance and exit criteria and communication among participants. The researcher thus argues that with the focus on the ecosystem perspective, enterprises could look beyond the traditional prospects with blockchain technology and present the types and components of a blockchain ecosystem. OECD (2023) analysed how can blockchain ecosystems can serve SMEs. The study has reported that Blockchain can ensure integrity, security, accountability, and trust among stakeholders, presents different opportunities to SMEs and start-ups, development of blockchain ecosystems is at large and that Governments in recent years have taken various policy approaches for encouraging innovative applications in SMEs.

Integration of Governance, Trust, and Openness (i.e. Transparency) is identified as the distinct strategic value proposition offered by blockchain (Riasanow et al., 2018). Based on the analysis of 419 blockchain companies using e3 value analytics, Riasanow et al. (2018) identified 11 roles for the different participants of the blockchain ecosystem (Figure 2). They are (1) consumers, (2) infrastructure providers, (3) platform providers, (4) application providers, (5) token-based community platform providers, (6) mining pools, (7) miners (8) ancillary service providers, (9) alliances, (10) Communities of users and tech-specific solutions and (11) consulting service providers. The miners and mining pools play a crucial role in permissionless blockchain networks. However, the role of mining activity is controlled by a few central participants of the permissioned blockchain networks.

Riasanow et al. (2018) present the roles of a consumer as a prosumer, a participant, an investor and being benefitted from the value-adding services and paying for the service. However, in SEs the consumer in addition takes up the role of community or consulting. The generic model states that the blockchain infrastructure provider supply users and developers the infrastructure capabilities such as the underlying decentralised ledger technology, P2P network, consensus algorithms, virtual machines, and historical records. For SEs, the service provider is to provide all the necessary hardware and network services. The generic model states that the platform provider offers the technical basis in the form of software and services that are on top of the infrastructure such as Elemetric. Monax, multichain, setl.io, etherparty, smart contract, Shapeshift, ChromaWay, IBM BlueMix. Considering the extended network of technical SE networks, all digitally savvy SEs can play the role that aligns with their value propositions. The generic model states that the blockchain application provider offers applications that are linked to on-chain and off-chain services such as Databroker DAO, Blockscience, Storj.io, Power Ledger, Crowdz, Propy, OwlTing, Bimded, FunFair, Scorum and TAO Network. The generic model presents that the token-based community platform is built on internal token distribution reward systems for establishing and evaluating content and the examples are Numerai and Steemit. Furthermore, Miner and Mining pool such as Antpool, Slush Pool, BTC.top and Bitfury, Mining Solution and equipment providers such as Giga Watt, Canaan, MinersGate, Technology, Riot Blockchain, Bitmain Technologies Ltd and Genesis Mining, Blockchain ancillary service providers such as Sweetbridge, SettleMint, Blockchain Academy, Byte Academy and BTC Media, Blockchain alliances, Blockchain community and blockchain consulting services are roles presented by the generic model. Due to the resource limitations of SEs and hyper-dynamic nature of blockchain evolution, this study groups the 11 roles into two categories BC service provider and BC service consumers for the context of SEs, as shown in Table 1.

Health, education and financial ecosystems with blockchain use

This section describes the three distinct blockchain ecosystem models in consumer-related transactions from the banking, health, and education domains. The first proposes an accounting ecosystem model to overcome the error-prone nature of double-entry accounting systems and its associated verification costs and delays (Gökten & Özdoğan, 2020). Scholars have also illustrated how the blockchain ecosystem can fundamentally transform the assurance tasks of accounting functions using the triple-entry ledger systems hosted in a blockchain network (Dai & Vasarhelyi, 2017). The key components of a blockchain-based accounting ecosystem are given in Table 2.

Scholars are actively exploring how electronic medical record transactions can be transformed into a blockchain ecosystem to ensure the privacy and security needs of this critical data (Cerchione et al., 2023; Sharma et al., 2021; Tanwar et al., 2020). Table 3 in the appendix provides key components of a blockchain-based EMR ecosystem.

In the education domain, MIT developed and deployed the Blockcert service which was an open standard for issuing and verifying academic credentials using blockchain (Schmidt, 2015). Based on the explorations of blockchain use by eight different universities, Grech and Camilleri (2017) proposed eight blockchain usage scenarios to transform the European Union education ecosystem. These scenarios are (1) permanently securing certifications, (2) verifying multi-step accreditation (3) creating life-long learning passports (4) Auto recognition and transfer of credits (5) Tracking and rewarding IP use (6) receiving student payments (7) student funding vouchers and (8) Using sovereign identities for student ids. In 2020, the Australian Council of ICT Deans Learning and Teaching Academy funded a proof of concept to make novel use of blockchain for tracking skills development from authentic assessments. Based on this evidence, Table 4 summarizes the key aspects of a blockchain-based education ecosystem.

Based on the blockchain ecosystem models created for social value generation, this study posits that a national eco-system model is necessary to enable small enterprises to source the skills needed to leverage the benefits of ABCD innovations. Next, we illustrate the components of a blockchain-based National Digital Skills Recruitment Chains (NDSRC) model.

National Digital Skills Recruitment Chain (NDSRC) model

Based on the synthesis of blockchain features and capabilities and ecosystem models, this study proposes a National Digital Skills Recruitment Chain (NDSRC) (Figure 3). The digital skills prosumers such as universities require digital research and development skills, digital enterprises require digital design skills, certification providers require blockchain verification skills, TAFE and Schools require digital operational skills and digital small enterprises require digital support skills. These digital skills prosumers could add/append individual digital skills such as artificial intelligence skills, blockchain skills, cloud skills and data analytics skills to the National Digital Skills Recruitment Chains (NDSRC). The digital skills recruitment services with services such as skill tokens, skill development alliances, skills sourcing, skills mining pools, skills contracts, skills audit, and skills consensus are where the small enterprises could subscribe to the services as required for their businesses.

Figure 3. National Digital Skills Recruitment Chains (NDSRC) for small enterprises.

This model is designed to leverage the features offered by Blockchain as a foundational mechanism for social transformation. The key stakeholders and their recruitment-related tasks are described below.

Key stakeholders

Considering the decentralized nature and large investment needs to set up blockchain infrastructure, this study proposes that government bodies plan and set up the network infrastructure required for rolling blockchain-based services. In Australia, the National Broadband Network rollout was completed in 2019. The discussions are already active on NBN futures to ensure that productivity and digital equity can be shared with all Australians (Holmes & Campbell, 2020). Considering the equity offered by the decentralized blockchain applications, this study posits that a government-led consortium will be necessary to set up a national blockchain infrastructure service to keep track of the digital skills inventory of all the potential employees available locally as well as globally. We expect this will be a consortium of telecom (Telstra, Optus and Vodafone) and digital hardware (IBM, HP, DELL) leaders led by the national governments. Table 5 provides ecosystem model components that can enable small enterprises to source the required ABCD digital skills from NDSRC.

Table 5. Digital skills recruitment ecosystem.

BC enabled tasks	Peer-to-peer stakeholders	Scope of smart contracts	BC features/capabilities
Add, append, and publish digital skills	Job seekers and skills prosumers including small digital enterprises	Skills validation and verification	Privacy and security Facilitating trust, networking, and innovation
Search, select, subscribe skills	Job seekers and -non-digital small enterprises	Skills scoping, selection, evaluation conditions	Privacy, security, and immutability Facilitating large network access, privacy
Utility pricing models	Governments and NDSRC prosumers	Governance rules and audit controls	Immutability and networking Facilitating innovation, disintermediation
Audit standards and controls	Governments and NDSRC consumers	Auditing rules and country-specific regulations	Privacy, security Facilitating trust and network
Networking and data security standards	Governments and telco providers governments and cyber security firms	Access controls, violation rules, escalation protocols	Transparency, privacy Facilitating trust, innovation, and networking

Blockchain-enabled tasks such as adding, appending, and publishing digital skills could be sourced by job seekers and skills prosumers for skills validation and verification due to the privacy, security and facilitating trust enabled by the blockchain features. Job seekers and non-digital small enterprises could search, select, and subscribe to skills including services such as skills scoping, selection, and evaluation conditions since the blockchain enables transparency, and privacy and facilitates large network access. Governments and National Digital Skills Recruitment Chains consumers could avail utility pricing models pertaining to governance rules and audit controls due to blockchain immutability and networking, disintermediation, and the ability to facilitate innovation. The Government and the National Digital Recruitment Chain consumers could also avail themselves of block chain-enabled tasks such as the audit standards and controls and the networking and data security standards.

Conclusion

The growth of blockchain technology and its features have enabled it to be widely used by the business community. While recent studies have highlighted the development of the generic blockchain applications and generic blockchain ecosystem, this research has focussed on blockchain-based skills recruitment models for small enterprises. By analysing around 479 blockchain businesses Riasanow et al. (2018) visualised the blockchain ecosystem with 11 generic roles and have suggested identifying potential business opportunities for the model. This research has described three distinct blockchain ecosystem models in consumer-related transactions from the banking, health, and education domains. The key components related to the blockchain-based accounting ecosystem, blockchain-based health record ecosystem and blockchain-based education ecosystem have been presented. Finally, the blockchain-based National Digital Skills Recruitment Chains (NDSRC) model is illustrated. The model design leverages the unique features (digital trust, data immutability, privacy and security) offered by Blockchain as a foundational mechanism for social transformation.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).