How to Build a Skills-Ready Workforce in 2026

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Jan 21, 2026

Jayney Howson, SVP of Global Workforce Skills & Talent Readiness at ServiceNow, discusses innovative approaches to workforce development. She highlights the creation of an AI-powered 'University of You' that personalizes learning for employees and practitioners. Jayney explores the importance of embedding learning into daily work, democratizing training, and maintaining psychological safety in skill development. She emphasizes that with the right strategies, the future of work can become more human, allowing for greater creativity and connection.

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INSIGHT

University Of You Personalizes Learning

ServiceNow built an AI-powered "University of You" to deliver hyper-personalized learning for each employee and practitioner.
The platform adapts to individual context, role, skills, and career goals to deliver the right duration and format of learning.

ADVICE

Embed Learning In The Flow Of Work

Embed learning into the agent experience and career profile so learning appears in the flow of work.
Use assessments to deliver minimum viable duration training tailored to existing knowledge.

INSIGHT

From Course Hours To Skill Evidence

Move from time-based courses to skill and assessment-led paths that reflect real capability.
Track and surface learning that happens informally so employees carry validated skills in their profile.

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In this episode of the HR Leaders Podcast, we sit down with Jayney Howson, SVP Global Workforce Skills & Talent Readiness at ServiceNow , to unpack why “talent readiness” has become a burning platform for companies trying to keep pace with AI, platform adoption, and customer transformation. Jayney shares how ServiceNow builds skills for both its 28,000 employees and the millions of practitioners who power ServiceNow implementations inside the world’s largest enterprises, including 85% of the Fortune 500.

She explains how ServiceNow built ServiceNow University, an AI powered, hyper personalized learning platform designed around the concept of the “University of You”, where every learner’s journey adapts to their context, their role, their skills, and their career aspirations. Jayney breaks down why minimum viable duration, skills profiles, and embedded learning experiences are replacing traditional course catalogs, and why democratizing training (including making it free) unlocks capability at global scale.

Most importantly, she shares why transparency, trust, and psychological safety matter more than ever as skills shift, roles evolve, and automation changes the nature of work, and why, if we do this right, the future of work becomes more human, not less.

🎓 In this episode, Jayney discusses:

How to embed learning into the flow of work and the flow of career
Why democratizing training creates global talent pipelines at scale
How ServiceNow University personalizes learning through AI and skills data
Why learning must shift to minimum viable duration and assessment led experiences
Why talent readiness became a burning platform for ServiceNow internally and externally

🙏‍ Thank you to our series partner - atlas copilot

Meet the AI-native adaptive learning platform that builds the course, teaches the skill, and proves the impact, while work is happening, not weeks later → https://www.atlascopilot.com/

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