Most people do not start thinking about identity and verification until they are already frustrated by it. By then, they have uploaded the same documents countless times, shared sensitive information across dozens of systems, and accepted friction as normal.
This is why I believe it’s critical to shift behavior when someone is young. If we want to change behavior at scale, we should stop waiting until people are already exhausted by the broken system. Instead, we should start earlier and give young people a secure, verified career passport when they are first entering adulthood, then let that credential grow with them as they move through school, work, and professional life. This way, they learn to protect their own data and be the guardians of the same.
What would this look like?
It could begin around the transition into college or early adulthood, lock in verified identity, place it in their wallet, and let it accumulate degrees, licenses, and trusted attributes over time.
The external landscape suggests the timing is right. As award-winning chef Nicholas Wyman points out, digital passports can help young people move into skilled work, and wallet-based records can map skills and career pathways more effectively. California’s official Career Passport reporting now points in the same direction, with a state effort centered on secure display of academic and non-academic credentials for employment and education use.
A Better Model Is Needed
Just as a driver’s license becomes a normal, expected milestone, a career passport should become a normal part of entering adult economic life.
This is especially powerful for younger generations because they are already digital natives. They are comfortable with wallets, biometrics, and app-mediated life.
What they need is not more willingness to digitize, but a better trust model to digitize into. If we teach them from the beginning that they do not need to repetitively hand over their personal data every time a school, employer, gym, landlord, or service provider asks for proof, we create a generation with better instincts about privacy and personal responsibility for their personal data.
Let The Wallet Grow as Life Grows
A real career passport cannot be static.
It should start with verified identity and then expand, carefully and selectively, as life unfolds. Diplomas, certificates, apprenticeships, licenses, skills records, exam integrity proofs, work authorizations, and continuing education achievements should be able to attach over time. That creates continuity between education and employment, rather than forcing people to rebuild their credibility from scratch at every life stage.
I like this model because it reflects how real lives work. Nobody stays frozen at the moment of first verification. People gain qualifications, change fields, add specialties, and renew licenses. A good trust credential should age with them, not expire into irrelevance the moment the next institution wants something slightly different.
Trending in the Right Direction
One reason this matters now is that the public sector is beginning to understand the same need.
The California Career Passport project speaks directly to the mainstreaming of this idea. Directionally, I think that is excellent news. Operationally, I worry whenever governments are tempted to build a giant system, it not only becomes a costly undertaking, but more importantly, privacy seems to erode over time.
California’s own report shows the promise clearly: a secure tool that helps people surface verified credentials from academic and nonacademic pathways and makes those competencies legible to both employers and colleges.
That is the right destination, but the wrong implementation can still ruin the right vision.
If this becomes another top-down repository that overwhelms the user, it will disappoint. If it becomes a user-controlled wallet that grows cleanly over time, it could reshape how a generation enters the labor market.
What excites me most about this model is not just efficiency. It is the chance to normalize trust credentials before “I give up or it’s the way it is done” sets in. Teach people young that their identity is theirs, their record should be portable, and proof should not require surrender.
Do that well, and a career passport becomes much more than an employment tool. It becomes the first healthy habit in a lifelong relationship with digital trust.
