For a Trade Union version of the New Skills for New Jobs initiative

Transcription

1 For a Trade Union version of the New Skills for New Jobs initiative ETUC Conference, 2-3 september 2010, Brussels With the support of the European Commission

2 Overview New Skills for New Jobs Initiative: from Lisbon strategy to Europe 2020 Sector Councils for Employment and Skills: > New Deal for Social Dialogue? > What kind of forward-looking studies? Learning outcomes: evolution or revolution? > A way towards a more efficient labour market? > From EQF (European Qualifications Framework) to ESCO (Skills, Competencies and Occupations Taxonomy) Vocational Training and Lifelong Learning > Structural differences and common problems of national systems > Networking to exchange practices and to coach catching-up countries

3 The New Skills for New Jobs initiative : between late Lisbon strategy and embryonic Europe 2020 New Skills for New Jobs : initiative launched in 2008 by EC in order to assess future skills requirements up to 2020 and combine them with a new industrial policy Goal : to replace defensive restructuring action with a forward-planning approach to human skills and productive specialisations Issues: development of human capital, sectoral redeployments, quality of jobs and occupational transitions The crisis has stressed the need to clarify the agenda : New Skills for New Jobs is one of the seven flagship initiatives put forward in the communication Europe 2020, A European strategy for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth (march 2010) The ability of European countries to adapt in a positive way to new competitive and environmental conditions depends on the availability of appropriate skills and on the upgrading of competencies of all workers: today, too many workers with a low qualification

4 A trade union version of New Skills for New Jobs initiative : how to empower workers facing occupational transitions? Double objective: the upskilling of individuals throughout their working lives and the cohesion among workers To consider all transitions that workers are likely to be confronted with: > the entry into the labour market > the acquisition of initial professional experience > the transition from casual or temporary employment to a permanent contract > the solutions to redundancy and dismissal > the access to training to guarantee ongoing employability, in particular for senior workers. The measures to be developed must cover as many workers as possible (ex: in SME) and correct any unfair treatment (ex: discriminations, gender mainstreaming, etc.): equal right to training, public funding, employers responsibility

5 The scenery and the stakes : from past to future To overcome the factors of the Lisbon strategy s failure : > Lack of R&D and training efforts > Too poor matching between skills, jobs, sectors > Giving up of the quality at work as key factor of productivity To overcome the obstacles to exiting the crisis : > Combined effects of demographic changes and economic transformations in the decade ahead: between dangers and opportunities > Ex: sectors with surcapacities and ageing manpower the risk of a noiseless but irreversible european industrial decline > No fatality, but the stake of the generational replacement : renewal of skills by attractiveness of jobs for young generations. it s different from a simple adaptation of workers to existing jobs To highlight the roles of basic and continuing education in ensuring the quality of occupational mobility, in particular for individuals affected by imbalances in labour markets

6 Skills and competencies : a public good for the smart, sustainable and inclusive growth (Europe 2020)? The theoretical definition of a public good is strict : non-rivalrous and non-excludable > Non-rivalry : use of the good by one agent does not reduce its availability for use by others > Non-excludability : no one can be effectively excluded from using the good Skills and competencies are complex goods, on the side of firms: > Firms used by high persistent unemployment to practice the cheap gathering of skills, with the risk of over-qualification of the workers relatively to the jobs > A firm is reticent to invest into training which could benefit to its competitors (big problem for SME and sub-contractors) > A firm is reticent to communicate its expected internal needs and supply of skills if it becomes a common information on its strategy for the competitors > Firms are tempted by a watchword the right competence at the right moment which considers skills and competencies as private goods usable on a short time horizon and on the side of workers: > competencies are knowledge and skills privately embedded in individuals (factor of personal employability) collectively embedded in work organisation (factor of firm s competiteveness) > Competencies as public good depend on : the right balance between specific and transversal skills in the personal mix of competencies the transferability of personal competencies between firms, sectors, territories

7 What interaction of social dialogue and public policies in order to optimize individual and collective development of skills? (1) The proposal by EC of Sector Councils for Employment and Skills at EU level The pragmatic view of the ECORYS feasibility report (march 2010, presented at Restructuring Forum, december 2009): > Realistic objectives and expectations > Voluntary participation of the stakeholders > Temporary and conditional support by EC (agreement on targets, monitoring of the process, evaluation of the outputs) > Initial focus on information exchange between social partners > Networking of national bodies (22 of the 27 Member States have at least one type of Council) Typology of Councils for Employment and Skills in EU Member States (number of Member States in which they are found) 1 1 Source: Sector Councils on Employment and Skills at EU level. A study into their feasibility and potential impact, ECORYS, march 2010

8 What interaction of social dialogue and public policies in order to optimize individual and collective development of skills? (2) The pragmatic way proposed by the report ECORYS has been validated by the Commission In a working document (22 july 2010), which summarizes the results and the outlooks of the sectoral social dialogue, the Commission speaks in favour of the revival of this dialogue and its efficiency 1 The Commission considers skills and competencies as an essential field of the sectoral social dialogue, in order to contribute to the definition of the public policies The commission considers the sectoral Councils for employment and skills as a complementary tool : Taking part in sectoral skills councils can help social partners to get involved in joint actions with other partners as a complement to their autonomous dialogue 1 Source: Commission Staff Working Document on the functioning and potential of European sectoral social dialogue, European Commission, SEC(2010) 964 final, 22 July 2010

9 A more normative Exploratory Opinion of the European Economic and Social Committee? CCMI/068 EESC 259/2010, Matching skills: sector councils on employment and skills > Appropriately organised and managed sectoral councils involving various stakeholders should provide crucial support in the process of managing sectoral changes > The activities of the European sectoral social dialogue committees (ESSDC) could serve as an operational model for the European Sectoral Councils (ESC) ESCs can have a broader scope, in terms of the number of stakeholders they comprise, and a more independent role than ESSDCs, focussing more on skills and the labour market than social dialogue > The most important tasks that the new ESCs could carry out would be: analysing quantitative and qualitative labour market trends in the given sector; make recommendations to fill and eliminate qualitative and quantitative gaps in the labour market and implementing programmes and measures to achieve this; supporting cooperation between businesses and VET providers > ESC constitute a platform which should include the social partners, education and training institutions and organisations, institutions, organisations and public authorities, professional associations and organisations providing vocational education and training (VET) and initial vocational education and training (IVET) Three remarks: > An openness not only to social partners but to other actors > A woolly link with the Sectoral Social Dialogue Committees: the design is not clear > Not only an information exchange role but also a political one

10 The opinions of Trade Unions Federations about Sector Councils for Employment and Skills 1 A common interest, with significant nuances > New Skills for New Jobs, an opportune flagship initiative > Councils = structure and resources interesting for consistent forward-looking studies supplying social partners with operational information networking of national councils and observatories > Different degrees of commitment to the process of implementing Sectoral Councils Work in progress: Textile-Clothing-Leather, Commerce, Car Industry, Embryonic stage in other sectors Debates and questions: > The right sectoral perimeter? A large one to foster transferability of skills and employability of individuals (ex: the fashion industry)? A limited one to fit with professional realities (ex: many sub-sectors in the metallurgy)? > The right link with sectoral Social Dialogue Committees (SSDC)? Consensus: the leadership of social partners What practical relationship of Councils with SSDC, to avoid redundancy : subordination or autonomy? Determination of work program and validation of the outputs by SSDC? > The right participation of social and civic actors? Some consensus for the participation of vocational training structures supplying expertise and action. but cautiousness concerning the participation of other players (what representativeness?) Problem: employers often more reticent than TU, when they prefer manage skills at the firm level 1 Federations surveyed: EFBWW, EFFAT, EMCEF, EMF, EPSU (Public Utilities), EPSU (Health and Social Services), ETF, UNI-Europa (Commerce), Uni-Europa (ICTS), ETUF-TCL

11 A bottom-up matter for the work of sectoral Councils: some issues raised by trade-unionists The tension between the development of skills of workers presently employed and the recourse to external resources (ex: recruitment of extra-eu engineers and/or outsourcing-offshoring in ICTS, Energy Public Utilities, Transports, etc.) The tension between the world standardisation of skills and the individual creativity as factor of competence and innovation (the knowledge workers in ICTS): Standardisation and segmentation of skills foster outsourcing (ex: cloud computing in ICTS), while systemic competencies need local clusters. The interaction between the ageing of workers and the restructuring of the industrial processes, with impact on the mobility of workers and on the attraction of young people for industrial jobs (ex: the Energy Public Utilities, with the emergence of services to customer and smart grids; the chemical industry, with the conjunction of overcapacities and ageing manpower ) The right balance between professional life and private life to favour social competencies and to open more resolutely occupations to women (ICTS engineers, Trade managers, etc.) The wages and work conditions, the quality of jobs as means to attract qualified manpower into sectors creating new jobs (ex: to attract more men in social care) The required mix of skills conditioned by economic, organisational and institutional factors. Ex: > In Health Services, the place of the publicly financed sector > In Social Services sector, the professionnalisation of social care > In Financial sector, the nature of the changes in regulation after the crisis > In Commerce and Transports, the determinant impact of business models on skills management

12 Forward-looking studies : towards more operational and better coordinated studies in sectoral councils? Today, two main sets of forward-looking studies at European level > CEDEFOP s Macro-quantitative forecasting of needs and supply of skills by occupations (ISCO) and qualifications (ISCED), in relation with teams in member countries. > Sectoral surveys in nineteen sectors, according to a common methodological framework (drivers, scenarii, impact on employment and skills, recommendations) The Trade-Unionists know and use these interesting studies, have exchanged with authors of surveys and contributed by constructive and critical remarks, but: > They appreciate frequently these studies as too futurist and abstract, not operational enough to be used easily in social dialogue (particularly to define training actions) > They consider frequently that hypotheses driving the scenarii don t take into account important variables (ex: the role of publicly financed sector in Health Services) > The real practices of skills management in firms and the differences among countries should be more explicitly taken into account > The future skills needs are not a simple consequence of future economic, technological and organisational changes : to develop the competencies of all workers is a condition to improve European position in world competition (ex: chemical industry, textile) > The councils could foster a better coordination of the different kinds of studies

13 To make CEDEFOP forecasts more usable by attention to ways of recruiting for professions and occupations The aggregate forecasts of CEDEFOP supply useful informations : > The relation between the macroeconomic growth paths and the dynamics of employment and qualification structures > A rough estimation of the global imbalances between needs and supply of skills, between qualifications of the occupations and skills of the people These informations have limits which handicap their use in social dialogue > Classifications of jobs and skills are not implemented homogeneously among countries > Lack of a precise and detailed description of the manpower flows on the labour markets, (ex: the actual qualification level of the jobs to be replaced after outflows) > An operational assesment of the imbalances between skills needs and supply require a better knowledge of the sources of hiring and the ways of recruiting (internal or external markets, young or experienced people, etc): different ways of recruiting according to occupations, in relation with the required skills (specific / transversal skills) The discussion on the CEDEFOP s priorities offers an opportunity for promoting such issues, in relation with concerns of Sector Councils

14 Learning outcomes : evolution or revolution? The EU orientation well received by the trade-unionists surveyed: > to give professional development in workplace a greater role in driving and validating skills development and acquisition > To focus on continuous learning outcomes throughout employees professional careers rather than exclusively on initial degrees. But such orientation raises a set of questions: > The compatibility with business model adopted by the firm, which condition the benefit of upskilling for the employees (better wages and / or employability): the collective bargaining on these issues is still limited. > What responsibility of Trade unions in training and skills assessment services? Is their participation in stakeholders partnerships, like Sector Councils, the right way? What bargaining of training programs in firms and sectors? > European public instruments (European Qualifications Framework, Credit Transfer System for Vocational Education and Training) are perceived as useful references but still too abstract or top-down to overcome practical obstacles to mobility > Noteworthy efforts, as the elaboration, by social partners, of professional passport in agriculture and tourism

15 Learning outcomes and labour market The learning outcomes approach raises the flexicurity of labour market: > Recognition of competencies acquired in workplace improves employability of people: it is part of the equipment enabling people to face professional transitions sucessfully > It raises also the depth of labour market: generic skills acquired in specific workplaces become available for other employers > Imbalances between needs and supply of skills are less rigid than by taking only the initial education cursus and diplomas into account A labour market recognizing all kinds of learning needs suitable rules and involved actors > Transparency of methods and clear responsibility of accreditation bodies in order to have effective equivalence of formal, no-formal, informal learning outcomes > Cooperation between social partners, public and private employment services in order to have united qualifications frameworks for initial and continuing vocational training > Implications for the initial education and training system, that should be able to describe diplomas and qualifications in terms of professional skills and competencies > In sectors with natural mobility (ex: transports), training and qualification frameworks are more easily a current issue of social dialogue and collective bargaining

16 Implications of learning outcomes for the work of Sector Councils A stable place to develop analysis of concrete changes in critical professions, impacted by economic, technological, ecological evolutions, with a right balance between direct observation, statistical description, forward-looking analysis > Example : the common project bricklayer of EFBWW and FIEC, in order to compare training systems, to design the competencies required by the bricklayer profession and their mutual recognition > Recommendation of ECORYs report: achieving early impact by focussing on a limited number of activities and on the quick delivery of high quality output By developing such bottom-up studies, Councils would contribute to improve European frameworks by taking the concrete dynamics of professions into account > European Qualifications Framework (EQF): an esperanto which supplies useful principles for building recognition between national qualifications, but not yet an operational tool for practical equivalences and free mobility on european labour market > Ex : Direct application of EQF is difficult where there is a binary system with a strong distinction between professional and academic-oriented higher education > Eurocadres report, Skills and competencies for mobility in a competitive Europe (2009): to complete EQF by a second layer, European grid for the recognition of European qualifications, based on a more sectoral approach and on a multi-stakeholder dialogue, including the different kinds of learning (formal, informal and non-formal) > Normative efficiency stakes: responsibility of accreditation, professional cards, criteria of quality assurance

17 EQF: a translator between qualifications levels (qualification= knowledge+skills+competencies)

18 Example: level 5 of EQF (knowledge, skills, competence)

19 Convergence of NQFs by implementation of EQF: work in progress, horizon 2012 Orientations confirmed by the EU Employment Council (June 2010) > Driving a common trend towards comprehensive NQFs covering all levels and types of qualifications, according to national traditions and structures > Referencing national levels and qualifications to EQF levels > Using the learning outcomes approach > Promoting integration between vocational and academic education: Coherent level descriptors covering all levels and types of qualifications or parallel qualifications strands at high levels 6-8 of EQF - one for academic qualifications - one for vocationally oriented qualifications But ETUCE Statement on the Employment Council Conclusions (June 2010) to stress its support for the diversity of the education systems in the EU as well as the need to ensure that the EQF and the creation of NQFs will not lead to a process of harmonisation of the structure of education systems Source: Advisory Committee on Vocational Training, Brussels, June 2010

20 Beyond EQF: towards a common and operational Skills, Competencies and Occupations Taxonomy (ESCO)? The fundamental aim of the program ESCO: the development, at European level, of the first ever multilingual dictionary linking skills and competencies to occupation, including a few thousand descriptors... in order to improve practical interoperability ( harmonisation) between labour market actors and education / training actors Ex: employers and employment services would use ESCO to define a set of skills and competencies required when they are developing a job description The Sector Councils could inject a useful bottom-up approach into the building of ESCO in order to have descriptors adapted to professional changes and to mutual recognition of skills The reference groups and the agenda of ESCO project should be adapted to the emerging contribution of Sector Councils

21 ESCO: a complex governance, a start-up phase achieved in 2010? EURES JMPortal on WWW ESCO Taxonomy Data Base WEB PES, PRES, Qualification Frameworks, HR- XML.org et al. ESCO Board Secretariat Web Tools for Inputs and editing. Individual sections for each Reference Group. Maintenance Committee Reference Groups (e.g. PES, PRES, Employers/Industrial Sectors, Education/Training, EQF Advisory Group, Guidance networks, Promoters of other Taxonomies)

22 Lifelong Learning in EU : an already long story By the mid-1990s, Delors white paper was the initial source of common programs (Erasmus, Comenius, Leonardo da Vinci ) and processes (Bologna, Copenhagen) > to overcome the usual dualism between initial and continuing education by promoting permanent education : LLL is the new watchword > to promote mutual recognition of qualifications and skills > to encourage individual mobility in Europe The 2000s : Lisbon strategy and Open Method of Coordination applied to education > Guidelines to set out coherent national strategies > Strategic objectives: Quality and effectiveness of education and training systems Access of all to education and training Opening up to the world > Detailed objectives and indicators to benchmark and influence the national practices

23 Vocational Education and Training : some key issues of the Communication from the EC 1 (june 2010) To equip the people with the right mix of skills (IVET) and to update it (CVET) > To balance : key competencies (= foundation for Life Long Learning) and vocational skills (= professional excellence) standardized skills (factor of productivity) and creative personal competencies (factor of innovation) > To foster LLL-friendly VET systems : easy access to CVET guidance services and individualisation of learning pathways Transparent and consistent recognition of learning outcomes To modernize the VET systems: > Convergent NQF referenced to EQF to foster permeability between VET and Higher Education (HE) to open barriers and ceilings by transparent qualifications and portability of learning outcomes > To make transnational mobility a way for upskilling (ECVET) > Quality culture thanks to quality assurance policy (EQAVET) > Sector councils: involvement of social partners to spread information and best practices (design, organisation, delivery and financing of VET) 1 Source: New impetus for European cooperation in Vocational Education and Training to support the Europe 2020 strategy, European Commission, COM(2010) 296 final, 9 June 2010

24 Points of view of the employees about the CVET: a common demand facing unequal opportunities A sample survey realized by CEGOS observatory, march 2010, in 4 european countries: France, Germany, Spain, UK, 2200 employees surveyed (550 in each country) Common features: > the training is mainly on the personal initiative of the worker (61%), > A majority of workers ready to training outside the working time (76%) The main reasons of non-training during the last three years : > 25% of people (29% in Germany, 34% in Spain) say: Never training in my company > In France, the main reason (22%): I don t belong to the persons trained 69% of employees consider that their company uses all possible means to define training needs and implement training opportunities : > between 75% in UK and 61% in France Unequalities concerning the access to e-learning: > 38% of employees have had access to e-learning training, but: > 54% in Spain, 42% in UK, 37% in Germany, 19% in France Source: «Quelle formation professionnelle aujourd hui et pour demain?», CEGOS, Mai 2010

25 Vocational training and Sector Councils According to the ECORYS survey > The emphasis of Sector Councils must be on issues relevant for both employers and labour > A great majority of the respondents (72 %) opted for a dual focus of Sector Councils: Initial Vocational Education and Training (IVET) AND Continuing Vocational Training (CVET) > with significant nuances : Employers : firstly interested by responsiveness of IVET to changes in skills needs and labour market Trade Unions : firstly interested by promoting CVET (= bodyguard for workers and firms) The relation between IVET and CVET in the heart of Sector Councils concerns > To connect the parallel worlds of education, training and firms > To define a fair balance between the priorities of Trade Unions and the ones of employers >... in order to involve pro-actively employers organisations (sometimes reticent) > To design an institutional framework to drive action of training providers and to use efficiently public and private funds

26 Vocational training : persistent differences and common problems between national systems Different groups of countries, on the basis of two criteria: the relationship between CVET and IVET (integration or separation) and the nature of CVET s regulation (centralised, decentralised, weak) > CVET integrated in IVET system (nordic countries) probably an advantage for promoting Lifelong Learning > CVET and IVET separate (continental and mediterranean countries), with a contractual regulation, more or less decentralized, of CVET the progressive and unequal emergence of an individual right of workers to training the stake of qualification frameworks to extend the transferability of personal skills > Weak regulation of CVET, whose intensity depends mainly on the unilateral efforts of firms (UK) the role of NVQ to signal the competencies of the individuals on the labour market > Shortcomings of vocational training and social dialogue in Central Eastern European Countries Inequalities and common problems > Strong inequalities among countries concerning the access to CVET > This inequality is stronger for small firms : SME s workers frequently outside the CVET common problems: access of SME s workers to training and appeal of SMEs to talents

27 Intensity of training actions in European firms Rate of access of workers to training % of firms realizing training actions (2005) Source: Eurostat, CEREQ, La formation continue dans les entreprises européennes, Bref CEREQ, n 251, avril 2008

28 % of European firms realizing training actions, according to the size (2005) Source: Eurostat, CEREQ, La formation continue dans les entreprises européennes, Bref CEREQ, n 251, avril 2008

29 Vocational training embedded in idiosyncratic systems of industrial relations, labour markets and public policies If vocational training is key concern of Sector Councils as networking of national bodies, it is crucial to take structural differences between member countries into account From theoretical point of view, different policy regimes for LLL 1 : combination of political principles, actors strategies, rules and instruments > Decommodified regimes: Corporatist (basic principle: access to a professional community) Academic (basic principle: school-based merit system) Universal (basic principle : compensation of initial inequalities) > Market Regimes: Pure competition market (basic principle: utility of services provided for individual human capital) Organised market (basic principle: fair price and quality of services developing skills as social capital) National models = specific compromises between typical regimes The European approach could be also be understood as a new combination of regimes : > Corporatist (sector councils), universal (fair opportunities and transitions for all workers), organised market (pro-active training providers regulated by common rules) > helping to correct national deficiencies and to spread best practices effectively 1 see: Eric Verdier, European LLL Strategy and diversity of national devices: an interpretation in terms of public policy regimes, 2009

30 An important point, concerning Central and Eastern European member countries In many CEEC, skills are rather of a secondary importance to social partners and slowly become to be a key issue European frameworks and tools are useful for helping catching-up countries to establish and develop qualification frameworks and vocational training systems European Social Fund supports social partners and helps them to check what vocational training options are available

31 Common trend of increasing qualification, without catching-up between leader and backward countries The expected increase of the part of high-qualified people is not higher in backward countries Source: CEDEFOP, Future Skill Supply in Europe, Key Findings, 2009