ICT Practitioner Qualifications and the EQF Principle

Transcription

1 CEN WORKSHOP CWA February 2006 AGREEMENT ICS ; English version European ICT Skills Meta-Framework - State-of-the-Art review, clarification of the realities, and recommendations for next steps This CEN Workshop Agreement has been drafted and approved by a Workshop of representatives of interested parties, the constitution of which is indicated in the foreword of this Workshop Agreement. The formal process followed by the Workshop in the development of this Workshop Agreement has been endorsed by the National Members of CEN but neither the National Members of CEN nor the CEN Management Centre can be held accountable for the technical content of this CEN Workshop Agreement or possible conflicts with standards or legislation. This CEN Workshop Agreement can in no way be held as being an official standard developed by CEN and its Members. This CEN Workshop Agreement is publicly available as a reference document from the CEN Members National Standard Bodies. CEN members are the national standards bodies of Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and United Kingdom. EUROPEAN COMMITTEE FOR STANDARDIZATION COMITÉ EUROPÉEN DE NORMALISATION EUROPÄISCHES KOMITEE FÜR NORMUNG Management Centre: rue de Stassart, 36 B-1050 Brussels 2006 CEN All rights of exploitation in any form and by any means reserved worldwide for CEN national Members. Ref. No.:CWA 15515:2006 E

2 Contents Executive Summary...3 Foreword Introduction...9 Background Purpose of the European ICT Skills Meta-Framework (M-F) Scope Conclusions and Agreements Detailed Findings and Comments Introduction: the realities of a changing ICT world Clarification from examples: some key ICT Practitioner Skills/Competence Frameworks Structured Review of Key Existing Frameworks Level Descriptors for ICT Practitioner Competence Guidance for Appropriate and Effective Use of ICT Skills/Competence Frameworks An Ideal Scenario Recommendations for Next Steps Usefulness Maintenance and Review References Glossary Terminology ANNEXES Annex A: The potential Uses, Benefits and Costs of a European ICT Skills Framework Annex B: ICT Frameworks: an Overview Annex C: Inventory of Main ICT Practitioner Skills/Competence Frameworks Annex D: Relationship of the ICT Skills Meta-Framework to the proposed EQF Annex E: Level Descriptors for ICT Practitioner Competence Annex F: A possible structuring & allocation of ICT Qualifications in line with the EQF Annex G: Principles of the ecco approach to analysing ICT frameworks

3 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The CEN Workshop Agreement (CWA) first presents an in-depth analysis of the current state-of-the art of ICT Practitioner Skills/Competence frameworks in order to clarify the nature of the next steps towards a European ICT Skills Meta-Framework, and its relationship to the proposed European Qualifications Framework (EQF). Then, recommendations based on the results of the analysis are presented. A comprehensive overview of ICT frameworks has been produced, and a structured inventory of five particularly significant ICT Practitioner Skills/Competence frameworks is presented, in terms of a number of key attributes. Three specific frameworks, representing the national approaches in three large Member States, are analysed in some detail, and certain findings are evident, based on their mutual similarities and differences. The overall structural paradigm and an example comparable profile for each are examined. It is recognized that the specifics of the two-dimensional structure of such frameworks, involving vertical (level) and horizontal (functional activity) descriptors, depends on the purpose(s) for which each was designed. In addition the CWA examines the realities of the continuing change taking place within the ICT marketplace, and the lack of stability within the work-organisation and resultant skill-set specification by employers that arise from this lack of stability. The CWA examines in some detail the relationship between Skills/Competence frameworks for ICT Practitioners and Qualifications Frameworks. It is noted that the proposed EQF consists of a set of 8 level descriptors, specifying learning outcomes in terms of Skills, Knowledge and wider Competences and so enables direct comparison of Qualifications thus described with occupational competence profiles. However, it is recognized that skills/competence frameworks specify the demand side of the ICT practitioner labour market, while qualification specifications relate to the supply side of the market. While a focus on learning outcomes has helped to relate these two worlds, it is recognized that they are not the same. The conclusion is that it is desirable to work for greater coherence at the European level of both (and that they are related), but that the variations of the labour market in different Member States means that the two developments can and should be considered separately, while each takes the other into account where appropriate. A structured review of four significant ICT Practitioner Frameworks (the three major national frameworks in the EU and one from North America) was carried out and is presented, and Level Descriptors for the specification of ICT Practitioner competence are developed from the generic EQF descriptors. In addition, based on the comparisons of existing frameworks, broad Guidance is provided for appropriate and effective use and further development of such frameworks. An Ideal Scenario is presented, aiming to introduce the potential benefits of greater coherence at the European level, and options are shown for possible ways of moving towards that world. It is recognized that there is a need for stronger evidence of benefits in relation to the different uses of such frameworks, and a set of recommendations for progressing increased coherence are made, in relation to both ICT Practitioner competence Frameworks and ICT Qualifications of different types. The in-depth analysis of a range of evidence leads to the following conclusions: 3

4 It is recommended to encourage and strengthen the process of convergence of ICT Practitioner skills/competence frameworks within the EU by means of a three step process: i. Provide via the CWA - basic information about frameworks, highlighting criteria that help to compare and to contrast various approaches and help companies and ICT professionals to select or adapt a framework that best fits their purpose and needs. ii. Promote the guidance given in this document. New framework initiatives may be able, and should be encouraged, to base their implementation on it. Existing frameworks may progress towards convergence during stages of review and updating. iii. Work towards an e-competence (reference) framework and the provision of information as to how each framework/ profile or proficiency model is related to it, recognising that this is likely to take considerable time. It is accepted that Life-long Learning is of the utmost importance, especially in the ICT sector and ICT Practitioner occupations, where understanding, skills and competence need regular updating. Consequently, the recognition of professional qualifications and the transferability of all learning outcomes (regardless of how they were acquired, and including those from informal learning) must be supported at all ages. The owners of the major frameworks in Europe should be asked to collaborate in developing a two-dimensional framework, with horizontal skills/competence descriptors specifying profiles, clustered into relevant groups, whose level specifications would be based on the generic level descriptors in the CWA. This framework would be neutral, not subject to any national/cultural or constituency interests, and could be especially helpful in those Member States where no skills/competence framework for ICT practitioners yet exists. A scoping study should be undertaken to clarify options for the top-level structure of a European ICT Qualifications Framework, drawing on the reactions of stakeholders to discussions on the possible structuring shown in Annex F, and on horizontal descriptors arising from the proposed two dimensional framework where possible. Taking into account the emergence in recent years of competence in many Member States, the term competence framework in preference to Skills/Competence Framework should be used as a more comprehensive and holistic concept. The Commission should support a serious exercise of gathering concrete evidence of the benefits of using ICT Practitioner Skills/Competence Frameworks as part of providing, in relation to each relevant potential use of a European e-competence Framework for ICT Practitioners (see Annex A), much greater clarity of justification for further commitment. Since language, terminology and semantics issues have posed problems during Phase 2, it is recommended that a project be undertaken to tackle this problem directly. (Approaches to) Methods and tools that could prove helpful in the development of a European ICT Qualifications Framework (for example, ecco) should be supported. In order for more widespread employer buy-in to be achieved, it is strongly recommended that the CWA and the recommendations within it be presented, on an individual basis, to a number of key European employers, and that the distillation of 4

5 the reactions be written up as a starting point for the next stage of development towards a European e-competence Framework. The fact that this CWA has focused on ICT Practitioner Skills should in no way detract from the importance of User Skills, and a scoping study for options in relation to a European e-competence Framework would be a natural follow-through to this CWA. A considerable amount of new reference material is provided in the Annexes. 5

6 Acknowledgements The Chair and Co-Chair of the ICT Skills Workshop, and the CWA authors Yosh Beier and Matthew Dixon, would like to express their gratitude to all those who gave their time to considering and discussing aspects of the Workshop s agenda, and to previous Project Team members for their contributions. 6

7 Foreword This Draft CEN Workshop Agreement documents the second phase of the CEN/ISSS Workshop project in relation to ICT Skills. The first phase work produced two initial CEN/ISSS Workshop Agreements: CWA Generic ICT Skills Profiles for the ICT supply industry (March, 2004), and CWA ICT Curriculum Development Guidelines for the ICT supply industry (May, 2004), both being reviews by the CEN/ISSS ICT-Skills Workshop of the Career-Space work. These Agreements drew on the pioneering European level work of the Career-Space consortium, and the next step Phase 2 of the CEN/ISSS ICT Skills Workshop has been to broaden the stakeholder base and the focus of attention beyond the limited professional roles considered by Career-Space, and to examine the field in more depth at all skills/competence levels. The main areas of development have arisen from recognition and analysis of: the range of existing ICT Skills/Competence Frameworks; the range of different purposes for which such Frameworks have been developed; the different types of relevant frameworks (e.g. for Practitioner Skills, for ICT User Skills, and for learning curricula); the particularly high rate of change within the field of Information and Communications Technologies, driven by waves of new enabling technologies, the resulting approaches to work organisation, and the resulting lack of stability of skills classification structures; and finally the need to ensure adequate consistency with emerging European Frameworks of relevance, in particular the proposed European Qualifications Framework ( EQF ) and the European Directive on Recognition of Professional Qualifications for regulated professions 1. Phase 2 of the Workshop has involved a considerable amount of work from a number of people, who have been actively involved since the conclusion of the ICT Skills Workshop s first phase. Following the approval, towards the end of 2004, of support for a second phase from D-G Enterprise through CEN, the scene was set at a meeting hosted by CEDEFOP in December The main milestones in Phase 2 were as follows: 1 Since there is no regulation of practice of ICT Practitioner work within the European Union, this Directive is currently of no direct relevance. 7

8 Kick-off meeting February 2005 under the auspices of the University of Karlsruhe (where the CEN/ISSS Business Plan for the project was approved, and the project team assembled); Second meeting May in Brussels (where the focus of the meeting was on the relationship between the proposed Meta-Framework and the European Qualifications Framework, proposals for which were emerging, as well as relevance to the emerging new Directive on Recognition of Professional Qualifications) An ad-hoc meeting on 28 th July in Brussels, initiated by Cepis and hosted by CEDEFOP, where a number of experts reviewed progress in the light of a briefing from Yosh Beier from the Project Team, and The Final meeting of the Workshop on September 2005 at the Headquarters of CEN (where the Draft CWA prepared was discussed and approved in principle, subject to a number of modifications). The issues at stake are complex and challenging. This CEN Workshop recognizes that progress towards the Ideal Scenario of a European Framework of what could be termed e- Competence is aspired to by many who are active in this area, and that progress has perhaps so-far been slow. This CEN Workshop has worked to find a proposition that moves things in a positive direction for supporting the contribution of ICT Skills to achieving the strategic Lisbon goals, while retaining the support of key stakeholders and employers of ICT Practitioners in a market that has still to achieve maturity and stability. As Co-Chairs of this Workshop, we would like to acknowledge with gratitude the very considerable support of all those who have contributed to the production of this CWA, in particular the final Project Team members and authors Yosh Beier and Matthew Dixon. Burkart Sellin Principal Administrator CEDEFOP Wolffried Stucky Former President CEPIS This CEN Workshop Agreement is publicly available as a reference document from the National Members of CEN: AENOR, AFNOR, ASRO, BSI, CSNI, CYS, DIN, DS, ELOT, EVS, IBN, IPQ, IST, LVS, LST, MSA, MSZT, NEN, NSAI, ON, PKN, SEE, SIS, SIST, SFS, SN, SNV, SUTN and UNI. 8

9 0 Introduction Key Terms It is essential that the meaning attributed in the CWA to a small number of key terms is put in context for, and understood by, the reader. The purpose of this initial alert is to flag that these terms must be interpreted carefully more clarification about their specific use is provided in the following sections (and in particular in Annex E). Skills and Competences: These two concepts are powerful and relatively complex, are central to the subject of the CWA, and undoubtedly viewed with different nuances in different (stakeholder) communities and between some Member States. Depending on the usage made in different communities, the meaning of the two terms can be relatively close or importantly different. A detailed analysis of their meaning across Europe is provided in the recent CEDEFOP report by Winterton et al. see References. The CWA draws heavily on the CEDEFOP study, and makes a recommendation about the future use of these terms in the names of relevant central concepts. Generally the frameworks under examination in the CWA are described as Skills/Competence Frameworks. Employer 2 : An employer is an organisation, either in private or public sectors of the economy that pays people who work for it, on some basis generally specified within employment legislation in each Member State. In particular an employer provides information about the requirements of the work (jobs) it offers, recruits people into employment, as well as providing guidance and support for the individual employee to improve, through learning of different kinds, their Knowledge, Skills and Competences. European Meta-Framework: There has been considerable discussion of the differences between meta- and referenceframeworks (and -models and -data). The term Meta-framework is generally used in the CWA to indicate that the work associated with the development of a Meta-Framework, and its use, is in no way intended to duplicate or compete with that already carried out in the development and updating of any existing relevant framework, whether national (within individual Member States) or of any other kind. It is important to recognize, therefore, that the use of Meta in the CWA may not in all cases be the same as its use in some other fields, in particular, in Computer Science. Qualification and Certification: Certification often means the awarding of a certificate, or other testimonial, that formally recognizes and records success in the assessment of Knowledge, Skills and/or Competences, as the final step in the completion of a Qualification. However, it is also used, in particular in relation to ICT Practitioner occupations, to mean the Qualification as a whole. It is important to be aware of these two ( narrow and broad ) meanings of Certification. 2 It is important to note that significant numbers of ICT Practitioners within the EU sometimes work on a contract basis as ICT contractors or consultants. The skills of such self-employed ICT Practitioners also need developing and updating, but their work relationship is with customers (rather than employers), and since their relationships with customers are in general shorter (sometimes significant shorter) than those of employees with their employers - they generally have to take full responsibility for developing their own Knowledge, Skills and Competencies. 9

10 0.1 Background Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Skills 3 are of strategic importance for Europe. The raising of ICT skills within the EU will form part of the means by which the challenging Lisbon objectives (for Europe to become the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world, capable of sustainable economic growth, with more and better jobs and greater social cohesion ) are to be achieved. It is recognized that education and training provision within the EU must be further improved to better match demand for skills, to improve access and equal opportunities 4, to increase the productivity of workers and raise social inclusiveness. The Synthesis Report of the European e-skills/competence Forum (Ee-SF, 2004) defined e- skills as consisting of three key types: ICT Practitioner Skills ICT User Skills, and e-business Skills While in no way questioning the importance of ICT User and e-business Skills, this CWA addresses frameworks for ICT Practitioner Skills 5. Expressions of interest in the development of such a Framework have been made in a number of contexts, not least in the European e-skills Forum Synthesis Report, and the Final Declaration of the European e-skills 2004 Conference in Thessaloniki. The European Centre for Vocational Training (CEDEFOP) and the European Commission have expressed support for the proposal. The Council of European Professional Informatics Societies (CEPIS) took an active part in turning this commitment into action and co-sponsored, with CEDEFOP, this Workshop under the auspices of CEN/ISSS. 0.2 Purpose of the European ICT Skills Meta-Framework The purpose of the proposed ICT Skills Meta-Framework (ICT Skills M-F, or just M-F) is primarily to promote better understanding within the European Union about the nature and structure of the ICT Practitioner Skills required by employers. As will be seen, frameworks can be used for a number of possible purposes, and the design is generally strongly influenced by the main intended purpose. Annex A shows, in tabular form, a number of possible purposes for which a European ICT Skills Meta-Framework could be used, together with information, for each, on the potential Uses, Benefits and Costs of a possible European level framework for Practitioners. 3 The term skill is used here, as generally within this document, in its broadest sense. Within the communities whose work involves using these concepts, competence would generally be the preferred broadest concept, encompassing Knowledge, Skills and wider Competences (see CEDEFOP, 2005 (Winterton et al.)). 4 einclusion is addressed in the i2010 Communication (for further information see document COM(2005) 229 final, source: europa.eu.int/comm/secretariat_general/impact/docs/ia_2005/com(2005)229.pdf, last visit January 2006) 5 defined by the European e-skills Forum as The capabilities required for researching, developing and designing, managing, the producing, consulting, marketing and selling, the integrating, installing and administrating, the maintaining, supporting and service of ICT systems 10

11 A Meta-Framework is one which stands beyond (or above) (other) frameworks, in the sense of describing (other) frameworks. A Meta-Framework is a framework about frameworks. There are a number of existing frameworks for ICT Practitioners within the EU and beyond, and the proposed Meta-Framework would stand beyond them in particular because it is not intended, or designed, to stand alongside them. It is not a new ICT Practitioner Skills/Competence Framework, but attempts to encompass and disseminate information about existing (and possible future) such frameworks, for the benefit of all. Better understanding about ICT Skills can be useful in a number of ways, but extensive discussions as part of the Workshop process have concluded that the greatest value from this Meta-Framework can be gained from its use as: a tool for structured comparison between existing ICT Practitioner Skills/Competence Frameworks; a guidance resource on which those considering the possibility of developing their own Frameworks can draw; a conceptual basis for planning future developments that would help assure a greater supply of competent ICT Practitioners to European employers; and a starting point from which the proposed European Qualifications Framework can be applied to, and evaluated for, ICT Practitioner work, both by employers and by practitioners planning their careers. ICT Practitioner work, and the skills and competences that are required to carry it out, arise from the way in which work on ICT products, services and systems is organized. Just as Information and Communication Technologies themselves are highly complex and continuing to evolve, so the skill-sets 6 needed in relation to deploying and using ICT are both very complex and not yet stable or mature in terms of coherence of their classification. As a result, efforts to clarify and codify the structures of these skills have not yet reached a level of stability that enables adequate agreement at the European level on classification frameworks that could be thought of as a possible future standard for the European Union. This is explained in more detail in the next Section. 6 again, read in the broadest sense or as competence 11

12 1 Scope The scope issues in this workshop are very important, but they relate, rather than just to the types of skills considered, to the clarification and positioning of precisely what the proposed ICT Skills Meta-Framework is (and what it is not). Classification frameworks are highly complex, particularly abstract things as only a certain level of abstraction allows for the emergence of classifiable structure. Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), the focus of ICT skills, are also highly complex. The concepts in both involve a number of aspects of abstractness and subtlety, e.g. the degree and granularity of abstraction and questions of delineation. This results in the fact that the underlying understanding necessary to validly assess different aspects of the design of an ICT Skills Meta-Framework is not very widespread. As in the ICT market as a whole, therefore, many aspects of debates around these topics include discussions involving considerable limitations of understanding. Classification Frameworks for skills, Competences and qualifications can also be very powerful concepts, since they can be applied in a number of important ways. These include: supporting HR and workforce development initiatives, describing certain roles in order to present attractive images of industry activity in order to encourage people to initiate their careers or apply for jobs in this work, helping to consistently communicate expectations about competences required by employers from individuals in order to effectively perform in given roles of the industry, providing a valid set of targets in terms of performance expectations - for education and training provision (and the qualifications awarded following successful completion of this learning), classifying jobs in relation to recruitment and salary data, and capturing occupational structure for statistical data collection on the workforce. The continuing changes in occupational structure in ICT work pose continuing challenges for those attempting to find adequate occupational classifications that span the economy as a whole (in particular, at the international level through the International Standard Classification of Occupations - ISCO 7 ). The design of frameworks arises first and foremost from the intended purpose, or application. This is fundamental, since although frameworks designed for one purpose can be, and often are, used for purposes beyond those they were designed for, they may well not be particularly well-suited for the other applications, and so may not perform effectively in that context. In short, frameworks once created - can take on a life of their own, and this can often produce unexpected, and sometimes undesirable, effects in other contexts. And finally, the scope of the stakeholder context is one where governments, employers and individuals interests are involved, from Member States with a wide range of cultures and traditions across the three relevant worlds of enterprise, employment and education. Given these realities, there has, during the course of the workshop activity, understandably been a considerable amount of discussion around what is needed, not all of which has yet resulted in satisfactory conclusions or adequate consensus. The response of the project 7 Currently undergoing revision by the International Labour Organisation 12

13 team8 to these challenges has been to work to maintain precision and clarity in relation to what is being proposed. During the course of the project, details of the structure of the proposed European Qualifications Framework emerged. The proposed EQF is of course a very important proposition, and is a major structural initiative to facilitate greater coherence for Lifelong Learning in Europe, while responding to the Lisbon objectives. The second part of the current project has therefore developed recommendations as to how ICT qualifications would relate to the proposed EQF. In clarifying the most constructive response of the ICT Skills Meta-Framework project to the emergence of the proposed EQF, it is essential to be clear about the difference between a Skills (or perhaps more correctly, a Competence) Framework and a Qualifications Framework. While most people would assume that the term qualifications relates to knowledge acquisition and academic achievement in the early years of life within the formal education system, it covers, in the European Union of today, a number of qualifications that are neither assessed or awarded in the early years within the formal education system, nor involve only the assessment of knowledge and understanding. In addition in the field of professional activity a considerable amount of professional competence is gained by means of informal and non-formal learning that has in the past not been recorded or recognized by qualifications. For this reason, and in order to strengthen the link between learning, qualifications and employer competence needs, the proposed EQF has been designed around learning outcomes, specified in terms of sets of Competences: Knowledge, Skills, and wider Competences ( KSCs ). The Workshop participants welcome this approach, in that it is ultimately not the way in which a qualification was achieved that matters but the individual s employability and, once employed, his/her ability to meet an employer s performance expectations. Thus qualifications relate primarily to the supply side of the labour market, providing certain evidence of an individual (job applicant) s capabilities to perform certain aspects of a job, while skills (or competence) frameworks express the structure of labour market demand (employers skill needs). In short, the main priority of an ICT Practitioner Skills/Competence Framework (and any European Meta-Framework related to such frameworks) is to provide something largely specified by employers, and of real value to them as well as to those employed as - and those seeking work as - ICT Practitioners, as well as stakeholders associated with both sides of the labour market. Its contribution as a platform via which the proposed EQF can be applied in relation to ICT Practitioner work remains secondary in the context of this Workshop. 8 The project team drafted a preliminary paper for the work group discussion. 13

14 2 Conclusions and Agreements The Participants in Phase 2 of the CEN/ISSS Workshop on ICT Skills continue to support: efforts at the European level to better understand the nature of ICT skills, in particular ICT Practitioner skills, in recognition of the importance of their potential strategic contribution towards the achievement of the Lisbon Goals; the importance of clarifying employer skill/competence needs in both improving policy analysis in relation to e-skills and the relevance and value of learning provision throughout the European Union; the importance of Lifelong Learning of all kinds (including informal and non-formal learning) in the raising of e-skills; and the aspirations and approach of the proposed European Qualifications Framework in support of these goals. The Workshop has given considerable thought to the nature of ICT Practitioner Skills/Competence Frameworks (see section 3.0 and Annex B), and in particular to the common features and differences between the major established (generally employer-led) frameworks in three significant Member States (see section 3.1). It is clear from this review that the realities of differences of culture, context and intended uses, taken together with the lack of maturity (and so stability) of the organisation of ICT Practitioner work (not least between different sizes and types of employers) mean that there is not yet agreement on a single skills/competence framework at the European level (see sections 3.0 and 3.1). However, it is recommended that convergence is encouraged and monitored at the level of individual occupation competence profiles within existing frameworks, and, where sustained stability is achieved, profiles could be considered for such a framework: the owners of the three major ICT Practitioner frameworks are encouraged to explore possibilities for accelerating this development. In addition, while agreement on such a European e-competence Framework 9 for ICT Practitioners could bring certain benefits, there are also accompanying risks of attempting to establish such a framework before the desired stability and consensus is achieved. These include both a likely loss of support from those committed to existing national frameworks and the potential fossilising (and growing loss of relevance) of activity based on such a framework that will be prone to decay. It is recognized that the widening and renewing of buy-in from employers and other stakeholders is a central challenge for the Workshop, so that it is crucially important to sustain and build on support from existing Workshop participants. The conclusion is that, as far as skills/competence frameworks for ICT Practitioner work are concerned, the best strategy for the EU would be to commit to enhancing and supporting convergence of Member State frameworks, by means of supporting the guidance and recommendations laid out in this CWA (see sections ). In view of the continuing waves of innovation and turbulence with the ICT world, such convergence of the whole scope of national frameworks cannot reasonably be expected in the short term. On the separate, but related, question of the application of the principles of the proposed European Qualifications Framework (EQF) to ICT Practitioner work, with a view to 9 The term e-competence Framework (as a future reference framework) is preferred to ICT Skills Meta- Framework since a) it avoids the ambiguities associated with both broad and narrow meanings of the word Skills, b) the avoidance of Meta eliminates inconclusive debates about the difference between the Meta and Reference concepts, and c) the e- prefix has begun to gain currency, not least in the title of the European e- Skills/Competence Forum. 14

15 establishing a Sectoral 10 framework as envisaged in the EQF consultation proposals, Workshop participants have considered the options. The expected absence of an agreed e- Competence (Reference) Framework within the timescales required for promoting and applying the EQF in relation to this important area has prevented the possibility of working directly from that. However, the workshop does not believe this absence must (or should) prevent the development of a framework to support a common structuring of ICT qualifications at the European level. This could, inter alia, draw on such common features of current ICT Practitioner skills/competence frameworks as do exist and on the Grid of Proficiency Level Descriptors relevant to ICT Practitioner work developed within Phase 2 (section 3.3), as well as benefiting from approaches to the classification of ICT qualifications of all kinds that has already been achieved within some Member States. Specifically, the Phase 2 workshop has developed and reached agreement on: a) a Structured Review of major existing ICT Practitioner frameworks; b) a Grid of Level Descriptors relevant to ICT Practitioner work, that are consistent with the reference levels of the proposed EQF and provide a set of indicators for levels of professional proficiency for ICT Practitioners; c) Guidance that enables employers, learning providers, individuals and policymakers, drawing on the structured review and the Grid of Level Descriptors, better to make appropriate and effective use of skills/competence frameworks in order to support the raising of ICT Practitioner skills; d) Articulation of an Ideal Scenario in which the all considerable benefits of an agreed European e-competence Framework for ICT Practitioners can be reaped; and e) a set of Recommendations for Next Steps, including options for reaching the Ideal Scenario. These are presented in detail in section 3.6, and include suggestions for a number of concrete steps through which progress could be made, both on the promoting of convergence of existing frameworks, the gathering of stronger evidence of the benefits of a single European e-competence Framework for ICT Practitioners, and for exploring ways of structuring ICT qualifications in accordance with the principles of the EQF. Annexes to this agreement provide useful background material, on: the potential uses, benefits and costs of a European ICT Skills Meta-Framework; existing ICT frameworks of different kinds; the structured inventory of main ICT Practitioner skills/competence frameworks; the relationship of the ICT Skills Meta-Framework to the proposed EQF; the design of the grid of level descriptors for ICT Practitioner competence; a possible structuring of ICT qualifications in line with the principles of the EQF, and the principles of the ecco approach. 10 or, more accurately, a cross-sectoral - ICT Practitioner occupational framework 15

16 3 Detailed Findings and Comments 3.0 Introduction: the realities of a changing ICT world The choice of a Meta-Framework as the aspiration for this project implicitly recognizes the fact that the ICT (supply) industry, the ICT market, and the ICT skills market that derives from it, are by no means mature. The considerable range of organisation of ICT Practitioner work apparent among different employers is evidence of this (as is the fact that the Workshop heard from a major global ICT - supply - company that more than one framework was in use within its operation). The assumed development lifecycle of an Information (or ICT-) System is generally very influential in relation to the ICT work organisation adopted by different organisations. The life-cycle can be viewed as consisting of the following typical steps: 1. Clarification of Business Need and relevant ICT capability 2. Specification of System Requirements 3. Production of System Specification 4. Design of System (Architecture) 5. Development of System in accordance with Design (+ possible refinements) 6. Installation/Implementation/Integration/Commissioning of Developed System, 7. Operational Management and Maintenance of System 8. Review of System performance and evolving business need 9. (return to 1) However, this cycle and the work organisation perceived to be needed to effectively carry out the different steps - is not necessarily viewed identically in different business environments 11. These differences occur between different organisational and employment cultures, as well as between two major sets of different business contexts: a) the perspective of ICT User Organisations (the ICT departments within user businesses and public administration) as compared with the perspective within (different parts of) the ICT Supply industry (hardware, software, systems, products, services, etc.), and b) the perspectives of large employers compared with those of smaller ones. For example, in a large organisation developing an Information System (IS), it is natural particularly where a large IS is involved to partition the ICT practitioner team into a significant number of sub-groups, for example one sub-team to take responsibility for each step of the system development life-cycle. This approach would result in the benefits of specialisation being harnessed to the improvement of overall system effectiveness and performance. In a small organisation, with a correspondingly smaller number of ICT practitioners, it becomes inevitable that more than one development life-cycle step will normally have to be covered by individual practitioners. Such realities would inevitably lead to a more fine-grain set of occupational profiles for a larger company than would be possible or appropriate for a much smaller company. 11 It should also be noted that ICT system development can also be carried out in a less formally structured way, through the use of Agile methodologies (such as rapid prototyping, RAD, etc.). The implications of these for required skill-sets should not be ignored the most likely probably being the need for greater breadth of understanding and multi-skilling of the individual. 16

17 To these complexities must be added the uniquely turbulent environment of ICT work, arising from repeated waves of new enabling technologies. Examples of waves of software tools, development techniques, paradigms and application area approaches over recent years are very considerable. To illustrate the challenge to come to established standards for skill-sets related to technologies, consider an ICT Professional who started work in the mid 1980s: he/she would by Autumn of 2005, have observed many such waves in different areas of the field, including: Third Generation Languages Transaction Processing systems Decision Support Systems Mainframe -> Mini -> PC -> Client/Server architectures Generations of Telecomms./Network infrastructure techniques (e.g. LANs/WANs) and tools MIS/EIS GUI/WIMP interfaces (HCI tools) Fourth Generation Languages CAD/CAM/CIM Automatic Code Generators EDI/EPOS Development of generations of Real Time languages Artificial Intelligence techniques (e.g. Knowledge Based Systems, vision systems and pattern recognition) Information Engineering (and generations of Computer Aided Software Engineering CASE - tools) CRM systems Generations of scientific research/analysis software (e.g. Finite Element and Continuous Systems Modelling approaches) Generations of database management systems Parallel/Distributed Computing Development of generations of Operating Systems Development methodologies ( structured and other - SAD, SSADM, RAD, DSDM) Project Management techniques and Tools (PRINCE) Mark-up languages (leading to HTML, XML) Browser and Web design technologies Enterprise Computing (ERP systems and others) primary (basic) and secondary (security/spam mail management) software and tools Generations of mobile system operating systems and software Enterprise Content Management PDM/PIM/Product Lifecycle Management systems Search Engine technology (first and second generation Autonomy) Business Intelligence software Open Source Software and tools Embedded systems software and UML CMM/CMMI Agent technologies Ubiquitous Computing RFID Web services While some of the above relate to different application areas, many boundaries between such areas and the corresponding communities shift and fade over time, as tools and techniques grow in power and generic functionality. The diagram overleaf illustrates the general realities of this dynamic environment, characteristic of a business/work environment/skill-need-identification situation that has so far (since the early days of computing in the 1960s) never reached an adequate level of stability for a single common model to emerge. 17

18 Evolution of Work Organisation for ICT exploitation Next enabling technology Initial Market Exploitation push Initial Work Organisation Initial Skillset identification Initial training market response Refinement/ Maturing of enabling technology Refinement/ Maturing of exploitation Refined Work Organisation Stabilised Skillset identification Refined training market response This diagram attempts to clarify what drives the development of specifications of ICT skills/competence needs. It shows how the emergence of each new ICT enabling technology (delivering useful new functionality, whether hardware or software) produces a series of responses in the marketplace, both from ICT supply companies (who believe they can make money by helping deploy the new technology for their customers), and from ICT User Organisations (who believe that the new technology could help improve their business activity and performance, whether public or private). In each case, efforts to pick up the new technology lead to the need for each organization involved to develop or refine the structure through which it deploys its Human Resources in this work, and from this to clarify the (at least, technical) skill requirements in the different jobs or roles. In the (general) absence of enough people with such capabilities, these in turn produce specific learning or training needs, to which the suppliers of ICT training provision respond through this secondary marketplace. Very often this chain of activity will be driven by assumptions about the new technology that do not (all) turn out to represent the essence of the contribution of the new approach. As a result, there can often be a second phase to the process, where each step is refined by being built more soundly on the realities of this technology s characteristics, now these are evident since it has matured. Since there is (as of late 2005) no real sign of the waves of new technologies abating, it will remain very important for all thinking about work organization and skill/competence need specification for ICT to recognize the very dynamic nature of the context. As can therefore be inferred, consensus on structures of employer skill-set needs can often follow several years after emergence of each new wave of technical functionality. 18

19 Given this lack of stability, and as will be seen the resulting lack of commonality in design of the skills/competence frameworks that have been developed, the question naturally arises as to what would constitute useful agreements in this area at the European level. In principle the CEN Workshop Agreement structure could be helpful, in that it is designed to help in situations where the fast-moving nature of the industry involved requires faster standard-development processes than is normally possible. However, in this case, there is neither adequate convergence on a single framework nor a consistent common need from the stakeholder constituency that is driving the development. It is important to emphasize that, if the analogy of industrial standards is to be fully followed, it will be necessary for more substantial evidence of potential benefits from the adoption of a standard European skills/competence framework to be gathered. Given the complexity and multi-purpose nature of a skills/competence framework, it is easy to perceive a number of potential benefits in a simple way, but not so easy for such hunches to be developed into convincing propositions of the kind that are understood for standardisation of engineering artefacts for example screw-threads for nuts and bolts, or electric plugs and sockets. Without clarity of the real, sustainable benefits of a new standard, buy-in from employers will remain a challenge. In the light of extended discussions, therefore, it became clear that it would not be advisable at this stage to propose a single European model, less because that could be perceived as a threat to the existing (mostly national) skills/competence frameworks, but more that to presume a correct framework and set it in concrete would not necessarily prove effective for the overall EU-level ICT skills promotion mission. The approach for the phase 2 work has, therefore, concentrated on producing the things that can meaningfully be achieved at the current time and stage of development, and examining the Ideal Scenario where the different models would achieve alignment within a largely mature environment, and then exploring steps through which the application of the EQF to ICT Practitioner work could provide outcomes of value to both employers and individual practitioners. 3.1 Clarification from examples: some key ICT Practitioner skills/competence frameworks In order for the many generic points presented above to be fully understood, it will be helpful to examine a small number of existing frameworks, and consider both similarities and differences. Table 1 (overleaf) shows four ICT Practitioner skills/competence frameworks developed within Europe, and one developed within the United States, in terms of the main purposes for which they were designed. The frameworks shown are: the Generic ICT Skills Profiles model (produced by the European industry consortium Career-Space, and incorporated in CWA 14925), where the profiles relate to Job Areas ; the French CIGREF (ICT Club of Large French Companies) ICT Occupational Nomenclature framework, whose set of profiles are viewed as Occupation Families ; the German Advanced IT Training System (AITTS/ APO-IT ) framework developed by a national partnership, in which the units are referred to as Profiles & Groups ; 19

20 the UK s SFIA Foundation s Skills Framework for the Information Age (v3), whose top-level concepts are named skill Categories ; and the (US) National Workforce Centre for Emerging Technologies (NWCET) IT Skill Standards, whose profiles, developed with major employer input for the (former) US National Skill Standards Board (NSSB), are termed Job Categories. The analysis which follows can be applied to any ICT Practitioner skills/competence framework: the choice of those selected (the five in the following tables include, for continuity, the Career-Space framework already covered in an existing CWA, and one from beyond the EU) was made in the light of the time constraints associated with the project it was concluded necessary to focus on a small number of major frameworks already in significant use within the market-place, and the inclusion of a significant framework beyond Europe is to emphasize the global nature of the ICT market. (A relatively comprehensive overview of existing frameworks is given in Annex B.) The frameworks shown here are, as indicated, chosen only to introduce, by example, the specifics of what is being studied in this CWA. As will be seen, the main focus of detailed scrutiny in the development of a European ICT Skills Meta-Framework within the CWA are the three major national frameworks developed in EU Member States (the CIGREF Nomenclature, the AITTS, and SFIA), and their relationship to the main comparable North American framework the US (NWCET) IT Skill Standards. One or two differences begin to emerge, including, for example that the AITTS is, the only of the scrutinized frameworks which includes assessment of the individual s competence as an integral part of the original purposes, while the Career-Space framework, whose main initial purpose was the presentation of attractive activities and role models, has no level specification involved within the profiles (other than they would all be assumed to require education to tertiary level) 12. Table 2 13 shows the top level structure of the same set of frameworks, through broad-brush alignments of the top level categories around key Broad Areas of ICT Practitioner occupational activity, related to the ICT system development life-cycle: Management Strategy/Planning/Design Development and Implementation Operation, and Others It will be seen that most of the Broad Areas are covered by the different frameworks, although not in identical ways, even at the top level of specification. This table purely addresses the functional activities within ICT Practitioner work, and does not consider any aspect of the skills/competence level of the activity. 12 It should be noted that the SFIA Foundation s approach to use of the Skills Framework for the Information Age is based on the framework serving as a light superstructure, on to which other things (adding value), in particular tools enabling its application for different purposes, can be bolted. A major example is the SFIAplus suite of products and services developed by the British Computer Society (a SFIA Foundation shareholder), which provide user-friendly environments for both Skills Management and Career Development. 13 This is an amended and updated version of a table provided in the Background Paper for the 2002 IFIP/OECD/WITSA joint working conference on Global IT Skills the role of professionalism (IFIP, 2002) 20

21 Table 1 (Initial, intended) Purposes of major existing ICT Practitioner Skills/Competence Frameworks Purposes Career-Space Generic (ICT) Skills Profiles (ICT Industry Consortium) Job Areas CIGREF (ICT Club of Large French Companies) ICT occupation Nomenclature (France) Occupation Families AITTS/APO-IT national partnership Advanced IT Training System (Germany) Profiles & Groups SFIA Foundation Skill Framework for the Information Age (UK) Categories NWCET IT Skill Standards (USA) Job Categories Skills/Competence/HR Management (by employers) Assessment of individuals ICT skills/competences (acquired through formal and non-formal learning, and recognised through Certification confirming achievement of some kind of relevant Qualification) Career Guidance and orientation ( ) ( ) ( ) Promoting/Marketing Work (careers) in ICT Provision of target (employer requirements) information for? Learning provision and providers Promotion of Competenceachievement and its recognition Use (by employers) in Recruitment Use (by individuals) in Career Planning and Development Salary (and Contract Day-rate) Surveys Labour Market statistics (occupational) classification and gathering 21

22 Table 2 - Top Level Categories of major existing ICT Practitioner Skills/Competence Frameworks Broad Areas Career-Space Generic (ICT) Skills Profiles (ICT Industry Consortium) Job Areas CIGREF (ICT Club of Large French Companies) ICT occupation Nomenclature (France) Occupation Families AITTS/APO-IT national partnership Advanced IT Training System (Germany) Profiles & Groups SFIA Foundation Skills Framework for the Information Age (UK) Categories NWCET IT Skill Standards (USA) Job Categories MANAGEMENT ICT Management Management and Administration IT Systems Manager IT Business Manager Procurement & Management Support Enterprise Systems Analysis and Integration STRATEGY/ PLANNING/DESIGN DEVELOPMENT & IMPLEMENTATION OPERATIONS Software Architecture and Design ICT Project Management Software & Applications Development Technical Support Analysis, Development & Integration IS Operation and Exploitation User Help and Support Internal Technical help and Support IT Technical Engineer IT Business Engineer Developer Coordinator Solutions Developer Software Developer Technician Solutions Administrator Product or Client Adviser Strategy & planning Network Design/Admin Programming/S/W Engr. Development Project Management Business Change Web Development/ (Admin) Database Develop t (Admin) (Network Design)/Admin Technical Support Service Provision (Web Development)/ Admin (Database Development)/Admin (Other) IT Business Consultancy IS Consultancy and Management IT Business Consultant ICT Marketing Manage t IT Marketing Manager ICT Sales Management Digital Design Technical Writing Digital Signal Processing applications design Radio Frequency Engineering Integration and Test Engineering Multimedia Design Digital Media Systems Specialist Communications Network Design Data Communications Engineering Research and Technology Develop t Product Design Ancillary Skills Cyber Security and Information Assurance; Other 22

23 Even greater insights into the relationships between such Frameworks can be gained by examining the similarities and differences involved in: 1. the top-level schematic that represents the view of the ICT System development life-cycle 14 for the three major frameworks that have been developed in EU Member States - in France, Germany and the UK. A comparison of top level structure paradigms between the CIGREF, AITTS and SFIA frameworks is shown in Figure 1, and 2. a comparison of (the closest) comparable profiles between the three European frameworks is shown in Figure 2. (It should be noticed that these profiles are viewed as comparable since in spite of their differences many others are likely to be less similar, and in some cases not even close in scope of functional activity.) Once again, despite evident similarities, important differences become obvious as well that illustrate the challenge of a potential synthesis of commonalities. 14 As already noted, the ICT System Development Life-Cycle is not the only way of viewing ICT practitioner work, and the impact of an assumed life-cycle on skill-set specification can and generally will vary with size of organisations. In this context it is worth recording that the nature of the stakeholders and relationships involved in this Workshop will generally be much more strongly influenced by large-employer practice rather than necessarily tracking accurately practice in Small or Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs). While it would generally not be sensible for SMEs to ignore the need for effective work organisation, it is probably important an in other skills policy thinking not to ignore the needs of SMEs, whose contribution to economic and employment growth can be very considerable. A study of SME needs for ICT Practitioner Frameworks should be considered in future. 23

24 Figure 1 Comparison of Top Level Structure Paradigms: Framework Examples from three EU Member States CIGREF AITTS/APO-IT SFIA Management and Evaluation of Inf. Systems Development Advice and Expertise Strategy and Planning Procurement and Management Support Business Change Carry out Inf. System Projects Assure I.S. smooth operation, utilisation and security Service Provision Ancillary Skills 24

25 Figure 2 Comparison of comparable Profiles arising from three different paradigms: Framework Examples from three Member States CIGREF AITTS/APO-IT SFIA Developer (Développeur) (unofficial translation) On the instructions of the project manager, and on the basis of functional specifications communicated by him/her, the developer analyses, parametrises and codes new software components in accordance with standards and procedures, as well as desired development of existing components.. Activities and Tasks: 1) Analysis Needs analysis of users for the content Organic analysis Adaptation and parametrisation of application software and multimedia Prototyping Integration of IS constraints and securityrelated rules 2) Development Realisation of modules Assembly of elements Production of documentation Industrial production of components and applications 3) Testing Elaboration of tests Test execution Identification and treatment of errors 4) Maintenance Corrective maintenance Evolutionary maintenance Administration of re-usable software modules Software Developer (Softwareentwickler/in) Software Developers are responsible for the cost-effective design and implementation to requirements of individual software components based on existing system, database and GUI designs. They specify technical details for the software components and define interfaces to other systems components.. Software Developers draw up algorithms, define data structures and convert programs to a higher programming language. They draw up test specifications, test data and test environments and conduct unit tests at the level of software components. They devise solutions within the development team and in cooperation with experts from the applications environment.. The entire profile-typical work process carried out by the IT specialists are documented by a set of partial processes, of which two examples for this profile are listed below. Mastery of this work process, combined with proficiency in the respective fields of competence and practical experience, forms the basis for professional competence: Support IT systems analysts and IT systems developers in the tasks of systems analysis and systems design, for example, by production of prototypes. Collaborate in defining the development framework and the development environment, estimation of costs, definition of milestones and identification of implementation risks... The competences necessary to successfully perform these activities are specified into sub-structures of three characteristic areas: 1. General/Universal 2. Group-specific, and 3. Profile specific Programming/ Software Development The design, creation, testing and documenting of new and amended programs from supplied specifications in accordance with agreed standards.. This Skill is specified at SFIA Levels 2, 3, 4 and 5, as follows: L2: Designs, codes, tests, corrects, and documents simple programs, and assists in the implementation of software which forms part of a properly engineered information or communications system L3: Designs, codes, tests, corrects, and documents moderately complex programs and program modifications from supplied specifications, using agreed standards and tools. Conducts reviews of supplied specifications, with others as appropriate. L4: Designs, codes, tests, corrects, and documents large and/or complex programs and program modifications from supplied specifications, using agreed standards and tools, to achieve a well engineered result. Takes part in review of own work and leads reviews of colleagues work. L5: Sets Standards for programming tools and techniques, advises on their application and ensures compliance. Takes technical responsibility for all stages of the software development process. Prepares project and quality plans and advises systems development teams. Assigns work to programming staff and monitors performance, providing advice, guidance and assistance to less-experienced 25

26 It is possible, in the light of these illustrative examples, to examine, from the similarities and evident differences, certain key characteristics of top level design of such ICT Practitioner Skill/Competence Frameworks. These include: 1) style ; 2) structure of competence specification (generally 3-Tier see below); 3) nature of Profile (smallest) unit (whether articulated as a competence, skill, occupation, job, role); 4) breadth or span - of a profile : ranging from quite narrow roles to a complete job ; 5) (arising from 4) - total number of Profiles (or Profile units ) to cover the total scope of ICT Practitioner activities; 6) The corresponding granularity of profiles; 7) whether the specifications are shown at more than one level (and, if so, how many); and 8) whether each profile is split into multiple specifications at different levels. An important determinant in a Framework is (5, above) the number of profiles selected to cover the full range of ICT Practitioner activity. This is strongly dependent on the main Use(s) to be made of a Framework. For example, typically: classifications primarily intended for use in a promotional message presenting an attractive view of work in ICT, in order to attract more people into this work, would typically involve, say profiles (see Career-Space Generic Skills Profiles); classifications that are for use in salary surveys or comparisons generally need to have a significantly greater number of profiles, since labour market salaries exist in relation to jobs, and this brings a number of profiles generally between 50 and 100; while for classification of ICT occupations for use in general labour force surveys and the statistics that arise from them the numbers of profiles would rarely go above 10. It is evident from these examples that: 1. considerable similarities between different ICT Practitioner Frameworks (that might be taken as an indication that harmonisation is practically at hand) are accompanied by important differences; and 2. these differences arise partly from different purposes, and partly from different contexts and cultural traditions in relation to work organisation, as well as certain assumptions about educational pathways and levels and skills management. 26

27 3.2 Structured Review of Key Existing Frameworks As can be seen from the above, assessing skills/competence frameworks is not a simple task. In this situation the Workshop has examined tools that can help in the structured review of what is currently available. These tools are essentially of two kinds: top-down approaches, where the main characteristics of the different frameworks are presented in what might be viewed as a structured inventory drawing on Dutch experience with the Generic Referential ICT Profiles (GRIP) approach (Hacquebard, 2005), and bottom-up approaches, where each profile specification is analysed in terms of the underlying units of competence, skills and knowledge (the e-competences and Certifications Observatory (ecco) project, researching the use of Knowledge Objects as the underlying unit, leads developments here). A summary of the principles of the ecco approach is presented in Annex G. This CWA uses the Top-down approach, but supports the development of complementary Bottom-up approaches as potentially providing more rigorous analysis for comparison and design. In particular completion of the ecco approach in this regard is awaited with interest. Annex B presents a rather comprehensive overview of existing ICT Frameworks, and Annex C shows the completed top-down comparative analysis of 5 recognized ICT Practitioner Skills/Competence Frameworks. Following initial proposals from Hacquebard (2005), the Workshop discussed refinement of an initial set of identifiers for such an inventory, and the set of attributes shown in Table 3 were felt to be most useful in facilitating an appropriate level of understanding to achieve meaningful comparison. 27

28 Table 3 - Proposed List of Attributes (drawing on approach of Hacquebard (2005)) Framework Details (Model name) Name of model Owner (organisation) Description of owner Owner website URL Designer(s)/Author(s) + key publication (if any) General Aims (including list of intended uses) Date of launch Last updated Based upon Language(s) (e.g.: national government department; employer association; or consortium of x, y, and z; etc.) (for credit to go to individuals, where their contribution was very significant, and for seminal publications on innovative approach or comprehensive/ scientific write-up) (but presumably much less likely for competence frameworks than for e.g. academic Body of Knowledge descriptions like CC2004 ) (take relevant sentence(s) from website, initially) (ideally month, year) (ideally month, year) (core concepts) English/French/German etc Development + Update (Model name) Development Approach Stakeholders actively involved No. employers actively involved Development QA Update approach Update QA Planned Update frequency One sentence description, including nature of employer influence (List of organisations) (a number perhaps with explanation) (description of e.g. reviews of drafts, (one sentence e.g. validity reviewed every year by advisory group, and update agreed when necessary ; or employer survey conducted on framework validity every 3 years... or whatever) e.g. New set of profiles checked for consistency and comprehensiveness (e.g. 3-5 years or as necessary ) Scope of Use (Model name) Target group Actors Main Uses (current) Levels of proficiency? Associated qualification concept? Modes of learning Quality Assurance QA based upon Certification Recognition of Competence Achievement for Higher Education Entry Requirements for each cell The people involved in using the Framework: HR, ICT practitioners, education provider etc. People to whom the profiles refer (but is this not now ICT practitioners in all cases?) (this needs to pick up whether the model is used in each of the major areas of use listed in the CWA, and should ideally give for each - a feel for the intensity of use e.g. how many employers are actively using the framework, how many learners have been assessed (presumably, in each case, in the last year) Exist Y/N...in terms of proficiency levels described Yes/No? Which/How? Formal/Non-Formal/Informal Yes/No? Internal/External? Norms, accreditation (institution, programme) Yes/No? Yes/No Specified Yes/No? Which? Model details (Model name) Orientation Structure type Main groupings /items Top level groupings Profile groupings Profiles Model Approach e.g. Life Cycle, Knowledge-based, Skills, Competence, Occupation, Curricula e.g. List or 3-tier hierarchy (e.g. Categories, Sub-categories and Skills, in the case of SFIA (list of e.g. SFIA Category titles) (list of e.g. SFIA Sub-category titles) (list of e.g. SFIA Skill titles) Best practice analysis, heuristic, ontology-based, 28

29 3.3 Level Descriptors for ICT Practitioner Competence In the absence of sufficient stability for agreement to be reached at present on a single ICT Practitioner Skills/Competence Framework at the European level, it was nevertheless possible to develop a set of ( vertical ) level descriptors for the specification of ICT Practitioner competence. The Workshop considers such level descriptors to be valuable instruments as they acknowledge the over-riding importance of coherence in relation to e-skills at the European level, and the relevance and value of the specification of the proposed European Qualification Framework reference levels in terms of learning outcomes based on Knowledge, Skills and wider Competences. The May 2005 meeting of the Workshop examined the proposed EQF and its suggested levels of qualification learning outcomes. Consensus was reached that: the competence basis of the Meta-Framework (M-F) corresponds to an outcome orientation, the proposed levels of the EQF are acceptable and appropriate as common reference points for the M-F, and it is expected that ICT practitioner work is likely to span five of these, ranging from EQF level 3 to EQF level 7. It is important to note that the main priority here is the alignment between the number of levels of the M-F and the EQF, as the frameworks are inter-related, and consistency for the inter-related purposes is of great importance. However, there are other perspectives on level in relation to ICT Practitioners. The Workshop recognizes the greater importance of the ICT industry, as compared with the formal education system, in the setting of such levels. It is therefore interesting to note that market activity in relation to ICT practitioners includes salary survey analysis for multinational companies that structures levels, in particular in relation to competence assessment for compensation calculations, that produce greater numbers of levels (typically 10 or more). Such approaches are essentially practice-driven, and as such cannot be ignored in reviews of ICT Practitioner competence level analysis. The proposed EQF is based on the specification of 8 qualification reference levels these are summarized in the table in Annex D. Deriving the level descriptors of the M-F had to take into account: The completely generic nature of EQF reference level definitions. These were to be refined as much as possible to reflect the approach, practices and terminology of the ICT industry, in relation to ICT practitioner work, in the light of the competence level specifications within existing ICT practitioner Skills/Competence Frameworks. The fundamental difference between a qualification and a competence framework. The EQF and the M-F are different in nature. While the EQF describes reference learning outcomes for qualifications ( supply side 15), the M-F describes reference points for competence in professional profiles ( demand side 16). Meaningful mapping becomes possible because the EQF is very sensibly - focused on 15 i.e. the testified capabilities of the job seeker/applicant 16 i.e. the stated skill/competence needs of the employer 29

30 outcomes: the outcomes of learning in terms of Knowledge, Skills, and wider Competences use the same language (and broad unit of measurement) as the requirements of professional activity in terms of defined statements of performance expectations. Levels described by the M-F are however not directly levels of qualification but rather levels of expected/required proficiency. For real clarity, the terminology and wording used for the two qualitatively different contexts must be distinct (see below). The level descriptors must give guidance for valid recognition of professional/vocational qualifications in the context of Lifelong Learning. In accordance with the Bologna and Copenhagen processes, recognition of qualifications is to be based on instruments for the accumulation and transfer of credits. Specification of credits involves both number and level. Developing competence in the workplace is generally an informal learning process. Agreed specifications for proficiency levels in relation to employers performance expectations in fields of professional activity should inform the process of the recognition of such credits. Relating Qualification and Competence Specifically, the Workshop has examined the deeper nature of the specifications relevant to the two sides of the ICT Practitioner labour market, drawing, in particular, on the seminal review of Knowledge, Skills and Wider Competences by Winterton et al (CEDEFOP, 2005) 17, and believes that Table 4 contains the essence of the distinction: Table 4 Structural Components of ICT Skills M-F and EQF ICT Skills M-F Focus: Performance expectations that correspond to the application of learning outcomes (formal, non-formal, informal) Structure: Cognitive competence Functional competence Social (incl. ethical) and meta competence EQF Focus: Learning outcomes Structure: Knowledge Skills (and know-how) Wider Competences It is essential to note the challenges arising from lack of common understanding of terminology during the course of Phase 2 (see summary following Glossary). In particular, misunderstandings have resulted from inconsistent use of the term qualification, which can carry different connotations that reflect particular purposes and assumptions about learning and knowledge. Qualification in the context of professional qualification can and must - be understood differently than in the context of academic education where a qualification can also exist for its own sake ( pure knowledge that needs no applying )! Outcome-based qualification, as considered here in the context of the M-F, is viewed as in the EQF context. However, the idea of qualification expressed as independent sets of outcomes expressed in terms of units, levels, standards and credits can be viewed as a radical and controversial change. (Young 2005). If qualification is intended to comprise Knowledge, Skills and Wider Competences applied in defined action-oriented contexts, then the differentiation shown below may seem redundant. However, as qualification is very often used to refer to the knowledge-based assessments within the formal education system, then the separation 17 on which the specification of the Reference Levels of the proposed EQF are based 30

31 laid out below is important for clarity. What differentiates competence from qualifications is the contextualized reference to ICT fields of activity in which knowledge and skills are employed (see also Annex F). Where expectations are defined in terms of standards, levels, and outcomes, there are indeed common aspects to the understanding of qualification and competence. This is not, however, inherently the case. Figure 3: Relating Qualification and Competence Focus: Competence Qualification Working Defined Expectations Learning Context: Is Set Is Open Perspective: Demand-side Supply-side Designation of competence levels must always be based on contextualized abilities to act, and not on a comparison of learning content. Being on the same level of competence does not mean that the repository of knowledge and skills is the same. It means that the ability to act competently in a defined work context is the same. The approach is described in more detail in Annex E. It is based on an analysis of descriptive categories for several national frameworks of qualification and of level descriptions from various ICT Practitioner skills/competence frameworks. Categories that help delineate levels of proficiency were derived and definitions for these categories on each level refined in an iterative process. The proposed EQF reference level specifications, with their typology of Knowledge, Skills, and wider Competences, served as an excellent starting point in enabling an effective and appropriate relationship between the EQF and the M-F. The result is the two-dimensional grid shown in Table 5, specifying statements of the requirements of the different dimensions of competence (Cognitive, Functional and Personal and various components of each e.g. Application of Knowledge, Autonomy, Responsibility) against the five levels from the EQF that have been proposed as relevant for IT Practitioner work. The grid is introduced here to show the structure of the specification 18, and examples of the specifications across the five levels are shown for two elements of competence: the Comprehension component of Cognitive Competence and the Analysis component of Functional Competence. The complete M-F grid of level descriptors can be found in Annex E. The Sub-categories and their respective descriptions are adopted as a starting point. An iterative process of improvement to this proposition, involving feedback from users, is strongly encouraged, as the precise wording will prove critical for the successful application of these descriptors. 18 For clarification of the use of terms and elaboration of the reference context of the sub-categories, see Annex E 31

32 Besides providing a general understanding of what cognitive, functional, and personal competence mean at each level, these sub-categories provide practical and descriptive criteria that are designed to be helpful (and probably in some cases indispensable) for successfully and consistently ascribing levels of competence to work activities. These subcategories are, in particular, offered to be of value and help in relation to professional practice within the ICT industry and beyond. The levels 3-7 of the table are aligned to levels 3-7 of the EQF. A description of those levels is given in Annex D, page

33 Table 5 Proposed Level Descriptors for ICT Practitioner Competence: structure of the two-dimensional grid with examples [Full table shown in Annex E (as table 11)] CWA 15515:2006 (E) Meta-FW Category Cognitive Competence Functional Competence Personal Competence Refers to Declarative and Tacit Knowledge Sub- Category Application of knowledge Understanding Comprehension Basic understanding in reference to practical contexts Level 3 Level 4 Level 5 Level 6 Level 7 Showing awareness when applying concepts, knowledge and terminology in practical contexts Recognising innovation in the field of ICT and limits of one s own knowledge base Understanding of theory, concepts and methods some of it at its limits Systematic and critical understanding of body of knowledge and its limits Technical Skills Selection Methodological Skills (Decision Taking) Autonomy / Responsibility Learning Competence (Planning / Organising ) Social Competence Professional/ Vocational Competence Analysis Able to interpret situation and to perform guided analysis based on given classifications or principles Able to analyse selected information and gather required information Able to analyse wide range of situations / problems by applying general ICT theory; Able to identify missing information and methods to access this information Able to autonomously analyse abstract or unfamiliar situations based on broad spectrum of methods; Able to analyse contradictory data and to perform guided research Able to create a research-based diagnosis to problems even with incomplete, conflicting or limited information; Appropriate and context-dependent selection of instruments and tools for analysis Evaluation Synthesis Autonomy Responsibility Context (Ability to operate in ) Insight/Reflection Learning to Learn Communication Cooperation Problem Solving Training of Others 33

34 3.4 Guidance for appropriate and effective use of ICT Skills/Competence Frameworks This CWA recognizes that there are many purposes for which ICT Practitioner Frameworks have been developed. They provide value for one or more of the four key constituencies: employers, individuals, learning providers, and policy-makers. These benefits include: Employers ICT practitioner resource management and systematic career development Support for recruiting process through transparency about competences and qualification Systematic and consistent job descriptions and position requirements Salary level assessment (market going rates ) Career materials for attracting high performing individuals Learning Providers Transparency about industry s outcome expectations of training provided Provision of relevant training modules Benefits of promotion where provider s services are recognised by employers Individuals Transparency about expectations in given job roles Labour Market information for career planning Certification to increase individual labour market value Target models and showing ways for the planning of systematic career development/progression Policy Community Structure for gathering and interpreting transparent labour market data (supply, demand, foresight scenarios) Support for the development of a mobile and highly qualified workforce (quality assurance, comparability of qualifications) Factual basis for policy measures to stimulate employment opportunities This diversity of purposes is reflected in different structures and building blocks of different frameworks. The variety of purposes and top level structure models (in particular the ICT System Life Cycle for product or service delivery) expressly informs the structure of a framework and if there is one its respective profile model. The Workshop concludes that across the many frameworks in existence no big enough common denominator has yet emerged that could constitute the core of a single agreed overarching framework. Consequentially, the M-F is by analogy with the European Qualification Framework understood to provide common reference points for the comparison, and possible construction and implementation, of ICT Practitioner skills/competence frameworks. 34

35 Scope: The Workshop concludes that there is no one correct approach that can lead to coherent set of recommendations for ICT Practitioner Competence Frameworks in the short term. However, the following recommendations were derived by best practice analysis studying major skills (Competence) frameworks already in place in Europe and worldwide 19. The following frameworks have particularly informed these recommendations based on acceptance, take-up and impact 20 : SFIA (UK) (from the predecessor of which the EUCIP Profiles were established); AITTS ( APO-IT ) (Germany); CIGREF (France), from which the Airbus framework has been developed; NWCET (US) IT Skill Standards developed for the NSSB (on which the CompTIA Tech Career-Compass drew) It is important to note that all these models are in accordance with the consensus decision of Workshop participants during the May 2005 meeting in Brussels output-oriented / performance based. The scope of this CWA and of the following recommendations covers only such frameworks and initiatives. However, there is no exclusion in scope as to the orientation of the respective model. Depending on purpose and guiding paradigm for the development of the profile model, different orientations are possible. Table 6 gives an overview: Table 6 Overview of possible framework orientations Orientation ICT job/occupation ICT task ICT development process ICT skills Examples Career-Space CIGREF (and Airbus) NWCET (and CompTIA TCC) ISCO88 AITTS 21, EUCIP SFIA Recommendations: When building new frameworks or revising existing ones, these recommendations can be used to support convergence towards common reference points that will ultimately improve the comparability and hopefully the consolidation of structures for describing ICT practitioner competences. 19 Where a framework fundamentally adopts another one as the AIRBUS framework is based on the CIGREF Nomenclature the underlying framework was considered. 20 Career-Space has not considered itself a skills/competence framework but an information tool. Therefore, it has not been incorporated in the more detailed analysis for drafting recommendations. 21 Although AITTS does specify occupational profiles, it is oriented towards the development process 35

36 These guidelines are about basic requirements that need to be fulfilled in accordance with recommendations laid out in the EQF and this CWA. Those contemplating developing their own frameworks can, in any case, add extra items, or choose not to adopt all of these recommendations. The guidelines refer to four steps to be taken: A) Preparation and preliminaries Providing information B) Terminology Use of terminology C) Building of Profile Models Structures, building process of profile model D) Filling in Competence Specifications Rules, elements, structure of competence specification A) Preparation 1) Frameworks and initiatives describing ICT Practitioner Competences and endorsing the process laid out in this CWA provide and update information that qualifies the attributes derived from the structured review of existing frameworks. The list of these attributes is found in section 3.2 (Table 3). B) Terminology 2) It is recommended to use terminology consistently and provide (within relevant documents) definitions for basic and commonly used terms. 3) Framework owners are encouraged to repeatedly examine the possibility to base their terminology on ICT-related ontologies 22. (The establishing of a functional and pragmatic ontology for ICT terminology should be supported.) C) Profile Model 4) Frameworks, their structure and their content, should be derived from best practice analysis of competence structures used by employers in the market, in collaboration with representatives from the ICT industry, employers of ICT Practitioners and relevant experts. 5) To ensure consistency of profiles within a given framework, profiles are best built based on some profile model, itself based on some explicit top level paradigm or orientation (for example the ICT System Development Life-Cycle). 6) While it is acknowledged that there is no one correct methodology to structure common areas of activity (as this is influenced by intended purpose and basic assumptions of the framework builders), the major current approaches have all resulted 3-tier (hierarchical) models: AITTS Functional Group Profile Reference Process SFIA Category Subcategory Skills 22 An ontology within Computer Science is a specification of a conceptualisation the definition of a shell or structure, into which a range of different instances can be entered. 36

37 CIGREF Job Activity Competence NWCET Job Concentration Job Title Job Description It would therefore be helpful for any future framework to adopt 3-tiers as it greatly facilitates the comparability of profile models. D) Competence Specification 7) It is recommended to base competence descriptions neither on jobs (or job titles) nor on technology (software environments), as stability of profiles is of great importance. (The specifics of technology may form part of the profile description but should not influence the structure of a framework.) 8) Profile descriptions are descriptions of competence (or skills in the widest sense of the word). These descriptions provide information as to what is required to be competent in a role. Profile specifications comprise verbal descriptions of profilespecific activities along with defined statements about performance expectations. 9) Levels should be attributed to the stated performance expectations. These levels should, unless there is good reason, be aligned to the levels described in this CWA (3.3, and Annex E). 10) Assessment as to which level is required should be made based on the Generic grid of level descriptors (3.3) 37

38 3.5 An Ideal Scenario The preceding sections have explained why it is neither possible, nor on balance desirable, to attempt currently to build a new European e-competence (reference) Framework for ICT Practitioner work. However, something that could improve coherence in common understanding about the ICT Practitioner labour market within Europe unstructured though it has been is clearly desirable in principle. The emergence of agreed plans for the proposed EQF for Lifelong Learning during the course of the Workshop s second phase has provided both a new need and a new opportunity: the need, in relation to this CEN Workshop, is the question of how a future EQF would incorporate qualifications for ICT Practitioners, and the opportunity is that, if this need can be adequately responded to, then the EQF initiative can indeed play an important catalytic role in promoting greater coherence, by providing targets in relation to structure and structure models for ICT Practitioner Skills within Europe. In an Ideal Scenario, in relation to clarifying the structure of ICT Practitioner Skills, there would be an agreed skills/competence framework that would be used by the ICT Industry within the EU as a whole, and well as by ICT User organisations who employ significant numbers of ICT Practitioners. As a single common platform, this would be valid, effective, and easy to use for all the purposes for which such frameworks could be used (see Table 1) and as a result would be used within all Member States for all of those purposes. Such a situation would enable a number of valuable benefits to be achieved, including: Data (in particular on skill shortages) gathered from all surveys (whether official (government) or in commercial market research) would be directly comparable both within and across EU Member States, thus providing a considerably stronger basis for policy review and development, as well as for Labour Market intelligence use by employers and job seekers. The labour market would possess a clear structure that helps employers understand more clearly what a certificate presented or experience documented by a job applicant (that refers to a qualification they have not heard of) really means. For example, an Analyst/Programmer with, say 7 years experience with a particular software environment would in essence - mean the same thing, whether they come from or are an applicant to supply or user sides of the ICT world, and whether their Competences were acquired in (e.g.) Spain, Estonia or Austria. Education and Training Providers would have a clear, agreed, set of target Knowledge, Skills and Competences at which course design and provision could be aimed, and, most important of all, in relation to the EQF, there would be a clear, agreed set of benchmarks against which all ICT Practitioner qualifications could be measured. 38

39 In order to capitalize on the opportunity offered by the appearance of the EQF, what are therefore needed are arrangements for qualifications for ICT occupations to fit effectively within the EQF structure in a way that is of value in better understanding for ICT Practitioners and their employers. While those recruiting ICT Practitioners currently appear to take little account of candidates qualifications, and this labour market is arguably already one of the most internationally mobile (both within Europe and beyond), a framework that helped clarify the positioning of the many ICT-related qualifications, in terms of their type, scope, level would help employers to be able to assess more meaningfully the attractiveness of job applications, in particular if they come from other Member States. Greater, and more meaningful, recognition by employers of qualifications will naturally result in greater (real and perceived) value being attributed to them by individuals. As is described in more detail in Annex D, the proposed EQF is envisaged as providing common reference points in particular for levels of Knowledge, Skills and Wider Competences against which two main types of framework can be mapped : 1. (Member State) National Qualifications Frameworks, and 2. Sector frameworks, systems and qualifications Thus the challenge for ICT Practitioner work is to come up with such a sectoral framework 23, so that ICT Practitioner qualifications can benefit from the coherence that the EQF initiative can catalyse. In the absence of the ideal agreed e-competence Framework in the foreseeable future, the Workshop sees three main Options for how it could respond to the need and the opportunity presented by the appearance of the EQF: a) start work on a European e-competence Framework (initially for ICT Practitioner Competences), building on a life-cycle, and a sub-set of profiles, that can be agreed between the current major skills/competence framework owners ; b) support and encourage convergence of existing skills/competence frameworks in Member States (and elsewhere); or c) support and encourage convergence of existing skills/competence frameworks in Member States (and elsewhere), and start to explore a European ICT Qualifications Framework, by considering the positioning of a range of significant ICT qualifications within the EQF structure. A possible structuring, in line with the reference levels and the K, S, and C dimensions of the EQF, is shown in Annex F. These options, and their most evident Advantages and Disadvantages, are shown in Table 7. It should be noted that the phase 2 Workshop focuses on the European ICT Skills/Competence Meta-Framework, and has no direct remit in relation to developing Qualification structures. 23 in fact a cross-sector occupational framework 39

40 Table 7 Options in relation to Workshop response to EQF OPTIONS Advantages/ Benefits Disadvantages/ Risks a) Start work on a European e- Competence Framework (initially for ICT Practitioner Competences), building on the ICT system development life-cycle, and a subset of profiles, that can be agreed between the current major skills/competence Framework owners Begins the process of producing an e-competence Framework that can be used as the target (agreed specification of performance expectations) for competence and qualification frameworks. Unlikely it would gain support from major existing framework owners indeed, this could prejudice the building of active involvement from those with most understanding and influence on job creation. Development projects within individual employers are often short-term, and owners will not be able to track these in detail. b) Support and encourage convergence of existing skills/competence frameworks in Member States (and elsewhere) Gain support from the major existing framework owners. An approach in the spirit of the Open Method of Co-ordination Convergence cannot be guaranteed, in particular, to occur within the timescales needed for application of the EQF. c) Support and encourage convergence of existing skills/competence frameworks in Member States (and elsewhere), and start work on a European ICT Qualifications Framework, by exploring positioning of a range of significant ICT qualifications within a structure derived from the EQF Gain support from the major existing framework owners, and enable progress, unconstrained by the need to create something that would risk the loss of major stakeholder support. Informal benefits, through the growth of common understanding around the EU arising from the ICT Qualifications framework ICT User Qualifications could also be incorporated Vested interests in (ICT?) Qualifications constituencies might perceive threats? Qualifications debates might revert to being too influenced by provider interests? 3.6 Recommendations for Next Steps These recommendations have been derived from detailed study of major ICT Practitioner skills (competence) frameworks already in place in Europe and worldwide 24. The following frameworks have particularly informed these recommendations: their selection was based on the strength of the breadth and depth of their institutional base and breadth of active use: SFIA (UK) (from which the EUCIP Profiles were developed); AITTS ( APO-IT ) (Germany); 24 Where a framework fundamentally adopts another one like the AIRBUS framework is based on CIGREF, EUCIP on SFIA and the ISM, or CompTIA on NWCET the underlying framework was considered. 40

41 The CIGREF Nomenclature (France), and the AIRBUS variant on it; and, for overseas comparison, NWCET Skill Standards developed for the US NSSB. The recommendations are aimed at helping to foster appropriate and effective mutual positioning between the various frameworks and qualification initiatives that exist. The conviction is that with the maturing (or at least stabilising) of the ICT market and the skills and competences needed for it, increasing overlap and ultimately alignment between these systems will emerge. By accepting in analogy to the proposed EQF common reference points for the description of ICT competence profiles, a foundation is laid for identifying and describing common features and ultimately establishing overall coherence and transparency about ICT Competence standards. 1. The M-F describes the basic features of competence frameworks that result from convergence arising from the stabilising of the ICT industry and its standard processes, showing as an example - the ICT system development life cycle often used as to show the overall structure of a framework s profile model. 2. It is recommended to encourage and strengthen the process of convergence of skills/competence frameworks within the EU by means of a three step process: a. Provide via the CWA - basic information about frameworks, highlighting criteria that help to compare and to contrast various approaches and help companies and ICT professionals to select or adapt a framework that best fits their purpose and needs. b. Promote the guidance given in this document. New framework initiatives may be able, and should be encouraged, to base their implementation on it. Existing frameworks may progress towards convergence during stages of review and updating. c. Work towards an e-competence (Reference) Framework 25 and the provision of information as to how each framework/ profile or proficiency model is related to it, recognising that this is likely to take considerable time. 3. Horizontal descriptors and clusters of ICT sector (ICT Practitioner occupational competence) profiles are essential for the establishment of a European e-competence Reference Framework as only they will provide the specific context required to describe competences. These clusters will need to be based on a shared understanding of a general product/service development life cycle (and its component processes) for the ICT sector. 4. At present, there is no agreement on such a life cycle. Consequently, horizontal clusters have not been proposed. It is recommended that convergence between existing frameworks should be supported in order to establish such clusters. Instead of imposing a general profile model, clusters/profiles should be identified and described after they have emerged and proved their sustainability. (This approach has been an integral part of the CIGREF updating process, and has proved rather successful.) 25 See footnote 9 on page

42 5. For those clusters that have emerged, contexts of activity should be defined, along with competence expectations in alignment with the recommendations given in this CWA. 6. It is accepted that Lifelong Learning is of the utmost importance, especially in the ICT sector and ICT Practitioner occupations, where understanding, skills and competence need regular updating. Consequently, the recognition of professional qualifications and the transferability of all learning outcomes (regardless of how they were acquired, and including those from informal learning) must be supported at all ages. 7. To this end, frameworks that involve qualifications or KSC assessments should establish a system of quality assurance that comprises serious accreditation and certification structures and procedures. In line with the orientation on performance expectations and competence, assessment should not only contain elements of knowledge testing but also of performance assessment. 8. The owners of the major frameworks in Europe should be asked to collaborate in developing a two-dimensional framework, with horizontal skills/competence descriptors specifying profiles, clustered into relevant groups, whose level specifications would be based on the generic level descriptors in the CWA. This framework would be neutral, not subject to any national/cultural or constituency interests, and could be especially helpful in those Member States where no skills/competence framework for ICT practitioners yet exists. 9. A scoping study should be undertaken to clarify options for the top-level structure of a European ICT Qualifications Framework, drawing on the reactions of stakeholders to discussions on the possible structuring shown in Annex F, and on horizontal descriptors arising from the proposed two dimensional framework where possible. 10. Taking into account the emergence in recent years of competence in many Member States, the term Competence Framework in preference to Skills Framework should be used as a more comprehensive and holistic concept. 11. The Commission should support a serious exercise of gathering concrete evidence of the benefits of using ICT Practitioner Skills/Competence Frameworks as part of providing, in relation to each relevant potential use of a European e-competence Framework for ICT Practitioners 26 (see Annex A), much greater clarity of justification for further commitment. 12. Since language, terminology and semantics issues have posed problems during Phase 2, it is recommended that a project be undertaken to tackle this problem directly. The crucial importance of a well-defined and mutually shared use of language at the European level is recognized. 13. Tools approaches and methods that could prove helpful in the development of a European ICT Qualifications Framework (for example, ecco) should be supported. 14. In order for more widespread employer buy-in to be achieved, it is strongly recommended that the CWA and the recommendations within it be presented, on an individual basis, to a number of key European employers, and that the distillation of the reactions be written up as a starting point for the next stage of development towards a European e-competence Framework. 26 The e-competence Framework would be a reference framework (see page 14, footnote 9). 42

43 While the situation in relation to ICT User skills 27 is importantly different (there is as yet - no comparable set of independently developed User Frameworks - the main example is that developed by e-skills UK see Annex B), in principle the same arguments apply in most cases, and the progress in relation to ICT Practitioner Skills will inform the thinking about similar approaches on the User side. The fact that this CWA has focused on IT Practitioner Skills should in no way detract from the importance of User Skills, and a scoping study for options in relation to a European e-competence Framework would be a natural follow-through to this CWA. 3.7 Usefulness The usefulness of this CWA will depend on the audience the different communities interested in this work. While the relevance of such Frameworks depend, as has been shown, on the nature of their application, and on the sphere of activity of the community involved, the CWA reviews the State-of-the Art in relation to ICT Practitioner Frameworks in a comparatively general way. It is believed that the CWA can be directly useful to three main communities: 1) those with little background knowledge about ICT Practitioner Skills/Competence Frameworks, as a useful briefing document; 2) those considering how such a Framework could be of use to their work in relation to ICT Practitioner skills, whichever of the types of use (see Table 1 these readers could include both policy people working in this area and individual employers). Specifically, employers wishing to choose among existing frameworks can obtain relevant information to guide their first steps; and 3) those working to assess what can most effectively be done at the European level to promote the raising of e-skills, in support of achieving the Lisbon goals, such as: policy-makers, industry associations, social partners, etc In addition, early indications are that this approach could prove of value in other sectors, when considering how the sector (group of occupations) might respond to the EQF. 27 ICT user skills: the capabilities required for effective application of ICT systems and devices by the individual. ICT users apply systems as tools in support of their own work, which is, in most cases, not ICT. User skills cover the utilisation of common generic software tools and the use of specialised tools supporting business functions within industries other than the ICT industry (Definition from e-skills Forum) 43

44 3.8 Maintenance and Review Since this CWA does not directly constitute a European ICT Skills Meta-Framework, there is no formal need for maintenance. However, in the fast-changing environment, both of ICT and of the context of the stakeholders involved in the Workshop, no state-of-the art-review remains valid for long. The List of Attributes for the Structured Inventory and the Overview of ICT Frameworks in Annex B will inevitably need to be revisited and updated probably every year for them to remain comprehensive and valid. Maintenance must particularly be borne in mind as the development of a reference framework progresses (3.6, recommendation 9). 44

45 3.9 References BMBF (2002): Systematic Continuing Education in IT, New perspectives for specialists and organisations Documentation. English (Original: German). Bonn: Bundesministerium fur Bildung und Forschung (Federal Ministry for Education and Research) Caumanns, J./ Walter, R./ Rohs, M./ Grunwald, S./ Mattauch, W. (2001): Advances in Vocational Training and Information Technology to Improve the Lack of IT- Experts. In: Szücs, A./ E. Wagner/ C. Holmberg [Hrsg.]: Learning without Limits: Developing the Next Generation of Education, Proceedings of the EDEN 10 th Anniversary Conference Stockholm, Schweden, pp CEDEFOP (Petersen,A.W.; Revill,P.; Ward,T.; Wehmeyer, C. ) (2004): ICT and e-business skills and training in Europe : Final Synthesis Report, CEDEFOP (Weiss,P., Dolan, D.; Stucky, W.; Bumann, CEPIS), (2004): ICT-Skills Certification in Europe CEDEFOP (Winterton, Stringfellow et al.) (2005). Typology of knowledge, skills and competences: clarification of the concept and prototype. Centre for European Research on Employment and Human Resources Groupe ESC Toulouse. Ee-SF (2004): e-skills For Europe: Towards 2010 and beyond, Synthesis Report of the European e-skills Forum. European Commission (2005): Towards a European Qualifications Framework for Lifelong Learning Commission Staff Working Document: consultation paper, SEC(2005) 957, July 2005 Hacquebard (2004): Towards the development of a European ICT Skills Meta- or Reference Framework. In Case Study I: ICT Sector. Seminar European Education and Training Solutions at Sector Level. Scheveningen. Hacquebard (2004): European e-skills/competence Framework, Universal and Open, Blueprint Outlines, Getting Started Outlines. Hummelo, The Netherlands: Adviesbureau voor Informatica en Onderwijs Hacquebard b.v. Hacquebard, Dijkxhoorn, & Erkelens (2005): Managing ICT Skills Profiles v. Weert, Tom J. (Ed.). Vol. IFIP 161 (v. Weert, Tom J., Ed.). Education and the Knowledge Society, Information Technology supporting human development. Kluwer Academic Publishers. Hacquebard (2005): CWA Survey: Draft 1 for CEN/ISSS ICT Skills Workshop (Phase 2) IFIP (2002): Papers for the IFIP/OECD/WITSA Joint Working Conference on Global IT Skills the Role of Professionalism, October, 2002 OECD (2004): The Role of National Qualifications Systems in Promoting Lifelong Learning (Report from Thematic Group 1), Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development. Rohs, M./ Mattauch, W./ Caumanns, J. (2001): Further professional education based on working processes: Workflow embedded training in the IT Sector, in: Weichert, D./ Rauhut, B./ Schmidt, R. [Hrsg.]: Educating the Engineer for the 21st Century, Kluwer Academic Publishers: Dordrecht; Boston; London, S

46 Supporting mobility: towards a European qualifications framework in: Cedefop Info 2/2005 p. 4 Young, M. (2005): In Focus Programme on Skills, Knowledge and Employability; National Qualifications Frameworks: Their feasibility for effective implementation in developing countries ; Skills Working Paper 22 for the International Labour Organisation 46

47 Glossary ACM AIS AISS AITTS APO-IT BCS BIAT BIBB BITKOM CAD CAM CASE CEDEFOP CEN CEN/ISSS CEO CEPIS CIGREF CIM CIO CompTIA CMM/CMMI CMU CRM CWA D-G DSDM DIN ecco ECDL EDI Ee-SF EIS EQF ERP ESC EU EUCIP EXIn GAHFA Association for Computing Machinery (US) Association for Information Systems Alliance for Information Systems Skills (UK) Advanced IT Training System Work-Process Oriented IT system (original German title for AITTS) British Computer Society BeruefsbildungsInstitut Arbeit und Technik (University of Flensburg) Bundesinstitut fuer Berufsbilding (German) Federal Institute for Vocational Education and Training Bundesverband Informationswirtschaft, Telekommunikation und neue Medien (German) Federal association for information technology, telecommunications and new media Computer Aided Design Computer Aided Manufacturing Computer Aided Software Engineering European Centre for Vocational Training European Committee for Standardisation CEN/Information Society Standardisation System Chief Executive Officer Council of European Professional Informatics Societies Club Informatique des Grandes Entreprises Françaises ICT Club of Large French Companies Computer Integrated Manufacture Chief Information Officer Computing Technology Industry Association (CMU/SEI Capability Maturity Model/CMM Integration) Carnegie-Mellon University (US) Customer Relationship Management CEN Workshop Agreement (European Commission) Directorate-General Dynamic Systems Development Methodology Deutsches Institut fuer Normung (German Standards Institute) e-competences and Certifications Observatory European Computer Driving Licence Electronic Data Interchange European e-skills Forum Executive Information Systems (proposed) European Qualification Framework Enterprise Resource Planning Ecole Superieure de Commerce European Union European Certification for Informatics Professionals Examination Institute for Information Science (IT-) Geschäftsfeld: (IT-) Arbeitsfelder, (IT-) Handlungsfelder, (IT- Arbeitsaufgaben (Model for IT Business Processes: Work Processes, Fields of Operation, and Work Tasks) 47

48 Glossary (continued) GCSE (UK) General Certificate of Secondary Education GRIP Generic Referential ICT Profiles GUI Graphical User Interface HCI Human-Computer Interaction HR Human Resources HTML Hypertext Markup Language ICT Information and Communication Technologies ICTP ICT Practitioner IEE (UK) Institution of Electrical Engineers IEEE-CS Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers - Computer Society IFIP International Federation of Information Processing IQF Irish Qualifications Framework ILO International Labour Organisation IMIS (UK) Institute for the Management of Information Systems IS Information System ISCED International Standard Classification of Education ISCO International Standard Classification of Occupations ISEB Information Systems Examination Board ICT Information and Communications Technologies ICTE Information and Communications Technologies and Electronics IT Information Technology ITIL IT Infrastructure Library KO Knowledge Object (in ecco) KSCs Knowledge, Skills and (wider) Competences LAN Local Area Network MCSE Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer M-F Meta-Framework MIS Management Information System MS (EU) Member States NSSB (former) National Skill Standards Board (US) N/SVQ (UK) National/Scottish Vocational Qualification NWCET National Workforce Centre for Emerging Technologies OECD Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development ONS (UK) Office of National Statistics PAFET Propuesta de acciones para la formación de profesionales en empresas de electrónica, informática y telecomunicación (Spanish project on Proposal for action for the training of professionals in ICTE enterprises ) PC Personal Computer PDM Product Data Management PIM Product Information Management PLM Product Lifecycle Management PRINCE Projects IN Controlled Environments (development method) RFID Radio Frequency IDentification QA Quality Assurance QAA (UK Higher Education) Quality Assurance Agency RAD Rapid Application Development (method) SAD Systems Analysis and Design 48

49 Glossary (continued) SEI SFIA SME SOC SSADM S/W TCC UK UML UNINFO URL VET XML WAN WIMP WITSA Software Engineering Institute (of CMU) Skills Framework for the Information Age Small or Medium-sized Enterprise Standard Occupational Classification Structured Systems Analysis and Design (method) Software (CompTIA) Tech Career Compass United Kingdom Unified Modelling Language Tecnologie Informatiche e Loro Applicazioni (Standards for Information Technology and related applications -Italian national ICT Standards organisation) Uniform Resource Locator Vocational Education and Training extensible Markup Language Wide Area Network Windows, Icon, Mouse (or Menu) and Pointer (User Interfaces) World Information Technology and Services Alliance 49

50 Terminology The working language of the Workshop is English. While this is particularly convenient for those with English mother-tongue, the fact is that those without this advantage often have to work hard to express themselves as clearly as they could in their mother tongue. It also brings with it deeper implications. It has become evident during the course of the Phase 2 Workshop that usage, and meaning attributed to certain core terms, upon which major argumentation takes place, by different Workshop participants can vary considerably. In addition, certain concepts relevant to this complex area are particularly subtle, with different nuances of usage and meaning in different communities and Member States. For example, for some months a debate continued about the use of the terms Reference and Meta, when prefixed to the word Framework. The CWA generally uses the word Reference very little, not least because it is clear that at present there is no clear consensus on the precise meaning of the two terms, in use in the context of the CEN/ISSS Workshop. Other terms that are evidently strongly related but are undoubtedly used in subtly different ways are qualification and certification (see 3.3). These subtle differences of meaning can have a very significant effect on discussions involving arguments and concepts used in the CWA, and given the acknowledged richness of the diversities of culture within the European Union this is not surprising (or if recognized too serious a problem). However it has not been attempted to resolve these problems within the CWA. Agreeing on core terminology is clearly very desirable in the longer run, and it is recognised that there is work to be done to produce a helpful set of definitions and clarifications. Understanding for this problem, and support for efforts to reduce it, should be part of the forward plan. 50

51 Annex A The potential Uses, Benefits and Costs of a European ICT Skills Meta-Framework (unpublished note, Dixon, 2004) Towards a European e-skills Reference Framework An initial analysis of Potential Uses, Benefits and Costs The design of a Skills/Competence Framework depends inter alia on the intended benefits and expected uses. In attempting to refine the overall purpose, it is worth considering the different ways in which a European e-skills Reference Framework could be used, and analyse the relative importance for the EU. While it would not be possible to prevent such a Framework being used in different ways, the prioritising of the different types of use based on the likely benefits (and costs) of each would be an important piece of progress in influencing the design. An attempt to document this is attached. The perspective taken is that aspects of e- skills relating to qualifications (and the certifications arising from successful assessment of achievements) are not necessarily or directly linked to an e- Skills/Competence Framework. This aspect ought to be closely related to the ongoing work at the European level under co-ordination of D-G Education and Culture in view of establishing an overarching European Qualification or Reference Levels Framework which may emerge from current priorities set within the «Bologna» and «Copenhagen» processes. This perspective can be considered a «first cut». More work will undoubtedly be needed to capture relevant experience from Member States and to refine the paper into a consistent/ comprehensive analysis with broad support from within the relevant actors and stakeholders. The exchange on different approaches to e- Skills/Competence Frameworks, which took place on the 26th May enables us to propose the attached overview for further consultation. 51

52 Table A.1 - The different potential uses and benefits of a European e-skills Reference Framework For each use/benefit Framework uses and benefits problem statement/ description of framework use potential benefit for EU (relevant stakeholders) specific tasks to be achieved* for the use, possible alternative approaches, and potential risks likely investment resource requirements (financial + time) of the additional tasks A : General Clarification of ICT Practitioner Skills and Comparison of Member State («MS») (and their own ICT Frameworks) B : Assessment of individuals ICT skills (formal and non-formal) C : Qualification (Certification) comparison, linkages D : Reducing barriers to worker mobility in Europe and beyond E : «Mapping the competences of an individual» between different national Frameworks F : Career Guidance and orientation E : Promoting/Marketing work in ICT Lack of clarity (simplicity?) in the specification of ICT Practitioner skill needs in considering policy development at the European level Assessment of an individual s KSCs generally involves both written and oral (and sometimes PC-based) tests within the context of a qualification. Recruiting employers give certain weight to candidates qualifications, ;not all employers are familiar with all qualifications, and an approved locating of an «unfamiliar» qualification within an accepted framework could contribute to recognition of that qualification throughout Europe (and probably beyond) The European ICT Practitioner Skills Labour Market within Europe is not identical across all Member States. (However, intra-ms mobility by ICT Practitioners is not generally a serious problem, since there is little if any «licence to practice» for this work) Comparisons between details of two existing frameworks generally referred to as «cross-mappings» would enable, for example, a German ICTP with a certain APO profile to be «positioned» within the SFIA structure; which could (informally) help with entry to the (relevant) UK job market A valid structure of e-skills descriptions at a series of levels can provide a useful background to (the individual ICT practitioner when planning) career paths. Useful background also for «Mentors/Coaches» and «Career Advisers» An accepted set of descriptors well presented and dissemination can clarify ICT work ( careers ) and help make it attractive. ( Improved clarity of MS situations and approaches, and so better informed policy development. (benefit to European policy-makers & - advisers, + some benefit to certain interested MS policy-makers and advisers). Possible use by national agencies or qualification bodies (especially in MS s whose VET systems are undergoing revision ). More widespread understanding (by recruiting employers) of a wide range of MS qualifications. Potential minor reduction in barriers ; resulting (?) in a more integrated labour market, with possible spin-offs in performance/cost of human resource and increased economic & social integration at the Euopean level...? Certain (informal) benefits to the migrant ICTP... Improved career planning by ICTPs themselves; better (consistent) information availability for the operation and transparency of the ICTP labour market Increased number of (young) people wanting to work in ICT, leading to increase in demand for ICT education and training provision, and to increased supply of candidates with relevant KSCs. Potential benefit to recruiting employers and competitiveness of EU companies If the objective is to enable policy-makers to assess a) the nature and scale of the problem and b) whether policy responses are justified, much more is required beyond agreement on a common framework : in particular, regular employer surveys to clarify skill shortage/gap realities. It is relatively difficult to assess directly against a Skills/Competence Framework : more realistic is for improved qualification design in certain VET qualification regimes and processes, given the «Target» provided (see G) This locating is an integral part of a European Qualifications Framework (not necessarily directly linked to an e- Skills/Competence Framework) There is little evidence of any significant barriers associated with ICTP occupations. This leaves the more general barriers that affect all intra EU migration, which are being separately tackled. (Industry certifications provide significant «international passports»...) The cross-mapping would not in general be «one-to-one», and could be done (generally more precisely) directly between the two (MS) frameworks Production of attractive exemplars about successful career development paths Promotional messages, materials and products would have to be produced, regularly updated and effectively & widely disseminated on the basis of the framework. Some use in policy research (employer surveys) would probably be needed to initiate real value in policymaking (see F) Not clear that investment effort would produce returns (much effort would be required to build an assessment infrastructure around the framework) Not clear that investment effort would produce returns (the real problem lies elsewhere) Not clear that investment effort would produce returns (little evidence of a real problem) Cost would be involved in carrying-out the cross-mapping (ultimately this could be computerised, but the development and updating - of the system would have a cost). If there were certain accepted value to the individual ICTP, s/he could cover these costs. Costs of providing careers material would be borne as now by e.g. large employers and the public sector careers advisory provision infrastructure. Cost of initiatives to promote ICT work must presumably fall on those who benefit - ICTP-recruiting-employers (N.B. These include employers beyond the ICT supply sector) 52

53 Table A.1 (concluded) For each use/benefit Framework uses and benefits problem statement/ description of framework use potential benefit for EU (relevant stakeholders) specific tasks to be achieved for the use, possible alternative approaches, and potential risks and costs likely investment resource requirements (financial + time) of the additional tasks F : Labour Market statistics classification and gathering on the European level G : Provision of «target» («employer requirements») information for Education and Training («E&T») provision H : Use in Recruitment I : Salary Surveys As well as clarification of the structure of ICT skills demand and supply, policy analysts and makers need meaningful quantitative and qualitative evidence of a problem («market failure» often relating to skill shortages). Existing official statistics (in particular from general official surveys) generally use occupational classifications that are relatively out of date. A structured set of KSC definitions that are really accepted by (most) employers recruiting ICT practitioners would be an extremely valuable set of targets for education, training and qualification/certification providers to aim at in their learning outcome design. Not all employers recruit in the same way, and a candidate s formal qualifications will often play only a minor role * However, clarification of the positioning of a candidate s recent work within an accepted overall structure for ICT Practitioner work would strengthen the understanding (in particular) of smaller or less knowledgeable employers... Recruiting employers need to know what salary to offer when preparing to fill each new ICTP vacancy. This information can come from employment intermediaries or the findings of (commercial) salary surveys. In either case an occupational classification is required. Up to date salary survey data provides important data on the labour market, in particular in relation to skill shortages, which can be of particular value to policy analysts... More reliable Labour Market Statistics, in the sense of data for the occupations required and recognised by employers. Potential benefits to Policy Researchers/Analysts, and so to improved policymaking/planning of investments etc. This is perhaps one of the major strategic potential benefits, although issues of KSC breadth and sensitivity to changes in framework structure arising from technology- and market-developmentneed, in particular, to be addessed. By not allowing any particular education/training model to influence the occuational KSC requirement design, all the rich variety of EU/MS E+T traditions can be focussed on this target. An agreed common reference framework could provide certain benefits for job-seekers and recruiting employers providing there is a critical mass of adoption/recognition. If the occupational classification within the proposed e-skills reference framework were adopted (widely in the EU) for salary surveys, this could provide very valuable comparative data for recruiting employers and policy-makers. Owners of (national and, in particular, international) official occupational classifications would have to agree to the classification produced for the European e- skills reference framework at the appropriate level of «granularity». The production of the «target» would require no additional effort review and refinement of Eduction &Training provision would take place at the initiative (and expense) of each interested E&T provider. It is not clear why a European-level framework would be picked up in the market-place for recruitment activity, unless there were a strong push from the public sector, and the framework were really supported by major employers. Those involved with salary surveys would have to (be persuaded to) adopt the framework. Costs of extended lobbying of (+ funding for?) the appropriate international bodies (Eurostat + ILO). International classification revision proceed slowly(!), ISCO revision may start in 2007 (An alternative would be for the Framework to be used directly in gathering employer skill needs/recruitment data. If all national surveys used the same framework, data would be largely comparable, but it is not clear whether the EU would cover the cost of regular surveys needed in an ever-changing market) Relatively little additional direct resource needed A lead from the public sector would be required (e.g. through Framework use by local job-centres), but some adoption by the private sector i.e. major employers and/or employment intermediaries (agencies), would probably be needed in addition. Widespread take-up likely to occur only with major public and private sector recognition of the framework. Funding is made available by governments and the EU. Data could become more reliable especially in qualitative terms. J : other??? 53

54 Underlying considerations in the development of a possible European e-skills Reference Framework 1. The role (and relative importance) of qualifications (certifications) in recruitment. The more employers weight experience as against formal qualifications, the less important any particular qualification becomes in the marketplace... (although probably one of the reasons employers do seem to attribute great importance to experience is the absence of widely recognised qualifications). In this context the relationship between public and private or industry certification is significant. 2. The relationship between the «breadth» of detailed KSC s needed for a particular ICT occupation/skill level and the reasonable breadth of a vocational qualification, given that a) the employer may not want the individual to stay in that occupation/role very long, b) the requirements of the occupation/role may change (indeed the occupation/role may fade away a number have over recent years), and c) the individual may not want to remain in that role, or with that employer, for too long. 3. The «breadth relationship» issue is not directly related to but not dissimilar in principle to the problem of - mapping between the KSC requirements of individual jobs/roles and the Body of Knowledge (in particular in Computer Science and Information Systems) addressed in the curricula of education/training ICT courses. Evidence from the UK suggests that the mapping from university ICT courses is more complex than is the case in (other branches) of engineering. 4. Overall, the benefits for the EU begin to accrue when there is a critical mass of relevant stakeholders who use the framework. Based on national experience, the achievement of this critical mass at the European level is not guaranteed. In addition, gaining significant buy-in is likely to prove at least as difficult as it is at the national level possibly even more difficult. 5. One of the considerations that seems to emerge from this analysis is that a reference framework might well provide comparatively greater benefit to smaller employers (in particular in ICT user sectors) and those Member States who are less advanced in the development of policy work in e-skills ; and who have no national e-skills/competence Framework. Perhaps a certain bias towards greater benefit to these groups may be appropriate to consider at the EU level. 54

55 Annex B ICT Frameworks: An overview (N.B. This overview is intended to be comprehensive and inclusive: please notify Co-Chairs in case of omissions) 55

56 ICT Frameworks (This overview is intended to be comprehensive and inclusive please notify CEN/ISSS in case of omissions) Name Originator(s) Summary Description (+ URL) Latest Update A) ICT Practitioner Skills/Competence Frameworks/Profile Sets: Advanced IT Training System (AITTS) (APO-IT) APO-IT national Partnership (Germany) Framework designed around the learning and assessment process (more details elsewhere in report). Establishment of APO-IT very innovative in Germany (partial) Airbus Airbus The Airbus IS competence catalogue was developed in 2002, building on the CIGREF Occupational Nomenclature (qv). It has been reviewed twice a year by the Airbus IS transnational competence network to take into account inputs from the 4 major countries where Airbus Information Systems are operating (France, Germany, UK and Spain). The Airbus framework is used to describe position requirements and employee profiles to support competence management within all the Functions of the Aerospace major. V4.02 Sept 2005? National Catalogue of professional profiles (CNCP) INCUAL (National Institute for Qualifications Spain) The CNCP catalogue lists 9 ICT professional profiles (in Spanish) /09 EUCIP Profiles EUCIP Ltd. Profiles specified in relation to the certification specifications for the EUCIP Professional (elective) levels. Profiles drawn from predecessor of SFIA (and due 2006) GAHFA (Model for IT Business Processes, Work Processes, Fields of Operation, and Work Tasks) BIAT (University of Flensburg) for CEDEFOP Proposed European ICT Skills and Qualifications Frameworks based on findings of EUQUASIT project. EUQuaSIT-biat.pdf E-Berufe-IH/1997/mechatroniker/GAHFA-METR-1998-IH-VO-LF.htm (in German)

57 Name Originator(s) Summary Description (+ URL) Latest Update ICT Occupation Nomenclature ICT Club of large French Companies CIGREF The CIGREF professional/occupational nomenclature specifies a description of existing occupations involved in activity under the Management of Information Systems carried out by large French (user) companies. =viewnews 2004 ICT Occupational Profiles (Portugal) Institute for Quality in Training (IQF) Reference framework of Occupational Profiles for ICT professionals. Each profile includes, inter alia, a description of mission, work activities, competence elements (knowledge, technical know-how and social/relational know-how), and prospective elements) 2005 IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) IT Service Management Forum (itsmf) and Office of Government Commerce (UK) ITIL provides consistent and comprehensive documentation of best practice for IT Service Management. There are associated (professional) qualifications handled by ISEB (UK) and EXIn (Netherlands) ? (US) IT Skill Standards National Workforce Centre for Emerging Technologies (NWCET) (US) Developed in 2000 (updated 2003) with support from the National Science Foundation in accordance with the overall strategy of the National Skill Standards Board. Telecommunications skills handled separately. (due 2006) Japanese IT Skill Standards (ITSS) Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), Japan (in Japanese J. character-set!) 2003? Occupational Skills Profile Model (OSPM) Software Human Resources Council (Canada) SHRC designed the Occupational Skills Profile Model (OSPM) as a human resource reference tool for IT occupations ? 57

58 Name Originator(s) Summary Description (+ URL) Latest Update PAFET project Profiles (the 20 most-demanded Professional ICT Profiles) (Spain) PAFET (Proposals for Actions for the Formation of Electronics, Informatics and Telecommunications Professionals) PAFET Project commissioned by Spanish Association of Electronics and Telecommunications Industries (ANIEL), in collaboration with the Official College of Telecommunications Engineers (COIT), and the Spanish Council of Universities. (in Spanish) 2001 (updates 2002, 2004 for User Orgs, and PAFET IV in 2005/11) Skills Framework For the Information Age SFIA Foundation (UK) SFIA was launched in 1999 as a lightweight superstructure for use in Career Promotion, Skills Management and Career Development Swiss Professions of ICT Swiss ICT Beruefe der ICT (in eight broad areas, 39 profiles, mostly specificed at 6 levels) specified in SwissICT book. Tech Career Compass Computing Technology Industry Association (CompTIA) TCC is a worldwide Information Technology repository for resources critical in attracting, training and developing properly skilled IT workers. Industry led, arising from the US (NWCET) IT Standards revision UK National Occupational Standards (for IT Professionals) e-skills UK Set of Competence Statements on the basis of which UK National and Scottish Vocational Qualifications (N/SVQs)are built Web Study Certifications IWA/HWG (the International Webmasters Association / The HTML Writers Guild) educational and certification standards for Web professionals. Since

59 Name Originator(s) Summary Description (+ URL) Latest Update B) ICT User Skills/Competence Frameworks: User Skills Framework e-skills UK UK Five level model covering 14 functional areas grouped into Systems, Communication, Developing and Presenting Information and Evaluation. General information at (ECDL) CEPIS-> ECDL Foundation (Qualification structure) C) Higher Education Curricula Frameworks: Curriculum Development Guidelines Career-Space European Industry Consortium Broad specification of the different requirements of University ICT courses relevant to the Career-Space ICT Generic Skill Profiles ? Computing Curricula 2004 IEEE-CS + ACM + AIS (US) Joint Task Force Guide on the main Computing disciplines (for university Degree courses) Computing Subject Benchmark Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) for Higher Education (UK) Broad Specification of structure and curriculum to which UK university Computing courses are required to relate. uting.pdf

60 Name Originator(s) Summary Description (+ URL) Latest Update D) Official Occupational Frameworks (including ICT Practitioner occupations) for national statistical purposes: Standard Occupational Classification SOC 2000 Office of National Statistics (ONS) UK General Set of Occupational Definitions for all Workforce Occupations (includes 4-digit ICT occupational specifications) International Standard Classification of Occupations (ISCO) ILO (Eurostat) General Set of Occupational Definitions for all Workforce Occupations (includes 3-digit 4-digit ICT occupational specifications) E) Structured Tools for analysing Frameworks Generic Referential ICT Profiles (GRIP) Consultancy and Research Bureau for Informatics and Education Top down approach for analysing and classifying ICT Profile frameworks 2003? ecco project AICA, Federcomin, and Fondazione Politecnico di Milano Bottom-up approach for analysing and classifying ICT Profile frameworks Under develop t 60

61 Annex C Inventory of Main ICT Practitioner Skills/Competence Frameworks 1) Advanced IT Training System (APO-IT) 2) CIGREF Occupational Nomenclature 3) Skills Framework for the Information Age 4) NWCET IT Skill Standards 61

62 Advanced IT Training System (APO-IT) 62

63 Information for AITTS Framework Details (AITTS) Name of model Owner organisation Description of owner Owner website URL Designer(s)/Author(s) + key publication (if any) General Aims (including list of intended uses) Advanced IT Training System ( AITTS ) German title: APO-IT (ArbeitsProzessOrientierte Weiterbildung in der IT) Federal Ministry of Education and Research [BMBF] in conjunction with German social partners of the IT industry and the Federal Institute for Vocational Education and Training [BIBB] Consortium of the Industrial Metalworkers Union [IG Metal], the Unified Service Industries Union [ver.di], the Central Association of Electrical Engineering and Electric Industries [ZVEI], the German Association for Information Technology, Telecommunications and New Media [BITKOM] Designer: Fraunhofer Institute for Software and Systems Engineering ( ) Documentation: _system.pdf (English) (List of German publications) For definition of career profiles: Creation of transparent, well-defined occupational profiles for ICT job roles Providing structure and instruments for systematic horizontal ( in field ) and vertical ( progression ) career development Enabling recognition of vocational and professional training For support demand driven qualification: Assuring quality of qualification based on action competence in the relevant work processes Building social and self-learning competence July 2002 (Enactment under public law) Date of launch Last updated June 2004 Based upon (core concepts) Language(s) German, English translation available Development + Update (AITTS ) Development Approach Multi-staged process included experts from HR and training from IT industry and science and education experts for the development of the training concept Analysis of job advertisements and position descriptions to build profile model Elaboration of profile content and associated curricula based on Best Practice analysis with partners from IT companies and training providers 63

64 Stakeholders actively involved No. employers actively involved Development QA Update approach Update QA Planned Update frequency Cooperation involved more than 60 representatives from the ICT industry and training providers, large Organisations and SME s alike; Examples: Siemens AG, Oracle Deutschland GmbH, Deutsche Telekom AG, Allianz < 60 Internal revision, revision by industry and by training partner Collection of feedback via online tool Advisory board meets annually and reviews those profiles for which demand is indicated through feedback forum Qualified feedback by IT practitioners being certified, examiners, certification bodies, technical experts lead to revision of profile / profile model (see development QA) Updated version must pass the advisory board As necessary when indicated through online feedback process Scope of Use (AITTS) Target group IT practitioners and lateral entrants, HR professionals or SME s respectively, education provider etc. Actors IT practitioners: either graduating from IT occupations or lateral entrants with considerable experience in the IT industry Main Uses (current) Concept and curricula for workflow-embedded training for competence development in the workprocess Use of profile system for transparent job role description within Organisations Strategy for systematic personnel development Quality assurance of work-based and informal learning Levels of proficiency? Yes: Currently four levels aligned with EQF levels 4-7 Associated qualification concept? Yes: Embedded workprocess-oriented qualification concept ( Working is Learning ) Modes of learning Non-formal and informal within work process Formal, if participation in additional training modules offered by training providers is necessary to meet performance expectations (e.g. Industry-based Certificates or building body of knowledge) Quality Assurance of Qualification Yes: External through accredited certification bodies for IT Specialists or examinations conducted by Chamber of Industry and Commerce for IT Professionals QA based upon Accreditation: based on DIN EN Performance assessments employed in both Certification: personnel certification based on DIN Examination: based on public law Certification Yes Recognition of Competence Achievement for Higher Education Yes 64

65 Entry Requirements Yes: Specialists: A completed VET in the IT occupations or a higher academic degree A completed Non-IT VET and a minimum of one year full-time work experience in the IT industry Four years full-time work experience in IT Professionals: Operative ~: A completed VET in the IT occupations and one year full-time work experience in the IT industry or a higher academic IT degree (or equivalent) A completed Non-IT VET and a minimum of three year full-time work experience in the IT industry Six years full-time work experience in IT Strategic ~: Like Operative Professionals plus a ICT degree (or equivalent) plus certification in the field of line or personnel management Model details (AITTS) Orientation Structure type Main groupings /items Top level groupings (Action) Competence based Work process oriented 3-tier hierarchy Functional Groups Occupational Profiles on 3 levels of proficiency Reference Processes 1) Software Developer 2) Solutions Developer 3) Solutions Administrator 4) Coordinator 5) Technician 6) Product- or Client Advisor 65

66 Profiles 1) Profile Constituents Model Approach 2) 3) 4) 5) 6) IT Systems Analyst IT Systems developer Software Developer Database developer User interface developer Multimedia developer Business Systems Advisor e-marketing Developer e-logistic Developer Knowledge Management Systems Developer IT Security Coordinator Network Developer Network Administrator IT Systems Administrator Database Administrator Web Administrator Business Systems Administrator IT Project coordinator IT Configuration Coordinator IT Quality Management Coordinator IT Test Coordinator IT Technical Writer Component Technician Industrial IT Systems Technician Security Technician IT Service Advisor IT Trainer IT Product Coordinator IT Sales Advisor Each profile is constituted by one or more Reference Processes : typical work processes related to the profile s job role. Best practice analysis Life cycle model ( IT Process ) as top level paradigm for profile model 66

67 CIGREF (ICT Practitioner) Occupation Nomenclature 67

68 Information for CIGREF Nomenclature Framework Details (CIGREF Nomenclature) Name of model Owner (organis n) Description of owner Owner website URL Designer(s)/Author(s) + key publication (if any) General Aims (including list of intended uses) Date of launch Nomenclature for Information System professional occupations in large (user) enterprises (also: Reference Occupations) Informatics Club of Large French Companies (CIGREF) Non-profit association of French companies, represented by the Chief Information Officer. A meeting-point for decision-makers and managers, all of whom are high-level users of large-scale Information Systems. Forum for sharing of best practice, experience, and exchange of knowledge The Nomenclature 2005 update project was coordinated by Frederic LAU (Research Officer). The work is now linked to the CIGREF theme on the governance of the Direction of Information Systems (DSI) and its occupations. The original aim was to respond to a need to clarify the management of human resources in ICT work. The framework provides a tool to help CIGREF companies to build their own HR reference arrangements. Ultimately CEGREF hopes to use it as an ICT HR observatory. The Nomenclature was created by a think tank created in 1990 on good practice in ICT HR Management. There have been four major versions, which have tracked the significant changes in HR management over the ensuing 15 years: 1991, , and Last updated February 2005 Based upon Enterprise Human Resource (standard) approaches Language(s) French, with certain job titles indcated in English shown for most Profiles (an English version of the 2000 document exists, and a translation of the 2005 version is planned) Development + Update (CIGREF Nomenclature) Development Approach Stakeholders actively involved No. employers actively involved Development QA Consultations among the HR Directors responsible for ICT work in CIGREF Members, who met each month since 2001 to share their experience and work on the formalisation of a common description of ICT occupations in their enterprises Nearly all stakeholders involved are CIOs and HR Directors of employers ICT Departments (CIGREF members) Nearly 40 involved in meetings, development and review. Repeated review and refinement by employer-led group 68

69 Update approach Update QA Planned Update frequency HR workgroups regularly review update proposals by CIGREF members. Every 5 years a comprehensive examination of all profiles is carried out. Review and refinement, co-ordinated by CIGREF official. As perceived necessary: minor updates continuously; major updates: review for need every 18 months only if major changes in HR strategies Scope of Use (CIGREF Nomenclature) Target group Actors Main Uses (current) Levels of proficiency? Associated qualification concept? Modes of learning Quality Assurance of Qualification QA based upon Certification Recognition of Competence Achievement for Higher Education Entry Requirements Senior HR staff responsible for ICT occupations within (large) User companies (CIGREF Members) I T practitioners Providing a tool to help CIGREF Members to build and develop their own reference frameworks. In addition, it provides a basis for CIGREF Members (and other employers) to enable better understanding of ICT Practitioner occupations Yes: 4 Niveaux Requis (required levels), specified as follows: N: Notional : familiarity with/understanding of basic concepts A: Application : Notional level plus capability to apply a procedure or an understanding within a defined realm/organisational context M: Mastery : Application level plus capability to handle exceptional cases, to extrapolate, to form (new) basic concepts and to operate outside normal situations and contexts when necessary E: Expert : Mastery level plus capability to significantly modify (a) procedure(s) with the objective of optimisation No, although see Entry Requirements Not specified N/A N/A N/A N/A Specified in terms of a (normal) Parcours Professionelle (Professional course / Standard Career Path): this involves indication of number of years of (tertiary) education ( after the Baccalaureat ) (in some cases Engineer specified) plus number of years of experience (+ in certain cases, a relevant qualification/certificate) 69

70 Model details (CIGREF Nomenclature) Orientation Structure type Main groupings /items Top level groupings Profiles Profiles specified in terms of mission, activities and tasks, professional course, tendencies, and based on Information System Savoir-faire; General Savoir-Faire and Aptitudes 3-tier hierarchy Core Areas, Occupation Families and Occupations Core areas in paradigm: Management and Evaluation of Information Systems (IS) Carrying out of IS projects Assuring smooth operation, utilisation and security of IS Advice and Expertise Families of (Professional) Occupations: 1. IS Consultancy and Management occupations 2. User (help and) support occupations 3. IS Operations and Exploitation occupations 4. Analysis, Development and Integration occupations 5. Internal Technical Help and Support occupations 6. IS Management and Administration occupations 70

71 Profile Constituents Occupations: 1) Information Systems Consultant Enterprise Architect (Business) Development Project Manager Business IS Line Manager Application Manager Business Project Line Manager 2) 3) 4) 5) 6) Functional Assistant Help Desk Analyst Customer Service Manager Operator Desktop (PC) Technician Network/Telecomms. Technician Systems Analyst Tools/Systems/Network and Telecomms. administrator Database Administrator Software Integrator Operation Controller Development Project Manager Developer Software Integrator ERP Parameter setter Webmaster Operating System Expert Network/Telecomms. Expert Expert in methods and tools for Quality/Security/Data Expert in Internet and Multimedia Technology Information System Security Manager Information System Architect Chief Information Officer ICT Operations Director ICT System Manager IS Asset Manager Telecomms. Manager Model Approach Consolidation of Employer practice, in context of refining existing Profiles and Profile Structure 71

72 Skills Framework for the Information Age 72

73 Information for SFIA Framework Details (SFIA) Name of model Skills Framework for the Information Age (SFIA) Owner (organis n) SFIA Foundation (shareholders: e-skills UK, British Computer Society, Institution of Electrical Engineers, Institute for the Management of Information Systems) Description of owner Consortium of the key government-recognised IT Skills Policy agency + the three relevant professional bodies Owner website URL Designer(s)/Author(s) Designer: First version developed from the ITNTO (eskills UK predecessor) s National Occupational + key publication (if any) Standards for IT Practitioners and the BCS s Industry Structure Model, under the auspices of the Alliance for Information Systems Skills (AISS) General Aims The collection of processes known as Skills (including list of Management inside companies that employ IT intended uses) professionals It is viewed as a lightweight superstructure on which value added services can be built (e.g. BCS provides SFIAplus, incorporating several web-based skills management and career development tools.) Date of launch Initial design ( National IS Skills/Competence Framework ) completed 1996, Formal Launch as SFIA 1999 Last updated September 2005 (V3 Launch in November 05) Based upon (core concepts) Language(s) English Development + Update (SFIA ) Development Approach Stakeholders actively involved 1) Integration of two existing employer-led frameworks. 2) Resulting Framework was refined with a reference group of major (supplier and user) employers 3) Field-Tested through employer accreditation by BCS and IEE In addition to four SFIA Foundation Shareholders, examples of employers using SFIA are: No. employers 10-20? actively involved Development QA Repeated review and refinement by employer-led group Update approach SFIA has been updated in 2001 and 2005 Update QA Formal project, involving Project Management Board, Pathfinder workshops and workshops in major cities around the UK Planned Update 3-yearly reviews frequency 73

74 Scope of Use (SFIA) Target group Employers (ICT Line Managers and supporting HR professionals) Individual IT practitioners Actors IT practitioners (and aspiring IT practitioners) Main Uses (current) ICT Practitioner Skills Management Career Planning and Management Levels of proficiency? Yes: 7: corresponding to progression of Autonomy, Influence, Complexity, and Business Skills: overall level titles : L1: Follow ; L2: Assist ; L3: Apply ; L4: Enable ; L5: Ensure, Advise ; L6: Initiate, Influence ; L7: Set Strategy, Inspire, Mobilise Associated qualification concept? Modes of learning Quality Assurance of Qualification QA based upon Certification Recognition of Competence Achievement for Higher Education Entry Requirements No, although: BCS uses SFIA level 4 as entry level for Chartered Professional Membership IMIS uses (only) SFIA for Membership admission (University Computing Departments have been encouraged to consider SFIA s specification of employer needs) Added value tools (e.g. based on SFIAplus) provide guidance on learning possibilities to move to more senior levels and other Categories N/A N/A N/A N/A Specification of Skill Requirements for each skill(set) at each level constitute requirement to be considered as working in that SFIA cell ) Model details (SFIA) Orientation Structure type Main groupings /items Top level groupings Profiles based on concept of Skills essentially Competence. 3-tier hierarchy Categories, Sub-Categories and Skills Categories (SFIA v3): Strategy & planning Development Business Change Service provision Procurement and management support Ancillary skills 74

75 Profiles Sub-Categories (SFIA v3): 1) Information Strategy 2) Advice & guidance 3) Business/IS strategy and planning 4) Technical strategy and planning 5) Systems development 6) Human factors 7) Installation & integration 8) Business change management 9) Relationship management 10) Infrastructure 11) Operation 12) User support 13) Supply management 14) Quality 15) Resource management 16) Education & training 17) Sales & marketing 75

76 Profile Constituents Skills (SFIA v3): 1) Information management 2) 3) 4) 5) 6) 7) 8) 9) Consultancy Technical specialism Information security Research Business process improvement Strategic application of Information Systems Business risk management Innovation Information Assurance Software development process improvement Systems architecture Continuity management Emerging technology monitoring Methods and tools Network planning Systems development management Data analysis Systems design Network design Database design Programming/software development Safety engineering Web site specialism Systems testing Systems ergonomics Content creation Non-functional needs analysis Usability evaluation Human factors integration Systems integration Porting/software integration Systems installation/decommissioning Business analysis Programme management Project management Business process testing Change implementation planning & management Organisation design & implementation Benefits Management Stakeholder relationship management 76

77 Model Approach 10) Configuration management Change Management System software Network control Capacity management Radio Frequency Engineering Security administration Availability Management Financial Management for IT 11) Data protection Application support Management and operations Network control and operation Database administration Service level management 12) Network support Service desk and incident management Problem management 13) Supplier relationship management Procurement 14) Quality management Quality assurance Quality standards Compliance audit Safety assessment 15) Project office Asset management IS co-ordination Client services management Professional development Resourcing 16) Education & training management Training materials creation and maintenance Education & training delivery 17) Account management Marketing Selling Sales support Best practice analysis 77

78 NWCET IT Skill Standards 78

79 Information for NWCET IT Skill Standards Framework Details (NWCET IT Skill Standards) Name of model Owner organisation Description of owner Owner website URL Designer(s)/Author(s) + key publication (if any) General Aims (including list of intended uses) National Workforce Center for Emerging Technologies (NWCET) A skill standards multi-dimensional framework & repository for IT and IT-infused skill standards for the next millennium, 2003 version NWCET National Science Foundation Advanced Technology Education Center, a not-for-profit organisation located at Bellevue Community College, WA, USA NWCET The 2003 NWCET Skill Standards are used by industry, education, government, and the general workforce to: Profile jobs Recruit technical staff Evaluate employees Design professional development programs Design academic and professional certifications Develop educational and training tools Develop curriculum Date of launch Current version of NWCET Skill Standards, 2003 Next version to be published in 2006, funded through a National Science Foundation Grant and private sector contributions. Last updated 2003 Based upon Previous versions and validated industry input and work by the National Skill Standards Board (NSSB, now defunct) Language(s) English Development + Update (NWCET IT Skill Standards) Development Approach Stakeholders actively involved No. employers actively involved Development QA Industry senior management (CEO s, CIO s), technology managers, human resource personnel, information and computing technology technicians, middle management, as well as higher education teachers and faculty across the USA actively participated in generating and reviewing the data that populates the skills standards. IT Industry, education, government, and the USA workforce. 50+ Focus groups, surveys, reviews 79

80 Update approach Update QA Planned Update frequency NWCET will be conducting another series of focus groups, surveys, and reviews and testing out a multidimensional web-based framework. Stage 1 will be completed by Consistent review, refinement, and updating of the standards that populate the standards by industry, education, government, and the workforce. Validation through extensive quantitative studies. Every 2-3 years. Scope of Use (NWCET IT Skill Standards) Target group (Industry) Human Resources (Industry) Employers (Industry) Employees (Education) Administrators (Education) Teachers, Faculty (Education) Students (Education) Career Counsellors (Government) Federal, State, and Local Agencies: Department of Labour, Department of Education, Department of Business and Industry, Economic Department, Department of Social Services (Workforce) Prospective employees, dislocated workers, unemployed workers Actors Main Uses (current) Levels of proficiency? Associated qualification concept? Modes of learning Quality Assurance of Qualification QA based upon Certification Recognition of Competence Achievement for Higher Education Entry Requirements The levelling of the global workforce having a core skill set in information and computer technology, the specialisations and multi-disciplinary acceptance by industry, government, and education makes all of these sectors stakeholders. Currently, the skill standards have been widely adopted by IT educators across the US. Some industry usage, including Microsoft, Boeing and Volt. The EU incorporates levelling in its standards. The NWCET skill standards will be incorporating levelling into the next version of its skill standards. Currently, there is a pyramid of Competences (Tier I, Tier II, and Tier III) in three broad skill categories. NWCET Skill Standards are vendor-neutral And are readily available for a nominal fee to anyone who wishes to use them. The NWCET has skill standards-based curriculum development guidelines. N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A 80

81 Model details (NWCET IT Skill Standards) Orientation Structure type Main groupings /items Top level groupings Profiles Critical Work Functions, Key Activities, Performance Indicators, Future Job Tends, Soft (Employability Skills), Job Descriptions (and, a levelling relational data base), are amongst the standards criterion. Multi-dimensional ICT (or, IT) and ICT and IT-infused present and future career pathways. The EU, especially Britain refer to information and computing technology. Note: EU references ICT, the NWCET references IT when referring to information and computing technology. Low-, mid-, and senior-level professionals Pure ICT or IT: 1) Database Development and Adminstration 2) Digital Media 3) Enterprise Systems Analysis and Integration 4) Network Design and Adminstration 5) Programming/Software Engineering 6) Technical Support 7) Technical Writing 8) Web Development and Adminstration 9) Cyber Security and Information Assurance 10) Project Management ICT or IT-infused (to include): 1) Nano-technology 2) Energy technolgy 3) Telecommunication technolgy 4) Manufacturing technology 5) Health Informatics technology 6) Etc. Profile Constituents Model Approach Global student, educator, workforce, industry and governmental employer or employee. A relational database that can absorb with increased rapidity the changing workforce needs, thus drive changes in education and anticipate industry or move into a predictive posture of future ICT- or IT- infused workforce movements. The ultimate goal is to reduce the level of unpredictability, while allowing for innovation and fluidity in emerging technologies, recognize trends before the emerge and collaborate with industry to act. 81

82 Annex D Relationship of the ICT Skills Meta-Framework to the proposed EQF Relationship of the ICT Skills Meta-Framework to the proposed EQF The Copenhagen process, in conjunction with the Bologna process, has resulted in proposals for the development of a European Qualification Framework. This initiative by the European Commission (with support from CEDEFOP) strives to establish the basis for significantly greater transparency and comparability for all types and levels of qualification around the EU. The Proposed European Qualifications Framework is envisaged as being linked to two other contexts of Qualification frameworks: National and Sectoral. In respect of links to Sectoral Frameworks, Systems and Qualifications, the EQF Consultation Document states: An EQF would also provide a common reference point to guide and inform developments of education, training and learning at sector level. Where possible, these sectoral developments should be linked to national frameworks thus facilitating transfer and compatibility. The EQF common reference would also make it possible to link sector initiatives to national qualifications and thus facilitate transfer and compatibility. Linking a sectoral framework to the EQF furthermore implies an acceptance of, and a commitment to, a set of criteria regarding quality and transparency. The decision on linking sectoral initiatives to the possible EQF should be made by the stakeholders themselves, in consultation with representatives of national authorities responsible for qualifications. The EQF aims to help establish clear, secure and simple arrangements for the recognition of qualifications. The European ICT Skills Meta-Framework ( M-F ) must be considered in this context. However, it is important to understand that the M-F s objective is to support the recognition of competence (or skills, broadly conceived) as it is not a framework for qualifications. [ A qualification framework is a qualification framework and a competence framework is a competence framework ] The main purposes of the proposed EQF are (European Commission, 2005) to: facilitate the transfer, transparency and recognition of qualifications, and to strengthen mutual trust between the different stakeholders involved in Lifelong Learning The following specific functions are envisaged (European Commission, 2005): the proposed EQF would: establish a common reference point referring to learning outcomes expressed as KSCs, so simplifying communication between providers and learners in education and training; function as a translation device (a converter or reading grid ) making it possible to position and compare learning outcomes; 82

83 function as a common reference for quality assurance and development in education and training; provide a reference for the development of sectoral qualifications; and be a force for change at European, national and sector level within the Lifelong Learning perspective. Key benefits of a successfully-implemented EQF would therefore be the: supporting of Lifelong Learning and ensuring that the outcomes of learning are properly valued and used which includes the validation of non-formal and informal learning; enabling of appropriate and consistent guidance and counselling on education and training; promoting of key-competences for a competitive workforce. As with the EQF, the Meta-Framework is an instrument developed and implemented entirely on a voluntary basis. It does not involve or imply any legal obligations. Both frameworks therefore require acceptance, support, and then commitment from relevant stakeholders in order to achieve their goals. Following the debate about the establishment of a European Higher Education Area (Bologna process), and corresponding aspirations for VET and Lifelong Learning (Copenhagen process), it is recognized that the crucial element in enabling effective relating of diverse national qualification systems lies in: an orientation towards learning outcomes; the establishment of instruments for the recognition in Member States of qualifications achieved in others, as well as effective transfer of credits; and the acceptance of certain common reference points, most notably reference to a set of carefully defined levels. Key purposes of the M-F are related to those of the EQF: to promote competences for a competitive workforce to provide guidance for the development of a professional ICT workforce to individual ICT practitioners and employers (HR professionals and line managers) alike; to create adequate transparency and comparability between Competence frameworks / systems of job/skills profiles; and to support Lifelong Learning and ensure that outcomes of workplace learning are properly valued and recognised for continuing education and training by supporting the recognition of vocational/professional qualifications. It is recognized that for ICT professionals working and learning are increasingly interrelated. The ICT Skills M-F addresses skills (broadly defined) or competences needed by employers for ICT practitioners. The M-F adopts a output-oriented approach. The conceptual basis is consistent with that of the EQF, and the proposed Vertical Level Descriptors for ICT Practitioners have been specified from the EQF Reference Levels. In the context of the M-F, learning and learning outcomes relate to performance and performance expectations. The M-F describes the common features of competence frameworks that result from convergence arising from the maturation of the ICT industry and its standard processes, 83

84 showing as an example - the system development life cycle often used to show the overall structure of a framework s profile model. Competence descriptions are based on a typology of knowledge, skills and wider competences as described in the EQF consultation document. The Generic grid of level descriptors developed for this CWA aligns with those given by the EQF. Additional specification is required, though, in order to allow for the description of levels of competence and in order address issues arising from the Directive for the recognition of professional qualification. It is accepted that Life-long Learning is of the utmost importance in the ICT sector, where understanding and competence need regular updating. Consequently, the recognition of professional qualifications and the transferability of all learning outcomes (including those from informal learning) must be supported. To this end, frameworks that involve qualifications or KSC assessments should establish a system of quality assurance that comprises accreditation and certification arrangements. In line with the orientation on performance expectations and Competence, assessment should not only contain elements of knowledge testing but also of performance assessment. Brief descriptions of the 8 reference levels for qualifications specified for the proposed EQF are shown in Figure 3. 84

85 Figure 4 Summary Description of Reference Levels in the Proposed European Qualifications Framework (EQF) EQF Brief indicator of level of qualification Level 1 Qualifications at level 1 recognise basic general knowledge and skills and the capacity to undertake simple tasks under direct supervision in a structured environment. The development of learning skills requires structured support. These qualifications are not occupation specific and are often sought by those with no qualification. 2 Qualifications at level 2 recognise a limited range of knowledge, skills and wider competences that are mainly concrete and general in nature. Skills are applied under supervision in a controlled environment. Learners take limited responsibility for their own learning. Some of these qualifications are occupation specific but most recognise a general preparation for work and study. 3 Qualifications at level 3 recognise broad general knowledge and field-specific practical and basic theoretical knowledge, they also recognise the capacity to carry out tasks under direction. Learners take responsibility for their own learning and have limited experience of practice in a particular aspect of work or study. 4 Qualifications at level 4 recognise significant field-specific practical and theoretical knowledge and skills. They also recognise the capacity to apply specialist knowledge, skills and competences and to solve problems independently and supervise others. Learners show self-direction in learning and have experience of practice in work or study in both common and exceptional situations 5 Qualifications at level 5 recognise broad theoretical and practical knowledge, including knowledge relevant to a particular field of learning or occupation. They also recognise the capacity to apply knowledge and skill in developing strategic solutions to well-defined abstract and concrete problems. Learning skills provide a basis for autonomous learning and the qualifications draw on experience of operational interaction in work or study including management of people and projects. 6 Qualifications at level 6 recognise detailed theoretical and practical knowledge, skill and competence associated with a field of learning or work, some of which is at the forefront of the field. These qualifications also recognise the application of knowledge in devising and sustaining arguments, in solving problems and in making judgements that take into account social or ethical issues. Qualifications at this level include outcomes appropriate for a professional approach to operating in a complex environment. 7 Qualifications at level 7 recognise self-directed, theoretical and practical learning, some of which is at the forefront of knowledge in a specialised field that provides a basis for originality in developing and/or applying ideas, often within a research context. These qualifications also recognise an ability to integrate knowledge and formulate judgements taking account of social and ethical issues and responsibilities and also reflect experience of managing change in a complex environment. 8 Qualifications at level 8 recognise systematic mastery of a highly specialised field of knowledge and a capacity for critical analysis, evaluation and synthesis of new and complex ideas. They also recognise an ability to conceive, design, implement and adapt substantial research processes. The qualifications also recognise leadership experience in the development of new and creative approaches that extend or redefine existing knowledge or professional practice. Figure 5 overleaf shows an unofficial comparison of levels across a broader set of Frameworks (drawn from the work of CEDEFOP/BIAT (2004)). 85

86 O C C U P A T I O N A L C O M P E T E N C E SFIA Levels German Advanced IT Training System/ "APO- IT" Levels Professional Qualification "groupings" (new EU Directive*) ISCO Levels (ISCO-88 COM) Life-long Learning Proposed Vocational Education and Training Reference Levels (Proposals for EQF - see Figure 3 for descriptors) EDUCATION ISCED Levels (Education Systems) (no level identified) (Legislators; Senior Officials and Managers) 8 7 (? - Some Doctorates?) 7:"set strategy, inspire, mobilise" Autonomy: Influence: Complexity: Business Skills: 6: "initiate, influence" Autonomy: Influence: Complexity: Business Skills: 5: "ensure, advise" Autonomy: Influence: Complexity: Business Skills: 4: "enable" Autonomy: Influence: Complexity: Business Skills: 3: "apply" Autonomy: Influence: Complexity: Business Skills: 2: "assist" Autonomy: Influence: Complexity: Business Skills: 1: "follow" Autonomy: Influence: Complexity: Business Skills: "Strategic Professionals"? "Operative Professionals"? C: "Specialists"? D: (d) a diploma certifying successful completion of training at post-secondary level of at least three and not more than four years' duration, or of an equivalent duration on a part-time basis, at a university (or..equivalent..) as well as the professional training which may be required in addition to that postsecondary course; (da) a diploma certifying that the holder has successfully completed a post-secondary course of at keast four years' duration, or of an equivalent duration on a part-time basis, at a university or.. equivalent.. and, where appropriate, that he has successfully completed the professional training required in addition to the post secondary course a diploma certifying successful completion of: (i) either training at post-secondary level..of a duration of at least one year following successful completion of..(relevant) secondary course; (ii) or, in the case of a regulated profession, training with a special structure which provides a comparable professional standard... B: a certificate attesting to a successful completion of a secondary course: (i) either general in character, supplemented by a course of study or professional training and/or by the probationary or professional practice required, (ii) or technical or professional in character, supplemented where appropriate by study or professional training and/or the..(relevant).. probationary or professional practice. A: an attestation of competence issued by a competent authority in the home M.S. designated pursuant to legislative, regulatory or administrative provisions of that M.S. on the basis of (i) either a training course not...(part of the above).. or a specific examintaion without prior training, or f-t pursuit of the professions in a M.S. for 3 consecutive years (or p-t equiv. over 10 years), (ii) or general primary or secondary education * based on Texts adopted at European Parliament sitting, 11 May '05 Fourth Skill Level (professionals) Third Skill Level? (Associate Professionals & Technicians) Second Skill Level? (Service Workers and Shop & Market Sales Workers; Skilled Agricultural and Fishery Workers; Craft and related Workers; Plant and Machine Operators and Assemblers) First Skill Level (Elementary Occupations) (Second Stage of Tertiary Education - Leading to an advanced research qualification) 5 (First Stage of Tertiary Education) 4 (Post Secondary Non-Tertiary Education - normally "left without content") 3 (Upper Secondary Education) 2 (Lower Secondary or Second Stage of Basic Education) 1 (Primary - First Stage of Basic Education) 86

87 Annex E Level Descriptors for ICT Practitioner Competence Recommendations for Level-Descriptors and Descriptor Categories for ICT Practitioner Competence The rationale for deriving level descriptors and descriptor categories is laid out in Section 3.3. This annex explains the process resulting in the recommended categories for level descriptors and their actual definitions. One of the key virtues of focusing on knowledge, skills and competences, is that these relate to learning outcomes or outputs, irrespective of the routes of acquisition involved. (CEDEFOP - Winterton et al. (2005)) These recommendations draw on: Generic descriptors for levels of the EQF (Consultation Document) Level descriptors of the Irish NFQ Level descriptors for qualifications in Germany Dublin Descriptors (agreed for the European Higher Education Area). They take into account the structure for general level description categories from the SFIA CIGREF, and AITTS competence models. For the purpose of clarity, it is important to differentiate between descriptive terms for qualification and those for competence. This differentiation is crucial for the understanding of the recommended grid for level descriptors. General Rationale: The rationale is to build upon (not implement) the common reference points specified for the proposed EQF and add specificity for the ICT sector (ICT Practitioner work) where possible: in terms of ICT Practitioner Competences by taking into account the specific situation that arises from referring to a context of professional qualifications. Criteria and expressions are to be added to highlight this context. Level descriptors must provide structure that enables evaluation and description of knowledge, skills, and competences as they are met in the real life of the ICT industry. Due to the practical orientation towards the ICT sector, level descriptors in the context of the European Meta-Framework must focus on the description of competences (cognitive, functional, personal), which involves the application of knowledge and skills. It is in this sense that the following level descriptors relate to the sector and ICT occupations and not to educational perspectives: Qualification here means being qualified to do the job. Qualification in the context of this annex means proficiency. So in order to avoid misunderstanding the term proficiency is therefore used instead of qualification. The levels of the M-F are to describe reference points for performance expectations within ICT Practitioner work. Consequentially, the description of levels is based on the specification 87

88 of competence expectations in equivalence to learning outcomes for qualification metaframeworks. (See 3.3 Relating Qualification and Competence.) At this stage, the descriptions are generic due to being related to the entire ICT field. They have been as much as possible adapted from the general context to reflect the specificities of the ICT industry and ICT Practitioner work. Any further specialisation requires a clustering of the ICT sector and subsequent reference to the resulting profile model. This could, at the present point, not be undertaken as no shared understanding about clusters of activity in the ICT was obtained (and it is not possible to track all employer developments). Level descriptors specialised to clusters would then obey the generic structure laid out here but gain technical and process-/ subject-related focus. The recommendations for descriptor categories serve as a guideline: Each specific implementation is free to add further sub-categories if considered necessary. If reasonable, not all of the derived categories need to be specified by a given framework in an implementation of these level descriptors. It is, however, important that the general structure Cognitive Functional Personal Competences is respected: first and foremost in order to enable and improve comparability in the assessment of proficiency levels and to keep a consistent interface to the EQF and so to issues of recognition and Lifelong Learning. Purpose of Level Descriptors One purpose concerns each framework as such: The level descriptors introduced here help to provide reasonable and practical criteria to assess, differentiate and identify levels of competence within the ICT sector. Another purpose concerns inter alia the relations of frameworks of competence: The use of the categories suggested here in alignment with the structure given by the EQF will facilitate convergence and make clearer definitions of performance expectations for progressive levels between different frameworks and also between the ICT Skills Meta-Framework and the EQF or other qualification frameworks. Adopted Typology The use of cognitive, functional and personal competence in relation to Knowledge, Skills, and wider Competences is adopted as a KSC approach responding to a wide consensus in European and international debates about qualifications. Most importantly, in conjunction with the focus on outcomes, it is crucial in enabling the alignment of frameworks of qualification and those of competences. This is now well established in the discussion and contexts relating to the Bologna and Copenhagen Processes and the level descriptors for the EQF as well. This CWA acknowledges that there is no one correct understanding of competence. In their comprehensive study on typologies of Knowledge, Skills, and wider Competences, Winterton et al. suggest the unified typology shown in Table 8. 88

89 Table 8 - Dimensions of Competences conceptual operational occupational Cognitive Competence (knowledge, comprehension) Functional Competence (skills, know how) personal Meta-Competence (learning, reflecting, facilitating ) Social Competence (behaviour, attitude) Deliberations in this CWA were made based on this typology. Differentiation from EQF Level Descriptors The descriptors shown in this annex have been designed to adopt the EQF level descriptors and to translate them into terms of competence. The objective is to ensure that levels aligned to the EQF are used as a common reference, with the generic nature of the EQF specification interpreted into the ICT Practitioner context. Furthermore, criteria have been introduced in order to foster the description of proficiency in the real life contexts of professional qualifications and to ultimately support instruments for the recognition of professional qualifications. In order to make the transition from a framework for qualifications (EQF) to a framework of competence visible, descriptor categories assume different wordings and address a different perspective on structurally-congruent issues. Table 9 - Structural relationship between EQF and M-F EQF Focus: Learning outcomes Structure: Knowledge Skills (and know-how) Wider Competences ICT Skills M-F Focus: Performance expectations that correspond to the application of learning outcomes (formal, non-formal, informal) Structure: Cognitive competence Functional competence Social (incl. ethical) and meta competence So while, e.g., a framework for qualifications uses the categories of breadth and kind to describe levels of knowledge, the M-F is concerned with understanding and the application of knowledge. As has been argued in Section 0 Relating Qualification and Competence, the term qualification carries different connotations in the context of professional and academic learning. In the former, qualification must be seen outcome-based, in the latter it can and often would be viewed in this way for applied ( vocational ) disciplines, like engineering, medicine, etc.) The understanding of qualification has been stretched sufficiently in the course of recent educational system reforms in Europe that the need for a differentiation between a 89

90 competence framework and a qualification framework may seem at first sight questionable. It is important to note, however, that there are still traditional qualification systems in place which are input-based and/or address (only) the provision of knowledge (sometimes for its own sake). The modern understanding of qualification in the context of this document and the EQF must take this into account. The key distinction between [outcome-based approaches like] the EQF and traditional qualification systems is that the EQF is designed independently of any training or education provision. (Young, 2005) Qualification based in terms of standards, levels, and outcomes shows a radically new understanding that can powerfully and more sustainably address the needs of the labour market. The usefulness of this understanding is acknowledged by this CWA and in the Meta- Framework built on it. The value of both work-based and educational institution-based learning is respected. Instead of assuming general equivalence of competence and qualification a priori, the relationship between competence and the provision of qualification has to be established. The ICT Skills/Competence Meta-Framework s scope is where competence expectations and learning outcomes meet. There will, however, always be a supply-side and a demand-side perspective on qualification and each retains its meaning and importance for the other. Synopsis of Terms for Main Categories: Several shades of meaning of the term competence are possible. The concepts used here are the terms and definitions from the CEDEFOP-commissioned study (CEDEFOP, 2005) on a typology of KSC (Winterton et al.) Competence is taken in the broad sense and comprises knowledge, skills and wider competences: it is not seen as a complementary category to knowledge and skills but understood to describe the practical application of knowledge and skills constituted by cognitive, functional, personal (meta and social) competence. Competence describes effective interaction of an individual with the environment (defined by White, quoted in Winterton et al.) Following Winterton et al., competence here relates to the individual, rolespecific and collective conditions underlying successful performance in institutions and social groups. Action competence includes all the cognitive, motivational and social prerequisites for successful learning and application and has been used to analyse the conditions for success in meeting task goals. Models typically include: - General problem-solving competence - Critical thinking skills - Domain-general and domain-specific knowledge - Realistic, positive self confidence - Social competences. I) Knowledge The knowledge category contains both declarative knowledge and comprehension and constitutes cognitive competence. It may make reference to subject categories and can relate to the outcomes of education and training. Very importantly, knowledge includes tacit experienced based knowledge. Knowledge is actually the result of an interaction between intelligence (capacity to learn) and situation (opportunity to learn), so is more sociallyconstructed than intelligence. Knowledge includes underpinning theory and concepts, as well as tacit knowledge gained as a result of the experience of performing certain tasks. Understanding refers to more holistic knowledge of processes and contexts, and may be distinguished as know-why, as opposed know-that. (Winterton et al. - CEDEFOP, 2005) 90

91 II) III) Skills Skills encompasses occupational skills and know-how (procedural knowledge). Skills and know-how are oriented towards the workplace activity and constitute functional competence. More generally, skills comprise manual and cognitive dimensions. Skills may be acquired through practice without training. Usually, the term skill is used to refer to a level of performance, in the sense of accuracy and speed in performing particular tasks ( skilled performance ). (Winterton et al.) Wider Competences These stand beside the Knowledge and Skills categories and inform the individual s degree of competence. They describe attitudes and behaviour of a person his/her personal, social, and meta competence. Professional Competence involves technical and methodological competence based on declarative and procedural knowledge that enables the person to solve problems and/or complete work assignments. Because of the importance of learning, the ability to learn is included here, too. Table 10 gives an overview of categories used by major frameworks or descriptors for qualification. Sub-categories of the respective frameworks or initiatives were placed in relation to the EQF based on understanding of their meaning and intention as described in the respective synopsises provided by the stakeholders of each framework/initiative. 91

92 EQF Category Knowledge Savoir Skills Savoir faire Wider Competence iii) Savoir être Table 10 - Overview of subcategories and their relation to KSC typology of the EQF Elaboration IQF Dublin German SFIA AIRBUS Sub-Categories Descriptors Descriptors derived Declarative and Breadth Knowledge Knowledge Knowledge Breadth Tacit (experience Kind and Kind based) Understanding Comprehension Comprehension Technical Range Applying Business Experience Range Selectivity Knowledge & Skills Selectivity Understanding Procedural Knowledge Making Analytical Ability Analysis / Judgements Evaluation Evaluation Know How Synthesis Synthesis Decision Taking i) Autonomy / Independence Autonomy Autonomy Autonomy Responsibility Responsibility Influence Responsibility Context Thinking in Complexity Context Processes Insight Ethical Insight, Insight/Reflection Reflection of Practice ii) Learning Learning to Learning Planning, Organising Learning to learn Competence Learn of Learning (planning / organising ) iii) Communication Communication Communication Communication Presentation and Social Role Co-operation / Competence Role iv) Professional / Vocational Competence Applying Knowledge & Understanding Problem Solving Application Business Skills Experience Transfer of Knowledge Problem Solving Transfer of Knowledge 92

93 Level Descriptors for ICT Practitioner Competence It is asserted that the span of descriptive categories derived on the basis of Table 10 is sufficiently comprehensive to build a grid of competence level descriptors for the European Meta-Framework. These sub-categories in Table 10 are not yet final for the M-F but constitute the basis from which the M-F s sub-categories (as shown in Table 11) are derived in order to make the transition from qualification level descriptors to competence level descriptors. The transition is based on the following considerations: Knowledge Cognitive Competence o Declarative and tacit knowledge (breadth, kind) Application of knowledge o Understanding Comprehension Skills Functional Competence o Range and Selectivity Ability to select from a certain range of skills (and tools, methods, procedures ) o Decision Taking based on: Analysis Evaluation Synthesis Wider Competences Personal Competences o Autonomy/Responsibility Autonomy Responsibility Context (Ability to operate within context) o Learning Competence Learning to learn o Social Competence Communication Cooperation (including Role) o Professional Competence 93

94 Problem Solving Training (and briefing) others (Transfer of Knowledge) While a general understanding of what cognitive, functional, and personal competences mean at each level can probably be achieved without this number of descriptive sub-categories, these subcategories provide additional criteria that are helpful (and probably in some cases indispensable) for successful and consistent ascribing of levels of competence to work activities. These subcategories therefore provide valuable additional information for the use and application of the descriptors in professional practice within the ICT industry. The authors of this CWA are aware that the precise wording necessary effectively to discriminate between consecutive levels of competence is of paramount importance and expressly invite feedback from technical experts to iteratively improve these level descriptions. Table 11 has been adopted by the Workshop as a starting point for this process. 94

95 Meta FW Category Cognitive Competence Functional Competence Refers to Declarative and Tacit Knowledge Understanding Technical Skills Methodological Skills (Decision Taking) Sub- Category Application of knowledge Comprehension Selection Analysis Table 11 - Level Descriptors for ICT Practitioner Competence Level 3 Level 4 Level 5 Level 6 Level 7 Apply a broad range of factual and basic ICT knowledge and to correctly use ICT terminology to describe problems or solutions Basic understanding in reference to practical contexts Select and apply known procedures, tools, methods and concepts from a limited, field-specific set of options (involves interpretation of situation) Able to interpret situation and to perform guided analysis based on given classifications or principles Apply field-specific practical and theoretical knowledge and ICT terminology within a broad area of ICT Showing awareness when applying concepts, knowledge and terminology in practical contexts Develop methodical approaches to tasks by using broad and specialised skills and tools and by applying specialist knowledge and expert sources of information Able to analyse selected information and gather required information Combine practical knowledge, theoretical concepts and abstract thinking based on significant underpinning theory within a variety of ICT areas and specialised within a field of ICT Recognising innovation in the field of ICT and limits of one s own knowledge base Develop methodical and creative responses to well-defined concrete and abstract problems based on a comprehensive range of standard methods and specialised methods and tools Able to analyse wide range of situations / problems by applying general ICT theory Able to identify missing information and methods to access this information Combine detailed knowledge from more than one specialised area of ICT and utilize theoretical concepts and abstract thinking some of it at the current boundaries of ICT technologies or processes Understanding of theory, concepts and methods some of it at its limits Demonstrate mastery of standard methods and tools and ability to apply complex and specialised advanced skills; Utilize fundamental techniques for enquiry and show innovative use of methods and appropriate judgement Able to autonomously analyse abstract or unfamiliar situations based on broad spectrum of methods; Able to analyse contradictory data and to perform guided research Synthesize detailed theoretical and practical knowledge from various and highly specialised fields of ICT; Show critical awareness of knowledge issues at the forefront in the field and at the interface between different fields Systematic and critical understanding of body of knowledge and its limits Develop new skills at high level including novel and emerging knowledge and techniques using specialised techniques of enquiry and research; Creatively select from complex and advanced set of skills Able to create a research-based diagnosis to problems even with incomplete, conflicting or limited information; Appropriate and context-dependent selection of instruments and tools for analysis 95

96 Personal Competence Autonomy / Responsibility Evaluation Synthesis Autonomy Responsibility Context (Ability to operate in ) Insight Reflection Evaluate reliability of data Collect information and categorize terms Demonstrate some independence in job role and act under direction For completion of tasks; Stable, defined contexts with some changing factors; Thinking in structures and terms Insight in technical and to some extend personal strengths and weaknesses Evaluate outcomes of used approach and the methods used Apply information and technical categories to given contexts Demonstrate some initiative in role and make suggestions for improvement to outcomes; Organize work within established guidelines Some responsibility for training of others; Supervise welldefined/routine work Predictable contexts with many changing factors some interrelated; Thinking in structures and terms Reflect own strengths and weaknesses; Recognize ethical dimension in work place Evaluate relevance and validity of information; Select appropriate evaluation methods; Rearrange and prioritize ideas and information to meet objectives Work mainly independently; Manage small projects; Show creativity in developing projects Manage people and review performance of self and others Defined contexts with occasional unpredictable behaviour caused by high interrelation of factors; Thinking in processes Reflect own beliefs and values; Reflect engagement with others; Reflect general social and ethical issues Evaluate outcomes and approaches critically and give recommendations based on reliability and validity tests; Evaluate reasons for conflicting data; Contextualise concepts of ICT and abstract information to given practical situations and develop innovative solutions Demonstrate responsibility for planning and organising of administration, resources and personnel; Show initiative in developing projects and managing processes within general guidelines Supervision of teams and processes Unpredictable, complex contexts with many interacting factors Thinking in networks Recognize role of own beliefs and values in the light of workrelated social or ethical issues; Recognize own responsibility and ethical values of profession Evaluate, present and assess existing or potential approaches; Review own or other s work confidently and systematically Combine and process knowledge, methods, tools from interdisciplinary fields; Development of answers/ approaches beyond current limits of knowledge or procedures Demonstrate leadership, innovation and autonomy in unfamiliar, complex and unpredictable professional contexts Review strategic performance of teams; Review and design technical or business processes New, unfamiliar, unpredictable and complex contexts often within large environments Thinking in problems Reflect habitually own role as peer and/or leader; Awareness of ethical dilemmas in research or ICT business contexts 96

97 Learning Competence Social Competence Professional/ Vocational Competence Learning to learn (planning / organising ) Communication Cooperation Problem Solving Training of others Take responsibility for own learning by accessing and using learning resources. Respond to and produce detailed electronic & oral communication; Report and present data and procedures; Take responsibility for self understanding and behaviour Works cooperatively within familiar, homogeneous groups Solve well-described problems using wellknown information sources taking account of some social issues; Able to assess complexity of problem; Apply possible solutions effectively Passing on own acquired factual, contextualized knowledge and skills (procedures) Demonstrate selfdirection in learning Respond to and produce clear and detailed electronic & oral communication in unfamiliar situations; Present options and alternatives and communicate possible rationales Joins and operates within multiple and heterogeneous groups Solve problems by integrating information from expert sources taking account of social and ethical issues; Formulate response to concrete problems Demonstrate transfer of practical and theoretical knowledge to others and when creating solutions to problems Evaluate own learning and identify learning needs necessary to undertake further learning Convey ideas in a wellstructured and coherent way to peers, supervisors and clients using qualitative and quantitative information; Choose from a variety of presentation styles and techniques; Adapt forms of expression to audience; Express comprehensive internalised personal world view Can actively build work relations within heterogeneous groups Recognize core elements of a problem and potential solutions; Formulate response to abstract and concrete problems; Train others; Develop team performance Consistently evaluate own learning and identify learning needs; Organize own learning efforts under guidance; Communicate ideas, problems and solutions effectively to specialist and non-specialist audiences using a range of techniques involving qualitative and quantitative information; Manifest solidarity with others and manage conflict at the work place Recognize, define and describe complex problems; Devise and sustain arguments for problem solving; Initiate trainings of others and for the development of team performance High level of understanding of learning processes; Direct autonomously self-learning; Use and organize professional support for learning process Moderate meetings and communications effectively; Communicate project outcomes, methods and underpinning rationale to specialist and non-specialist audiences choosing and using appropriate techniques; Ability to facilitate and to resolve conflicts Work with and within groups towards agreed goals; Assume functions as leader or mentor Review and develop strategies for solving of problems that involve many interacting factors and different levels; Solve problems by integrating complex sometimes incomplete knowledge sources; Adapt to unusual or unexpected situations Organize learning for individuals and in organisation 97

98 Annex F A possible Structuring and Allocation of ICT Qualifications in line with the EQF A possible Structuring and Allocation of ICT Qualifications in line with the EQF This CWA emphasizes the fundamental distinction between skills/competence frameworks and qualification frameworks, since, given their separate roles as demand and supply specifications, respectively, the detailed relationship between them is played out within the relevant labour market. However, the approach of the proposed European Qualifications Framework, whose reference level specification is based essentially on Competence (Knowledge, Skills and wider Competences), should facilitate opportunities for developing the ICT Sector s response 28 to the proposed EQF, providing a very important opportunity for greater structure to be brought to the ICT Practitioner labour market. The table overleaf is intended to stimulate the process of developing that structure, by proposing a broad grouping of existing ICT Qualification types, based on the degree to which assessment is focused mainly on: (almost entirely) Knowledge, Knowledge and Skills, or Full Workplace Competence directly assessed (covering all aspects of the proposed EQF s core concepts). In addition, the table draws on the proposed EQF s reference levels (1-8). The main classes of well-known ICT Qualifications have been positioned, on a first-cut basis, within the relevant areas of the 2-dimensional matrix, as an illustration of what could be done at the European level. As clearly emphasized in the heading, it is recognized that the allocations that have been made to particular cells in the matrix are in no way officially authorized by the Qualification owners, and it is expected that a number will probably have to be corrected in that sense. However, this table helps: confirm certain key characteristics of ICT Qualifications; confirm that the EQF s K, S, C variables can be extremely useful in helping to structure qualifications for the benefit of clarification in the market-place; and further clarify the relationship between Competence Frameworks and Qualification Frameworks 28 strictly, as throughout this CWA, ICT Sector should be viewed as the market for ICT Practitioner skills across both supply and user sectors 98

99 (It is interesting to note that there may be certain ICT qualifications that fall below the EQF Level 3 that has been initially assumed to represent the lowest competence level at which ICT Practitioners operate. In principle, these could clearly be viewed as kinds of entry level qualifications.) 99

100 Definition: A POSSIBLE STRUCTURING OF ICT QUALIFICATIONS, IN LINE WITH THE EQF N.B. THESE QUALIFICATION POSITIONINGS ARE SIMPLY FIRST CUT GUESSES (ONLY FOR ILLUSTRATION OF THE PRINCIPLES) THEY WILL NEED CORRECTING!!!!! Competence-based Qualifications Skill + Knowledge Qualifications Knowledge-based Qualifications Qualifications involving direct assessment against statements of occupational competence (specified by employers) Qualifications assessing knowledge and skills of occupational areas, but not fully competence-based (no workplace competence evidence required) Qualifications assessed in, and awarded from, the formal Education System: largely Knowledge-based EQF Level Examples of Competence-based Qualifications in ICT Examples of Skill + Knowledge-based Qualifications in ICT Examples of Knowledge-based Qualifications in ICT Level 8 Level 7 Level 6 Level 5 Level 4 Level 3 Level 2? (National Vocational Qualifications for ICT professionals e.g. for CIOs in UK)??AITTS Strategic Professionals?(National Vocational Qualifications for ICT professionals (e.g. for ICT Operations Manager in UK); BCS Professional Qualifications??AITTS Operative Professionals?(National Vocational Qualifications for ICT professionals) (UK)??some AITTS Specialists?(National Vocational Qualifications for ICT professionals) (UK)??Some AITTS Specialists ; Some IT Occupations (Germany)? NVQ for Comms. Professionals (UK)? Some IT Occupations (Germany)? NVQ for IT Professionals (UK)?? NVQ for IT Practitioners (UK)???one or two Specialist Industry certifications? Some EXIN/ISEB (Managers)?Some higher-level Industry Certifications; Some EXIN/ISEB/EUCIP Electives??Some Industry Certifications (e.g. Novell, Cisco); some EXIN/ISEB/EUCIP;??Some Industry Certifications (e.g. Novell, Cisco, some MCSE); some EXIN/ISEB/EUCIP Foundation; some traditional Vocational qualifications??some Industry Certifications (e.g. Novell, Cisco, some MCSE); EUCIP Foundation; traditional Vocational qualifications??low-end Industry Certifications (e.g. A+); traditional Vocational qualifications?phd in an ICT field (Bologna 3 rd Cycle)??Master s Degree in an ICT field? (Bologna 2 nd cycle)?first ( Bachelors ) Degree in an ICT subject (Bologna 1 st Cycle)??Tertiary Education initial qualification (e.g. UK Foundation Degree )??(Secondary-Tertiary borderline educational ICT qualifications)??(secondary education completion ICT qualifications? e.g. UK A Level in ICT)??( mid-way Secondary education ICT qualifications e.g. UK GCSE in ICT)? Level 1 ( ) ( ) ( ) 100

101 Annex G Principles of the ecco Approach to analysing ICT frameworks Principles of the e-competences and Certifications Observatory (ecco) The guiding principles behind ecco are that: - knowledge and competences are expected to be the basis for consensus-building on profiles and frameworks; - the specification of small units of knowledge and competence can be the way to make job profiles flexible, in handling market changes and context; - job profiles are sets of competences identified coherently by both a reference ICT process (e.g. an ICT system development life-cycle) and company requirements; - the maintaining of competence sets may be up to companies, together with social partners, as job profiles must be renewed continuously; - assessment and certification may address competences. The principal idea is that job profiles are composed of competences, competences are composed of knowledge (put into action), and knowledge covers sets of know-how, know-what, and knowwhy. The proposed approach makes use of the idea of shape decomposition: It divides complex shapes into simple elementary units, i.e. primitives, M. R. Quillian, Semantic memory in M. Minsky, Semantic information processing, MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 1968, The ecco model is based on the concept of Knowledge Object. In particular, we define Knowledge Objects (KOs) as the smallest internally-consistent sets of knowledge and as indicated - knowledge is equivalent to sets of know-why, know-what and know-how. It is not, in fact, possible to define a priori a correct granularity of KOs. In fact, the granularity can change each time in accordance with at least two factors: use and profile. For example, if we take into account handling (manipulating) numbers, when we are considering the profile of pupils in their first year of primary school, we can assume as a KO the set of numbers between one to twenty with addition and subtraction. At secondary school KOs may be the sets of natural number, rational number, integral, etc. KOs are the building blocks of competences. The same KO may appear in more than one of the competences within a profile specification. A single KO can produce a basic competence: to be able TO DO SOMETHING (α) in a specific CONTEXT (z). Here, α is a KO, and z is a mandatory requirement (an attribute) of α. In fact, knowledge (of both hard and soft kinds) can be transformed into skills and competences based on specific deep construction rules. Such rules are both contextual and psychological. Individual psychological construction rules are related to contextual understanding, soft as well as hard understanding, J. Searle, Intentionality, an Essay in the Philosophy of Mind, Cambridge University Press, Specifications of both skills and competences are not skills and competences themselves. The latter are the products of learning cognitive rules applied to KOs and contexts. So, the ecco information system does not represent those meta-skills and cognitive rules - rather it only describes competences in terms of their visible outcomes. 101

102 The bottom-up analysis is focused on the following items: e_skills area Components e_skills area Objects Elements (descriptors) Values ICT related Job profiles Knowledge Competences Standard profiles Name The specific Description reference value Person involved (professional, user) for each Proficiency Level descriptor Type: ( hard, soft ) Know-how, know-what, know-why (reference discipline) Action verb Contexts (place, business process, period of time) Reference qualification (*) Reference Institutions (*) Learning contents (*) 102