Hasse Karlsson, ITM Worldwide Foundation was invited as an expert on SMEs and trade training to the Restructuring Forum - "New Skills for New Jobs" in Brussels December 7-8, 2009.
What jobs will be available in about 10 years? Is the training provided now useful to find a job tomorrow? Are skills needs and jobs changing all over the EU?
Adapting to change and ensuring the correct matching between labor market and supply is crucial if EU countries want to remain productive and competitive. The rapid change implies that EU countries have to become pro-active and be able to anticipate in order to be better prepared for future challenges.
SMEs was very much in focus and one of the main drivers of change is globalization and the opportunities that are to be find in emerging markets. New skills and competences asked for is entrepreneurship, innovativeness, ICT and E-skills, intercultural management, international value chain management and green management according to EU.
EU recommendations on education and training:
- modernize vocational education
- flexibility
- increase use of mentoring programmes
- new training programmes for SMEs
- online and digitalised learning tools
"We believe that ITM Worldwide Foundation together with Center for Advanced Learning Technologies at INSEAD and Jönköping International Business School can play a vital part in developing new skills for SMEs going international".