Supporting continuing professional development of trainers in enterprises

The purpose of the study was to gain insight into the framework conditions for the competence development of this group of people in order to contribute to an improvement of corresponding support measures. According to the working definition of the study, the target group is characterised by the following features: (1) they are internal trainers, i.e. employed by the company; (2) they deliver internal training, i.e. training carried out by the company for its own workforce; (3) the training is aimed at adults and is part of continuing training. The purpose of the study was to gain insight into the framework conditions for the competence development of this group of people in order to contribute to an improvement of corresponding support measures. The research activities comprised a literature-based survey of existing practices in the 28 EU member states as well as a standardised company survey in eight EU member states and four sectors.

The project ran for a total of 14 months (October 2013 to December 2014). In the first project phase, up to spring 2014, a literature and document analysis covering all 28 EU member states was carried out to analyse current development trends and measures regarding the support and promotion of the competence development of in-company training staff. The analysis was structured around the focal points “regulation of in-company training in SMEs”, “qualification requirements for trainers”, “policy measures and support programmes” and “organisational factors and staff development”. The second phase consisted of a standardised survey of company managers and trainers in SMEs in eight countries (Belgium-Flanders, Bulgaria, Denmark, Germany, Lithuania, Poland, Portugal and Spain) and four sectors (automotive, construction, IT services, hotel and catering). By summer 2014, a total of 254 companies had been surveyed.

According to the results of the study, three main groups of in-company training staff can be distinguished: (1) managers/company heads with a training function (i.e. those who also, but not predominantly, engage in training as part of their work), (2) employees with a training function and finally (3) in-company trainers in the narrower sense. Members of this group perform in-company training as their main task and spend at least 30% of their working time on training activities. The most frequent in-company training task is the induction of new employees; the most important dimension of the competence of in-company trainers is professional or technical expertise. Their own competence development takes place primarily through informal learning, while formal qualifications or independent occupational profiles play only a subordinate role for in-company trainers.

Subcontractors:

HIVA – KU Leuven (Belgium)
ISSK-BAS (Bulgaria)
KUBIX (Denmark)
Vytautas Magnus University (Lithuania)
Jagiellonian University Extension (Poland)
SPI (Portugal)
University of Valencia (Spain)