Skill surveys for current and future
challenges: the impact for adult learning
policies
Aviana Bulgarelli
Gabriella Di Francesco
EMSAAL – Initiative
September 12–14 2012
International Training Centre of the ILO (ITC-ILO)
Turin, Italy
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ISFOL: A BRIEF INTRODUCTION
 ISFOL is a
public research institute; It reports to the Italian
Ministry of Labour and Social Policies.
 ISFOL works with all stakeholders: other Ministries, Regions,
Social partners, research Institute at national and international
level, European Commission, OECD.
 Since 1973, ISFOL has been playing an institutional role in the
field of vocational training, adult learning, skill assessment, Labour
Market, skills anticipation, forecasting.
 ISFOL also acts as in-house agency for the Ministry with respect
to relevant National Operational Programmes co-funded by the
European Social Funds.
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ISFOL: Areas of interventions
1.Anticipation of skill needs
•ISFOL supports the labour
market reform introduced by the
so-called Fornero Law 92/2012
• ISFOL has developed an
information system on
“Occupations, employment and
skills” :
–The national system for
permanent vocational needs
analysis
–The classification of
occupational units
NUP/ISCO) with ISTAT
–The short term forecast in
cooperation with other
survey (Excelsior ) lead by
Unioncamere (skills gap)
•http://professionioccupazione.it
2.Labour market
information and adult skill
surveys
•PIAAC
•(International Assessment of
Adult Competences)
•OLC Project
•(Organisations, learning and
Competences)
•www.isfol.it/piaac
3.Qualification systems
•ISFOL supports National
Ministries in implementing
educational and labour market
reforms
•ISFOL is the National point to
implement the European
strategy for transparency and
mobility of qualifications and
competences.
•(EQF,ECVET;Europass;
Validation of Non formal)
•ISFOL is contributing to the
building of a National
Certification system for LLL
within the new labour market
reform (Law 92/2012 )
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2. Labour market information and adult skill
surveys
Within ISFOL several research activities have been developed in the
last few years concerning adult skills studies:
Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies
(PIAAC)
Organization, Learning, Competencies (OLC) Project
INDACO-Enterprises, complementary to Eurostat’s CVTS (Continuing
Vocational Training Survey) and INDACO-Workers, complementary to
Eurostat’s Adult Education Survey (AES)
Monitoring and Technical Assistance to active ageing policies and CVT
will focus our attention on the “OLC” project and the “PIAAC”
(Italian pilot).
 We
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OLC Project:
a Model to analyse the relation between
the Organization, Learning and Competences
•OLC is a multi-disciplinary project established in March 2003.
•Two surveys: the “Employees Perspective Survey” (3605 interviews) and the
“Employers Perspective Survey” (1820 interviews) (within manufacturing and service
sectors)
Main questions:
-Which new policies are really needed in support of SMEs employees in tech sectors?
(Italian Enterprises System is composed of 90% SMEs 1-10 workers)
- How relevant are the acquired qualifications for the workplace?
- Which relation between the development of competences and work organization?
The project adopts the JRA approach and it assumes that measures of skills used at jobs are a
reasonable proxy for the skills of the job-holder
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OLC some evidence
HPWO and medium key competences index
Practices adopted
Overall skill index (%)
Manufacturing sector
Service sector
None
11.6
13.7
Only one 1 practice
18.6
20.7
No more than 3 practices
16.5
19.2
All 5 practices
28.9
25.7
HPWO and percentages of employees involved
Practices adopted
Percentage of employees
involved in Italy (%)
None
18
1 practice
82
3 practices
71
All 5 practices
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THE OLC PROJECT
Main findings for policies
The levels of key competences seem to increase proportionally with:
─ the increasing of work seniority (from 18.3% to 23.4%);
─ the length of the training time (from 16.7% to 28.1%).
─ Informal learning processes play a key role in all kind of firms (73%).
 The Organizations that adopt a range of practices – e.g. job rotation, quality circles, reengineering,
self managed teams, peer performance review, employee involvement, pay for skill, profit sharing, total
quality management,……
…….seem to hold higher levels of skills than the other organizations, showing a strong relationship
between their characteristics and the skills development (“High Performance Work Organisations –
HPWOs”).
But a very few number of Italian firms can be defined as HPWOs: only 1.9%.
In 2012 an extended OLC survey with the Italian Department of Public Services is ongoing.
2000 interviews will be realized in 200 public services sector at national level aimed at
implementing adult learning paths and supporting new forms of organisations in the public
services.
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PIAAC –
Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies
(a new strategy)
In 2008 Italy joined the OECD international Programme for the
International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC), along with 24
other countries.
Internationally comparable information across 25 countries
Computer-based assessment
A direct assessment of foundation skills of the adult population (16-65 years
old) and an indirect assessment of skills used at work (JRA)
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PIAAC –
Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies
(a new strategy)
(Foundation) skills have become the global currency of 21st-century
economies
Impact competencies on social and economic outcomes at individual and
aggregate levels
It is increasing the policy attention to supply of and demand for skills within
the adult learning
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Main evidence from the pilot in Italy (caution for use)
Competencies and school-work transitions:
a delicate shift (1)
0,8
0,6
0,4
Standardized logit score
0,2
0
-0,2
-0,4
-0,6
-0,8
-1
-1,2
-1,4
15
20
25
30
35
40
45
50
55
60
65
Age
Source: Italian PIAAC Field Test data, 2010.
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Students and workers obtained
the best performances in the cognitive tests
10,0%
20,5%
21,7%
35,6%
35,3%
32,2%
Class C Logit
58,4%
31,8%
39,1%
40,9%
Class B Logit
38,8%
Class A Logit
57,8%
33,7%
47,7%
39,1%
23,4%
25,9%
7,9%
Full-time employed
(self-employed,
employee)
Part-time
employed (selfemployed,
employee)
Unemployed
Pupil, student
In retirement or Fulfilling domestic
early retirement or tasks or looking
given up business
after
children/family
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Fewer than one fifth of the respondents
are over-educated
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Low skills and education outcomes
Italy
Odds ratios
Seconda ry s chool
not compl eted
14,0
12,0
10,0
Ha s not
pa rtici pa ted i n
pos t-s econda ry
s chool i ng
8,0
6,0
4,0
2,0
0,0
Level 5
Level 4
Level 3
Level 2
Level 1
Ha s not
pa rtici pa ted i n
a dul t educa tion or
tra i ni ng i n the
l a s t 12 months
Skills levels
Source: Italian PIAAC Field Test data, 2010.
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Low skills and social disadvantages
Odds ratios
Unemployed
Italy
7,0
6,0
Recieved
unemployment,
disability or sickness
benefits in the last
year
Has fair to poor health
5,0
4,0
3,0
2,0
1,0
0,0
Level 5
Level 4
Level 3
Skills levels
Level 2
Level 1
Does not volunteer for
charity or non-profit
organizations
Source: Italian PIAAC Field Test data, 2010.
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Skills affect people’s lives and the well being of nations ,…..
……for these reason we need to better understand how skills are linked
to age, work, practices, training activities and learning opportunities.
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Lessons learned from our studies towards a new skills strategy for
adult learning (1)
 The need of new approaches of studies
 Shifts the focus from traditional proxies of skills, such as years of formal education
and training or qualifications attained, to a much broader perspective that includes
the skills people acquire, use and maintain–and also lose–over a whole lifetime.
 Workplaces provide a strong learning environment for both transversal and specific
skills (OLC Project)
 Unused skills tend to atrophy, while new skills are, to a large extent, developed
informally, often through work experience.
 People need both hard and soft skills and a range of skills that help them to
contribute to better social outcomes and build more cohesive and tolerant societies
(foundations skills).
 The importance of international comparability of the distribution of competencies
between countries and the need of a direct measure of skills as basis of effective
skills policy making (PIAAC )
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Lessons learned towards a new skills strategy for adult learning (2)
In Italy a new Labour Market reform (2012) based on lifelong learning
perspective has being implementing moving towards an integrated
skills strategy.
4 Ministries involved:
(Ministry of Labour and Social policies, Ministry of Education, Economy, and Development)

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

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The main stones of the reform for lifelong learning
Foster a whole institutional approach (national,regional, local) and different forms
of workplace learning (Apprenticeships, internship)
Remove barriers to investing in further learning (transparency, certification
system, validation of non formal learning)
Recognising learning outcomes:Transparent standards, embedded in a framework
of national qualifications, should be developed alongside reliable assessment
procedures
Provide new curricula base on transversal and foundations skills (from initial to
continuous and adult learning)
Flexible delivery of relevant programmes: It is essential to ensure that
programmes are relevant to users and are flexible enough, both in content and in
how they are delivered (part-time, flexible hours) to adapt to adults’ needs and
learning for their lives.
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THANKS FOR YOUR ATTENTION
Aviana Bulgarelli
Gabriella Di Francesco
www.isfol.it
www.isfol.it/piaac
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