Jöhet a life long skilling!

2024 is the Year of Skills in the European Union - began the presentation of Ákos Zsuffa, labour market skills expert and managing director of Learning Innovation Kft. "87% of companies see that there is or will be some kind of skills gap in their organisation. Meanwhile, only 40% of employees say that the company is developing their skills," added the president of the Association of Adult Educators and labour market skills expert.

Akos Zsuffa cited a Linkedin training report that said skills-based recruitment will reduce turnover by between 25-75 percent, make hiring costs 70 percent cheaper and cut hiring time by 50-70 percent. He cited the example of the US department store chain Walmart, which employs 2.2 million people and has moved to skill-based selection. They do not take qualifications or CVs into account, they only recruit on the basis of skills. In this spirit, they have rewritten all their jobs to be skills-based and are investing $1 billion in training.

The expert said that the perception of training among workers has also changed. Instead of the negative, "I don't like it but it's mandatory" attitude they used to have, they now welcome it, see it as a value and recommend companies that offer it to others. According to Linkedin research, more than a few people think of skills training courses as a straightforward benefit. Ákos Zsuffa sees a world of life-long skilling coming.

How does Bosch become a learning company?

"Over the past few years, Bosch has become a learning company," says László Ronyák, the company's regional organisational development expert, "a company that integrates learning into people's everyday lives. We see learning not as a destination but as a journey." According to László Ronyák, employees need to be taught how to learn, what tools are available to them and from what sources. But it is also essential to learn to prioritise and to create the time to learn.

László Ronyák said that there is a wealth of video content available at the company, from soft skill development to industry 4.0 to inspirational stories. He himself also recommends MOOCs (mass open online courses) that can be studied online at renowned universities around the world. He himself has completed a wellbeing course at Yale, storytelling at Sydney University, game theory at the University of Tokyo, and positive psychology at the University of Pennsylvania. She pointed out that when we think of learning and self-development, we should not only think of formal training and courses. One such innovative form is collaborative learning at Bosch. This means that someone within the company announces a problem and anyone from the workforce can join in - on a voluntary basis - to find a solution. But there is also a lot of experiential learning, for example by rotating jobs, replacing a manager, giving a presentation in English.

László Ronyák believes that it would be worthwhile to build on the impact mechanism of online video games. They are deliberately designed to start at an easier level, then gradually become more difficult, and learning and self-improvement are continuous throughout the game. And solving the quests is a happy experience. The player also gets positive feedback - for example, through scores. The five factors of problem solving are all present in the games: striving for novelty, seeking a challenge, thinking creatively, choosing the hard way and cooperating.

Collaboration.

Development programmes at Mol

"70 percent of knowledge comes from experiential learning. 20 percent from learning from others, for example mentoring or coaching. Only 10 percent from formal learning," noted Tamás Kothencz, MOL's training development partner, who presented the company's core development programmes. Future@Mol is the latest talent programme for experts. It develops generic skills based on the 7 Habits of High Performers methodology, developed in partnership with Franklin Covey. The other development programme is called "First Time Leaders", an 8-month course for first-time managers. Its "sister" is the "First Time Leaders" programme. This is for those who have moved up from the first level of management. The "Reskilling/upskilling" programme develops future-proofing skills, while the "Knowledge transfer" programme focuses on the transfer of knowledge to those who are about to retire.

Then Annamária Győrffy-Hegedűs gave an insight into MOL's central competence development programmes to the professional audience.

Practical tips for knowledge sharing

A number of good practices were highlighted during one of the roundtable discussions. Szabolcs Tomkó, Managing Director of Continental Automotive Hungary Kft. mentioned the bi-monthly management roundtable. They go through the "Leadership in critical times" toolkit, working through the advice given here with their own examples, what worked, what works differently, etc. At Continental, first-time managers receive extensive training. They go through every stage of the employee's time with the company, what to look out for, what tools are available to managers.

The first time managers are given a first-hand introduction to the company.

Noémi Csaposs, president of the National Association for Human Resources Management, said that it often takes cultural development to make continuous learning a matter of course in a company. The HR consultant said that the reality in Hungarian companies is that organisations are still training their managers on a campaign basis. But training is not always a question of money, there is a range of cost-effective tools for learning: internal mentoring, self-training, knowledge sharing. "A practical tip for knowledge sharing can be: if you send someone to a training session to share their knowledge with the team, you can also put the presentation on the shared drive."

Sabolcs Tomkó also talked about one of their successful projects in response to a question from Andrea Kökényesi-Nagy. Their workshop for electrical engineers is in its seventh year. Seventy percent of the trainees come from their own operators, who move on to other jobs after their training. Continental also uses the workshop to teach existing electrical technicians the latest technology. This is much cheaper than bringing in and training electrical technicians from third countries.

The company also uses Continental's own training centre to train existing technicians in the new technology.

In the opening picture, participants of the first block of the HRbreakfast from left to right: Szilvia Szabó (Budapest Metropolitan University), Ákos Zsuffa (Learning Innovation), Noémi Csaposs (OHE, Select), Andrea Kökényesi-Nagy (Parrish Crawler), Szabolcs Tomkó (Continental), Annamária Győrffy-Hegedűs (MOL), László Ronyák (Bosch), Tamás Kothencz (MOL).