Machinery/electronics sector needs a shift

Machinery/electronics sector needs a shift
from vocational training to lifelong learning, says ILO

Despite recently announced job cuts, employment growth
over the past 5 years has been substantial

Friday 20 September 2002
( ILO/02/43 )

GENEVA (ILO News) - Recent developments in the mechanical and electrical engineering (MEE) industries show the need for a shift from purely vocational education and training to lifelong learning, if the sector wants to remain a growth and employment engine, says an ILO report released here ahead of a five-day meeting of industry experts beginning on 23 September. ¹

Despite some 600,000 projected job cuts announced by March 2002, employment growth over the past five years has been substantial in the machinery/electronics sector. Between 1995 and 2001, employment increased in many companies by 100 to 500 per cent.

According to the report, China faces the greatest employment challenge of any of the countries studied. Industrial restructuring in the MEE industries already resulted in job cuts of about 40 per cent between 1997 and 1998 in China. While providing increased export opportunities, China's entry to the World Trade Organization (WTO) will also open its domestic markets to increased competition.

In Japan, changing employment practices may lead to greater labour market flexibility and result in workers changing jobs more frequently than in the past and acquiring new skills along the way.

The report provides examples of what companies are currently doing to target precisely the learning needs of their employees. Many large corporations have in-house universities or learning centres, often combined with distance learning. Some universities are reaching out to enterprises to respond to demand-driven training. As teaching and learning are best done as close to the workplace as possible, a number of universities and colleges send staff to the shop floor to conduct tailor-made courses.

High performance or alternative work practices are becoming more common. Well-known innovations include such work methods as 360-degree appraisal ² and personal development plans. These practices can be combined with traditional ones like job rotation, performance-related pay and self-directed work teams to create a work environment which not only develops the personality of the employee, but also raises the productivity of the firm.

While computer chips are doubling their capacity every 18 months due to technological innovations, knowledge is often becoming obsolete even faster. The learning curve is accelerating rapidly. Whereas professional engineers talk of certification limited to five years, some companies offer online certification valid for two years, or subject to quarterly updating.

According to the report, many recent initiatives were the result of collective bargaining. Increasingly, trade unions are including retraining or continuous training programmes emphasizing the employability of workers in collective agreements, either with individual companies or industry-wide. Workers who had participated in such programmes and were laid off found a job sooner and at higher wages than those who had not participated.

Small and medium-sized companies generally do not have the resources for continuous training as the example of the United States shows. This has led to the establishment of some kind of corporation as the official employer of a group of apprentices who are then rotated between a number of companies. Such schemes enable smaller firms to participate in vocational training to an extent that might not otherwise be possible.

The bulk of the MEE industries is concentrated in a relatively small number of countries. Two thirds of machine tool production is concentrated in four countries (Japan, Germany, United States and Italy) and the top ten countries account for 90 per cent of world production and exports. Ten countries produce over 80 per cent of the world's information and communication technology (ICT) equipment, led by the United States and Japan.

Eighty-five per cent of the world's exports of office and telecommunication equipment (OTE) comes from just 15 countries: 47 per cent from developing countries. Most of these developing countries' exports of OTE originate in export processing zones (EPZs) and account in some cases for over 50 per cent of their total exports.

1 Lifelong Learning in the Mechanical and Electrical Engineering Industries. Report for discussion at the Tripartite Meeting on Lifelong Learning in the Mechanical and Electrical Engineering Industries, International Labour Office, Geneva, 2002. ISBN 92-2-113211-0. Price: 20 Swiss francs.

2 A 360-degree appraisal is based upon performance feedback from multiple sources, rather than dependence on an employee's supervisor or other single source. In a 360-degree appraisal, feedback may come from peers, staff, internal customers, external customers, supervisors, and the individual.