The scenario of Latin America and the Caribbean
has been thoroughly modified during the last few years. Beyond the economic,
political and social reforms carried out already, the growing exposure
of national economies to international competition has led to greater
demands for those who design and those who execute vocational training
policies.
The features of economic activities and new social
needs have placed training in a central position as regards its abilities
to act as an inclusion force, knowledge disseminator, generator of better
employment conditions and facilitator of social dialogue options.
In addition, the increasing complexity of nowadays
circumstances has also required further efforts from training institutions
to be updated and to offer services that are according to demands. The
last years of the millennium have also witnessed the frequent modernisation
flows carried out by, and demanded from, training institutions.
The progressive introduction of new agents
in the training offer, the availability of a mixture of financial sources
and the necessary demands of relevance from
training programmes are all factors which have played a part in the
generation of modernisation processes and institutional transformation.
On the other hand, training users need to know their
best offers, those which assure them the highest degree of efficiency.
Both businessmen and workers seek efficiency signs. Financial support
providers are also interested in the best use of the funds invested
in training. Quality-managed institutions are seen as a social guaranty
for the efficiency of public expenditure in training. The same logic
may be applied to funds coming from the private sector, which should
be deposited in organisations that account for relevant and efficient
training processes.
Therefore, vocational training institutions are
strongly interested in improving the efficiency and relevance of their
activities, which has been recently reflected in the adoption of management
mechanisms to assure quality.
This trend has been materialised in direction and
participation actions which take hold of tools and implement institutional
actions aimed at the development of a quality culture. Such actions,
usually immersed in a constant improvements philosophy or in institutional
modernisation processes, imply activities of officials training,
search for critical factors, clarification of the mission and objectives
which lead, on their own, to qualitative institutional improvements.