Quality in vocational training institutions

The progressive entry of new actors into the training offer, the availability of a variety of sources of finance, and the necessary relevance that is demanded of training programs are among the factors which have impinged on the genesis of the modernization and transformation processes in institutions. Currently, the processes of transformation and adaptation to change are priority subjects on the training institutions’ agendas.

In a market which is diverse and which has numerous offers, the clients, that is the users of training, have an increasing need to know which the best offers are, that is to say, which provide the best guarantee of quality. Both entrepreneurs and workers are seeking indications of efficiency. Providers of financial resources are also interested in the best use of funds invested in training. Institutions that are managed with quality are a social guarantee of the efficiency of public expenditure on training. The same logic can be applied to funds from the private sector; they should reach organizations which can provide training processes that are relevant, efficacious and efficient.

This is why vocational training institutions are interested in improving the efficiency and relevance of their activities, and recently this has been reflected in the adoption of management mechanisms to ensure quality.

This trend is being expressed through the adoption of actions of direction and participation in which tools are adopted and institutional action to develop a culture of quality is executed. These activities, usually immersed in the philosophy of continuous improvement or in institutional modernization processes, involve training activity for personnel, the search for critical factors, and clarification of the mission and objectives which, in themselves, bring qualitative institutional improvements.

Some training institutions participate in national policies of quality and work in association with national standardization and accreditation organizations. This joint work is evident from the accreditation of their technological development centers (ISO 17025) to render measurement or testing services that are required to comply with the quality norms for different products in national and international markets. Examples of this are the national technology centers of the SENAI and the technological development centers of the SENA.

Besides this, training and counseling is given to enterprises for implementing quality control systems, a service which institutions are offering more and more. This is also the case of the SENATI centers of services for small and medium sized companies, which give training with the emphasis on the improvement of quality.

At the same time the institutions have sought an external seal of quality, and have had recourse to the guarantee of the certification of quality audited and approved by an external organization, under the ISO-9000 family of norms.

VTIs began activities for the management and the assurance of quality in training institutions from the beginning of the 1990s in Europe, and a little later in the Latin American region. The first institutions implemented mechanisms for total quality management, and the majority sought certification under the ISO 9000 norms. In this section, some institutional experiences will be described,(1) and there will be a review of the information gathered in a survey of the institutions which have obtained quality certification in recent years.

The National Industrial Training Service (SENAI)in Brazil had one of the first experiences in the region. There were antecedents in the regional department of Santa Catarina with the application of the 5 “S”(2) program, and subsequent recommendation for ISO-9000 certification followed in 1997. The regional departments of Paraná (in 1997 the Paraná Institute of Technology was the first vocational training school in Brazil to obtain ISO certification) Besides that, the National Department of the SENAI was certified with the ISO 9001 with application in planning, the development and coordination of strategic projects, and operative improvement projects.

The SENAI has antecedents in work towards the management of quality:

- Participation as coordinator of General Subprogram III of the Brazilian Program of Quality and Productivity (PBQP) in 1992: “The Education, Training and Preparation of Resources”.
- Member of the commission of General Subprogr

Since 1993, the SENAI has widely used an internal system of management and recognition of the quality of its training centers which, after an evaluation process, awards them the title of “Model Centers of Vocational Education” or “National Centers of Technology”. This system was inspired by the criteria of the National Program of Quality, which includes process management, personnel management, leadership, strategic planning, focus on the client and on the market, and results and information management. It was made up of three progressive levels of compliance with the criteria which, in ascending order, define the categories: bronze, silver and gold.

In the SENAI work towards total quality, in 1993 the CENATEC (National Technology Centers) national project set a model. Its central objective was that technical schools should implant a model of quality management. This was a project in the national ambit, and it had the following specific objectives:

• Establish a strategic alliance between the SENAI and the different social sectors linked to the productive sector, to raise the level of technological training in the country.
  
• Form a network of poles of competency in the different technological areas.
• Consolidate quality management in technical schools.
• Absorb, adapt and spread innovation and technology, leading to the continual improvement of the teaching-learning process.

The process which went ahead under this program was aimed at meeting the rigorous requirements of the national award of quality through the following stages:

- Conception via planning (strategic administration focused on planning)
- Implantation (total quality management)
- Evaluation (national quality award)

Afterwards, in 1996, in the light of the success of the CENATEC process, the national department of the SENAI developed another project for total quality management in the learning schools. Its aim was to implant in the CEMEP (model centers of vocational education) the principles of quality oriented to training for work.

Since the mid 1990s, progress in the policy of institutional quality has created a favorable climate for a number of regional departments to undertake the process of quality certification.

Among the regional offices that have obtained quality certification are Alagoas (AL), Amazonas (AM), Bahía (BA), Ceará (CE), the Federal District (DF), Espíritu Santo (ES), Minas Gerais (MG), Paraná (PR), Pernambuco (PE), Río Grande do Sul (RGS), Río Grande do Norte (RGN), Santa Catarina (SC), Sao Paulo (SP) and Sergipe (SE). In total, SENAI has more than 180 certifications of quality. The majority are for training schools, others are for its laboratories, and still others for the head offices of the regional departments. Besides these, 35 certification process are under way.

It is worth noting that the different regional offices participate in the definition and establishment of a policy of quality in coordination with the actors in the economic activity of the state in question.

In this way, SENAI assembles different management tools so as to construct an organization which learns and is capable of day by day improvement in its processes to foster better training, with the ultimate goal of raising competitiveness and productivity of the Brazilian economy.

The National Rural Training Service (SENAR) in its administration in Minas Gerais (established in 1993), has quality of services rendered as one of its basic foundations. This is why it implanted the SENAR total quality program. In this, a number of methodologies were applied, including teamwork, strategic analysis, the 5 “S”, the “quality coffee”, quality panels, and the journal of quality.

The processes involved were registered and made available to everyone, and in this way it became an organization whose functioning was transparent. In 1999, SENAR-MG acquired ISO 9002 1994 certification. Currently the institution is preparing to receive the technical audit aimed at the 2000 version of ISO 9001 certification.

The National Training and Employment Service (SENCE) in Chile was the first public service in that country to obtain certification of quality of the ISO 9000 family. In January 2000, it received the certificate of the Bureau Veritas Quality International (BVQI), which accredited that the process of the constitution of technical training organizations in the metropolitan region “satisfies the requirements of the ISO 9002 quality standards”.

In April 2003, the National Training Service (SENA) in Colombia obtained ISO 9001:2000 certification for three of its training centers in the Antioquia regional office. These were the National Construction Center, the National Wood Center, and the National Footwear and Leather Manufacturing Center. Prior to this, the sub management of planning in the same regional office had obtained the ISO certificate. Within the framework of its strategic plan, the institution has initiated the process which will lead to the certification of its 114 training centers throughout the country, and its goal is to achieve this before 2006. The SENA also gives counseling and technical assistance to enterprises which apply for ISO certification.

The National Training Institute (INA) in Costa Rica, one of the first institutions to initiate the process of quality assurance, obtained ISO 9000 certification for its accreditation unit (3) in June 1998. Follow up audits were carried out in December of that year and in June 1999. This unit works mainly on verifying the suitability of the training offer of various outside institutions against the quality of the INA institute’s own offer. An institutional policy of the INA reads: “Design and execute programs and projects which allow the assurance of the quality of the internal and external management of the services it offers to staff and users”.

The Technical Institute for Training and Productivity (INTECAP) in Guatemala successfully undertook the work to obtain quality certification under the 2000 version of the ISO 9000 normand this led to recommendation for certification in November 2002. Included in the scope of the certified INTECAP quality management system are “Studies of labor markets, the design and development of training by labor competency services, training services certifiable by the traditional method developed in INTECAP centers and in companies, and also technical assistance services”.

In the current context of developing technological innovation, increasing competitiveness, the globalization of productive economies, and the progressive increase in the flexibility of the labor market and of labor rotation, the INTECAP had to modernize to be able to cater adequately to the productive sector in the area of human resources competency.

A notable characteristic of the INTECAP experience is the fact that the certification of quality is part of a wide-ranging and successful process of institutional modernization which was begun at the end of 1998 with the backing of the management council. The plan for modernizing the institute consisted of the following:

- Definition of a document of bases for the modernization of the INTECAP;

- Establishment of bases for organic restructuring: organigrams on the level of unit, division and department;

- Schedule for initiating modernization.

The modernization project incorporates the following orienting elements:

- Changes in the process, both of value and of support.
- Redefinition of the concepts of mission, vision and values.
- Redesign of the technical and administrative processes.
- Recognition of the importance of orienting the institution towards total quality.
- Design and implementation of a horizontal organizational structure.

Besides all this, the management of modernization revolves around seven sub processes:

1. Naming heads of divisions, units and departments, and also staff who, in line with the organic law, have to be appointed by the management council.
2. Preparation to establish a total quality culture.
3. Re-design of the main institutional processes.
4. Definition of the organizational structure and the pilot plan for its implementation.
5. The administration of human resources.
6. Regionalization.
7. The consolidation of institutional image.

In February 2000, the Occupation Competency Standardization and Certification Council (CONOCER) in Mexico was certified with the ISO 9001 by Lloyd’s Register Quality Assurance (LRQA) in recognition of its adoption of efficient systems which demonstrate its capacity to assure the quality of its processes in the stages of the design, development, production and distribution of its products, and in the rendering of associated services.

Today, the CONOCER is thought of as the coordinator of a scheme whereby people can accede to continuing training processes based on standards that are set by agreement between the productive, labor and educational sectors. It is in itself a quality body which aims at improving the quality of the country’s enterprises, workers and training institutions.

In Peru, the National Service of Occupational Training in Industry (SENATI) has received the ISO 9001 certificate of quality. After a wide-ranging national effort, the institution obtained certification for its vocational training and preparation programs: dual learning, the qualification of workers in service, industrial technicians, industrial administrators, industrial teachers, technicians in engineering, continuing training, multimedia training, computers, and its work package. Also certified were the technical services of manufacturing and non destructive testing, and counseling and consultancy for small and middle sized enterprises, in its 41 area offices. In March 2003, SENATI obtained integrated certification of the quality system and ambiental system ISO 9001:2000 and 14001:1996, thus becoming the first institution in the region to achieve this for its ambiental policy management

The road to ISO 9001 certification in the SENATI can be summed up in three great events. After institutional restructuring between 1993 and 1998:

- Process of ISO 9001 certification between July 1998 and December 199

- Obtention of ISO 9001 certification in the year 2000

- ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 certification in 2003

The main steps which SENATI took to obtain certification were:

- Agreement of the National Council to implement the quality system
- Initial training of directors and heads about the ISO 9000 norm
- General training of all personnel using modular course design and a clear evaluation system
- Approval of the quality policy by the National Council
- Definition of SENATI products and clients by National Management
- Setting up of work groups to prepare and revise the documents of the system
- Training of internal auditors
- Approval of quality manual, and manual of organization and functions and general directives, by the National Council
- Approval by the National Director of the control directive of the system, quality plans and specific directives
- Internal audits in zonal headquarters
- Audit of pre-certification
- Audit of certification

One of the most demanding aspects of the road to quality assurance is the definition and specification of processes, and this is even more true when we consider that this is an institution that renders a training service. This has led to an interesting institutional discussion about the correct definition of the institution’s products and clients.

Certification of theFORCEM quality system in Spain

Since the end of the 1990s, the FORCEM, the institution in charge of the subsystem of continuing training in Spain, has been promoting the process of defining its quality system. With this aim, the training of coordinators in areas related to the ISO 9002 norm has been undertaken. After preparing the work schedule and the relation of the procedures to be carried out, the work, which covered some 155 procedures, was begun. The work of coordinating and unifying criteria, and control over the progress of the project as a whole, was done in the department of procedures and quality, management of organization and systems.

In September 1998, given FORCEM’s range and responsibility in the national ambit, the decision was taken to present its petition for this certificate to AENOR.

This was considered an ambitious project, practically all the organization’s personnel participated in it, and in the end this was the main factor in the success of the initiative. In June 1999 it obtained the certificate of quality in line with the UNE-EN-ISO-9002 international norm.

 

1. This will not be an exhaustive list. The experiences for which it has been possible to obtain information are included by country.
2. Japanese management control system oriented to fostering order and cleanliness. The 5 “S” are Seiri: Remedy; Serton: Order; Seisou: Clean; Seiketsu: Maintain; Shitsuke: Discipline.
3. Awarded by INTECO and the AENOR (Spanish Standardization and Certification Association) in line with the standards of the ISO-9002 norm.

 

 

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