Opportunities and challenges ofskills development– why do we need evidence‐based decisions?

Shoko YAMADA
Nagoya University
1

The structure of presentation
Why is the industrial skills development demanded?
• The node to link and achieve various developmental goals

Why does skills gap occur?
• “Live together but in different worlds” – Why is the coordination among
stakeholders so difficult?
• Twin gaps of supplies and demands in the labor market• Fluidity and multi-dimensionality of targets and contents

Who demands for TVET?
• The skilled workers are necessary but should they be trained at TVET?

Any impact of COVID on skills development？
What does it mean to be competent at work?
•Do we really know the exact contents of “skills” to be developed?

•The latest global discussion on the concept of “knowledge”

2What causes the skills gap?
“Live together but in the different worlds”
Our school has XX
major and thegraduates will havespecialist certificate

Our national plan is to bea middle income country
by 2030. To achieve it, weneed more high skilledworkers in ZZ industry.

School teacher

YouthsGovernment officials

I want to be an IT
engineer

I will be a fashion
designer!

We invest in Country
A but cannot findcompetent people tobe local managers.
We need workers who
can work accurately andefficiently.

Employers3

Twin gaps of supplies and demands of skillsin the labor market
Supply side

Demand side

Educator/ Trainer
Skills they teach
Education/Training

Workers
Actual skills they haveSelf-efficacy,
motivation

Workers
Self-evaluation of skills

Employer
Skills they expect to workers

First thing we need to do is to diagnose
the causes and nature of skills gap first
Are there any system‐level deficits?
– Asymmetry of information on employment→Matching job opportunities– The fast pace of change of the employers’ skills needs→Routinized needs assessment and enhanced flexibility and responsiveness of the training
system– Legal and financial framework to promote skills development does not exist or malfunctional→Skills development act, Occupational standard, accreditation, skills development fund,subsidies– Low quality of training contents and delivery→Improvement of training materials and trainers

What are the contents of skills which cause the mismatch?
– Abilities to conduct specific tasks →Vocational/ operational skills– Personalities and attitude? →Noncognitive skills– Basic cognition which enables continuous learning?→Cognitive skills– Educational certificate → Expansion of the school system

5Types of intervention to promote skills development and actors’ involvement
Objectives
Enhanced
coordination
among actors

Resource
utilization for
effective skills
development
systemFormation ofquality skilledworkers

Role of employers

Role of training institutions

Role of learners/ workers

Interventions

Role of government• To establish the coordination
agency for skills development,
involving multiple government
bodies, industries, and training
institutions•

Public‐private partnership(PPP) to fill the supply‐
demand gaps

Establishment of thefinancial incentive
mechanism to vitalize thetraining market• To introduce the levy for skills
development• To establish the skills
development funds• Provide subsidies for companies
and training institutions• Scholarships for students• To provide opportunities of skills
development, both on‐site and off‐site, for employees utilizing thesubsidies and loans from thegovernment (SMEs)• To provide matching funds to thegovernment subsidies (largecompanies)• Receive trainees from thecompanies• To pay the tuition for training• To acquire opportunities of suited
training using vouchers and othergovernment services• To demand for loans andscholarships for continuous learning

Skills assessment andcertification based on the
problem solving skills
required in the world ofwork• Establishing the occupation
standard for respective industries
and levels of skills• Establishing the mechanism toaccredit training providers whofollow the occupation standard• To input the needs of employers indeveloping the occupation standard• To take part, as the examiner, in theskills assessment following theoccupation framework• To provide education and training
along with the occupation standard• To be accredited by thegovernment according to theoccupation standard (accreditedinstitutions will have a chance ofsubsidies)• To sit for the skills assessment on
the national occupation standard, inaddition to the TVET certification
exams• Matching the TVET interns withthe companies through the skills
development coordination
agency• To accept interns (practicaltrainees) from TVET

Strengthening the practicaltraining••

To enhance the partnership for various forms of skills development, such as
in‐firm training, apprenticeship, and public and private TVET
Modernization of the apprenticeship system
To bridge the training gaps between formal and informal sectors

Direct provision ofTVET is• only
a minor
Participationin practical training• Finding companies and workshops
at which students can work as anpart of theintern• Improve the conditions for in‐school practical training government’s role in• Teacher training to catch up withthe latest techniques of the skills developmentindustry)

Promotion ofemployment

Direct provision of TVET tosupplement the training byprivate TVET and employers• Direct management of public
TVET

Matching recruiters and job
searchers• Establishment of an employment
agency• Open recruitment (reduce closedrecruitment)• Make the info of students andgraduates available for recruiters• Proactive job searchWho demand for the government‐led skills
development most?
• The recent neo‐liberal conception of skills development demands thegovernment more coordinative role than direct involvement in training
provision– To mitigate the asymmetry of information between the supply and demand– To incentivize the skills development by reducing the financial and systembarriers• Large companies (e.g. factories of the global multinationals) have theirown priorities and strategies of workers’ skills development and promotion
 driven by their own internal labor market• TVET demands are higher among SMEs and informal sectors which do nothave the capacity to internalize their workers’ training• Linkage between the plans for industrial development and skills
development is a key7

Horizontal and vertical skills mismatches
Does the increased investment in TVET solve the problem ofskills mismatch??
1. The government planned the resource allocation among
different education levels mistakenly  created many workers
with “Over‐education” and “Under‐education” Verticalmismatch
2. There are significant gaps of perception between the employers
and the trainers/educators, but demand side data is often
unavailable  The skills development plans are made without
demand side information  Horizontal mismatch
8

The constructs of knowledge
Socio‐emotional skills• interpersonal skills• team work
• autonomous activities

Cognitive skills can explain only a minor partof the effects of education on labor market
outcomes such as employment or income(Bowles et al. 2001)
Noncognitive skills

Meta‐cognitive skills• Problem‐solving,
discovery, creativity• Logical and criticalthinking• Adaptive learning

Skills assessed as the competencies
developed at school

Cognitive skills• Language skills• Mathematical skills• Information skills• Technical skills

The domain considered as work‐
related skills conventionallyKatsuno 2013 adopted from Bloom

Problem‐solvingg at work

≠ gettinggg highg score in exams

9

When, where, and what kind of skills do they need to develop?
Pre-employment
Highered

Learning is alifelong process

SecondaryPrimary

TVET

Skills/Knowledge
specific to theworkplace

Off-JT(Off-site)

Adultliteracy

General skills/knowledge

Off-JT (on-site)
OJT

Apprenticeship

Upskilling after employment

Source: author

10

COVID and the new demands for skills development• Vocational training without contact?
– Increased inequality of learning opportunities  aggravation ofexisting problem• Lack of access to school, alternative tools of learning, or learning support– Restriction of practice‐based training New challenge• Despite TVET reforms to increase relevance, a large part of the practical training
and internship were suspended• Changed mode of business operation– Enhanced transfer of goods without human interactions
 More reliance on IT and indirect communication skills
11Problem‐solving skills in the era of with‐COVID• Performance evaluation will be
more outcome‐oriented thansharing the process• Attentive and accurate workwithout visible outcomes will notappeal to the supervisor• Capacities to verbalize (= expressin written or spoken words insteadof actions or feeling) the work‐
related concerns andachievements will become more
important12

Skills and Knowledge for Youth (SKY) project
We can diagnose the skills of workers from multiple
angles‐ Our module provides pictures about the complex
relationships among cognitive, non‐cognitive (behavioral),and vocational skills‐ We can compare the perspectives of different
stakeholders and identify the exact nature of gaps
‐ We can provide evidence‐based proposals for
improving the skills development plan13

More information about us
Websitehttps://skills‐for‐development.com

Twitter@SKYproject_NU

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