Print version Recommend this page Press release
40/ 2005
Bonn, 10.10.2005
Skills development in the temping sector
BIBB specialist conference discusses potential and limits
Temping is booming in Germany. The number of those temping as a proportion of the working po-pulation as a whole now stands at 1.5%, having more than tripled in the last ten years. This means there are about 400,000 workers currently employed in a branch demanding high levels of flexibil-ity and readiness from the staff it hires out for fixed term work. Temps are expected to be able to adjust to changing work assignments and activities in a wide variety of sectors, quickly find their feet when faced with new and unaccustomed working situations and conditions, face up to new pro-fessional challenges and, on top of all this, be willing and capable of constantly learning new things and developing themselves further. This begs the question: how can temps reach the level of quali-fication required for these ever-changing job descriptions and retain their employability? Which continuing vocational education and training concepts are available to enable temps to keep their occupational skills up to date? The specialist conference "Skills development in the temping sector - potential and limits", organised by the Federal Institute for Vocational Education and Training (BIBB) and to be held in Bonn on 20 /21 October 2005, aims to go some way towards answering this question.
The issues the specialist conference plans to raise and discuss include:
- how skills development can be implemented in the temping sector,
- which concepts temping agencies have in place to support the skills development of their employees,
- what part the companies where the temps are employed play/should play in the skills develop-ment of the employees,
- to what extent the temps themselves bear the responsibility for keeping their employability up to date.
As well as papers given by well-known representatives from Germany, there will be an introduction to the temping models practised in other European countries. In the Netherlands, for example, where the right to continuing training is stipulated in collective wage agreements, the periods in which temps are unassigned are used for targeted skills development. In France, two percent of wages and salaries are set aside for continuing training of temps. The intention is for the experiences gained in these countries thus far to shed some light on whether and to what extent these ap-proaches to continuing training and skills development for temps are transferable to Germany.
The conference is taking place as part of BIBB's "Promotion of skills development in the temping sector" research project, the aim of which is to establish initial responses to the fundamental ques-tion of how the temping sector can be organised in such a way that employees can achieve qualifi-cations through their work, how these new qualifications can be used in a targeted way and how the newly acquired skills can be recorded and recognised.
- The complete conference programme and registration documents for the specialist conference "Skills development in the temping sector - potential and limits" are available online under www.bibb.de/de/1427.htm
- Places are still available. The conference fee is €80 (€40 for students on presentation of a student card or proof of registration at an educational institute).
