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Holger Reinisch
History of commercial occupations
A study mainly focusing on the history of German merchants, their activities, their position in society, their organisation and their training structures from the outset until the close of the nineteenth century.
In the wake of the requirement for qualified staff for primary and secondary services, recent years have seen the emergence of new commercial services occupations and a proportional growth in the number of training contracts and advanced training contracts with a commercial and business management emphasis compared to the technical occupations. A current research project being undertaken at the Federal Institute for Vocational Education and Training is investigating the commonalities and differences between commercial and business management occupations whilst also developing a design concept for commercial thought and action. This context has also given rise to a literature study on the history of merchants. The study is based on a large number of sources and is the first of its kind to encompass the development of the commercial mentality and of mercantile skills within the context of economic changes which took place from the Middle Ages into the 1920's. It enables the identification of the reasons for commercial vocational qualifications, the genesis of commercial occupations in Germany from travelling merchants to the heyday of the merchant traders to the emergence of the commercial employee and a recognition of the commonalities of their activities.
