Overall there is no doubt about the fact that there is still some kind of difference and gap between models and approaches in the business world and the (VET) education systems in Europe. All approaches, instruments, methods etc. in education and VET (e.g. ECVET, learning outcomes approach, NQF and its descriptors and levels etc.) have so far not found its full immersion in the business and enterprises. To overcome these differences and barriers it is certainly necessary to make use of principles and developments in the business world and use them as bridging factor towards the important and well established European VET principles. Out of our experience from representation and support of business and companies we can clearly see that there is one megatrend upcoming which so far: 1) has not fully entered especially the world and thinking of smaller enterprises (SMEs) and 2) has the huge potential to act as a translator between business world and education world Talent Management can be seen as huge potential to bridge the gap between business and education systems. In front of the described project background the TALENT 4.0 project envisages the following core aims: 1) Analysis of the current situation of talent management especially in SMEs in Europe with a special focus on identifying overlaps and synergies with European VET policies and instruments (e.g. ECVET instruments, EQF/NQF descriptors, learning outcome approach etc.) and deduction of needs and requirements on the level of training and (web 4.0 based) instruments 2) Development of knowledge, skills and competences in SMEs about talent management and talent analytics (web4.0 based) as well as European VET policies and instruments which support the talent management process 3) Development of a collection of instruments and tools about talent management and talent analytics (with special focus on web 4.0 based instruments for talent analytics) 4) Achieving a better understanding on company level for European VET policies and instruments via the "translation tool" of talent management To achieve the set aims and objectives, the following results and outputs are foreseen: IO 1: Investigation research about needs and requirements of SMEs in Europe regarding talent management and analytics 4.0 IO 2: Toolbox for talent management for direct use in SME talent management processes IO 3: Training programme for talent management and analytics for SMEs in Europe The main target group of the project are SMEs with their need to improve their HR processes and at the same time achieve better coherence between VET processes in the world of work and the VET systems in Europe. Moreover the project also envisages social partners, VET trainers and VET centres as their central target groups. The project partnership consists of social partner institutions, training centres, SME networks and technology research organisations from AT, DE, ES, IT, IE, CY and SE. Direct impact will be realised on about 700 SMEs in the partner countries during the course of the project. All project outputs will be made available in all partner languages for further use on a comprehensive dissemination and exploitation strategy.
The most valuable assets for sustainable business success in these volatile days are people. But not just any people: Motivated, high performing people, their skills and knowledge, their creative potential and their openness to learn and grow. Talent Management 4.0 seems to be the most promising approach for organisations to attract and maintain these key people and talents to better deal with a fast-changing VUCA-world and global developments like the Covid-19 pandemic, demographic and climate change, digitisation, automation, and globalisation. The Talent 4.0 project aimed to develop different resources and outputs to enable Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) to apply modern Talent Management and analytics in their business strategy and HR practice. Furthermore it wanted to draw a strong contribution to bridge the gap between current VET practices and business needs in this field. To implement this ambitious project Talent 4.0 brought together a strong international partnership of 7 different organisations from 7 European countries. The project partnership consisted of social partner institutions, training centres, SME networks and technology research organisations from AT, DE, ES, IT, IE, CY and SE. The core target group of our activities and also of the intellectual outputs were SMEs that are confronted with the need to properly implement talent management processes and tools to better deal with the VUCA world and changing HR demands. Furthermore we addressed VET Centres and Trainers that provide training programmes in HR and talent management. An overall of approximately 900 SMEs and 90 VET Trainers or VET Centre responsible persons were involved during the implementation of the project. The Talent 4.0 project implemented three main activities and produced three main results to support SMEs to build Talent Management 4.0 knowledge, skills and competencies to bridge the gap between the VET system and the business world. (1) Talent 4.0 Research Report A study on current talent management practices and needs of SMEs in the 7 Talent 4.0 partner countries was carried out to find out about SME needs and inform the further design of the other two products, the toolbox and training programme. A total number of 331 SMEs took part in the survey. An overall report and an executive summary, translated into all 6 partner languages, was produced. (2) Talent 4.0 Toolbox Talent 4.0 has developed a toolbox featuring a selection of useful and practical resources catered explicitly for the needs as a small and medium sized company that SMEs, consultants, education & HR professionals and experts, can easily benefit from. The toolbox was developed as document version as well as in web format. Both versions were translated into all 6 partner languages. (3) Talent 4.0 Training Programme The Talent 4.0 project partnership developed a 5-day modular training programme (1.5 ECVET Credits) with accompanying resources targeted to support SMEs on their journey to set up their own talent management system. The training programme consists of a curriculum document, five interconnected modules: Check-in to Talent Management for Industry 4.0 (M01) Attract – How to find best-fit and attract the right people (M02) Develop - Identify and Build-Up the talents of your team (M03) Motivate – Establishing a high performance culture (M04) Retain – Offering prospects for lasting commitment (M05) Every module contains theoretical input as well as practical elements and exercises with a special focus to web 4.0 tools and platforms. We developed a web version with introductory videos and guiding infos. All materials are available in all 6 partner languages. Despite the covid-19 restrictions the partnership tested and trained 21 VET trainers and HR experts during a unique online training event in June 2020. Feedback received led to further improvements of the materials and the experiences of a virtual event helped to further implement national pilots. National pilot courses were implemented as unique online training events testing all developed learning materials in totally different organisational and national pandemic situations with around 130 participants from 7 countries. The partnership also achieved the following further important objectives: 1. We developed the project website https://t4lent.eu and an online community of practice on social media via the project's facebook page https://www.facebook.com/t4lent.eu with more than 400 subscribers from all over Europe. 2.Despite the pandemic restrictions we were able to implement the very successful online conference “Talent Management 4.0 in times of pandemic” with over 60 participants from 7 EU countries. We will disseminate and exploit the project and its results after the end of the project lifetime with a Stand at the Euroskills 2020 event in September 2021 in Graz, AT, a permanent Talent Management Training offer at the WIFI Steiermark and the follow-up project Talent4LIFE.