Background
COMPLIMENT: COMPetence DevelopMENT and Age Diversity – Self-directed Learning and Competence Development with elder and younger employees in social facilities (ESF Art.6)
Demographic change is an Europe wide phenomenon influencing every aspect of social life. Consequences and problems for the job market will be felt and must be anticipated. Demographic change is subject of investigation and conceptional consideration for the industry. A changing age distribution pattern of a society demands to keep employees fit for work for a longer time. An important instrument to achieve this is continuing education and advanced training. Further, life long education helps to keep up motivation, capability to work and flexibility of the employee and gives the chance to use his/her personal and work experience.
Even though the social sector (e.g. care for elderly and handicapped people) is not only affected by the demographic change because of older employees but also because of older clients there are still only single projects (especially care for elderly people). Carried out projects mainly involved health prevention as well as the areas of work structure, organisation and work schedules but no systematic approach to the problem. Apart from that it is necessary to emcompass the demographic change with strategies involving active human resource development and a plan for lifelong continuing education and to impemtate this into strategies of personell development. Especially the social sector suits for environments of intergenerative learning with methods of selfdirected Learning.
Younger and elder employees are different in their working- and educational biographies and have different strenghts and weaknesses; they have high potentials in sharing their individual competences and supporting each other.
This includes a high potential of ressources for workers and institutes and will be very helpfull for facing the challenges of the demographic changes in the next years.
Two areas 1) stationary care for elderly people; 2) stationary care for handicapped people are to be analysed, or - if you prefer - the sector child/youth care. Since the content of qualification is controlled by the professional organizations, the project will have a closer look at the personal, methodical and social capabilities (e.g. self-management, integration and capability of learning) of the employees. A „diversity" approach will be used to highlight the potentials of the elder employees instead of emphasizing their faults. The project aims to raise awareness for younger and elderly employees and to a self-determined definition of qualifying needs.