Career guidance has sense for everyone, not just young people
The current statistics on unemployment in Slovakia, but also in other European countries, confirm the importance and significance of guidance in finding a profession or professional orientation, in other words, career guidance. By far, it concerns not only young - it must be for all population groups with different levels of educational attainment.
This was agreed during a kick-off meeting of the project "Career guidance and counselling - the basis for a better future" with the participation of partners from France, Hungary, the Netherlands and Slovakia. The project coordinator is the company TREXIMA Bratislava.
The meeting was held on 14 October 2013 in Bratislava. In addition to project partners the kick-off meeting was attended by representatives of the Ministry of Labour, Social Affairs and Family of the Slovak Republic; the Central Office of Labour, Social Affairs and Family; labour offices; Ministry of Education professional bodies; employers; social partners; civil society organisations; as well as other experts interested in the topic of career guidance.
Creating international partnerships within the Leonardo da Vinci subprogramme belonging to the Lifelong Learning Programme funded by the European Commission is one of the important ways how national and international experts can share their experience, knowledge and opinions on the current situation in career guidance, as well as vocational education and training with a special focus on the efficient use of human resources with a view to reducing unemployment.
Director General of Labour Section of the Ministry of Labour, Social Affairs and Family of the Slovak Republic PaedDr. Danica Lehocká highlighted measures of Slovak government in solving labour market problems, including the National Reform Programme for Employment. Subsequently, Ildikó Hanuliaková from the Civic Organisation - Teamwork for a Better Future unveiled the project and highlighted its vision, goals and the importance of partnership strategy.
In the next programme, the representatives of project partners introduced their organisations and presented data on the labour market situation in their countries. Situation in Slovakia was elucidated by Lenka Beňačková from TREXIMA Bratislava who, in addition to statistical surveys and analyses of employment and unemployment, also emphasised the need for cooperation between the state, employers and schools to improve the current situation and develop skills of the economically active population.
The situation in the Hungarian labour market was presented by Zsuzsa Pataki (Human Profess Közhasznú Nonprofit Kft.) who also stressed the employment problems of disadvantaged groups such as the Roma minority. Laurent Dedieu (LENO CONSULTING) noted that in France large employers have a decisive impact on employment and added that unemployment in the country is not decreasing because of the reluctance of people to travel to work in another region. Gustav Morjan (Morjan European Vocational Education and Training) explained the advantages of the Dutch system of vocational education and training and put high employment in the Netherlands in direct correlation to the level of career planning and counselling in the country.
Jakub Žabka from TREXIMA Bratislava introduced to meeting participants an online tool “Labour Market Integrated System” – run by Central Office of Labour, Social Affairs and Family – and its benefits for the unemployed, employers and other labour market stakeholders in Slovakia.
From the conclusions of the meeting it becomes clear that in order to increase employment it is necessary to constantly look for new opportunities and solutions towards gaining a strong foothold on the labour market, to expand counselling services to several institutions and improve their professional competence. To do this it is necessary to increase the expertise of guidance staff and this can be boosted by obtaining foreign experience.
During the following working meeting on 15 October 2013 the partners agreed upon further progress of the work, general and time schedule of tasks so that the project was beneficial to all participating countries.
- 17. 01. 2014, 00:00
- | Trexima Admin
Most Read Articles:
- Start your career now
- Career guidance in partner countries
- Welcome
- Career guidance has sense for everyone, not just young people
- Non-public working meeting of the partners (23.-24.01.2014)
Interesting links:
- EU - Euroguidance
- EU - EURES
- SK - ISTP
- FR - Guidance for everybody
- FR - ONISEP (National Office for information on education and professions)
- FR - APEC (Recruitment and jobs frameworks)
- FR - Midi-Pyrénées education and professions
- FR - Region Midi-Pyrénées
- HU - Nemzeti Pályaorientációs Portál
- HU - Courses in Hungary
- HU - Professions in Hungary
- HU - Karrier
- HU - HR portal in Hungary
- HU - Workania
- HU - Careerjet
- HU - Job portal in Hungary
- HU - Pályaorientáció
- HU - Pályaválasztási tanácsadó portál
- HU - Euroguidance Hungary
Slovakia
The main aim of the working meeting of the partners which took place on 23 - 24 th January 2014 in Budapest was the creation of the questionnaire which would assess the level of career guidance in partner countries.
At the outset, let’s look at the acronym ISTP. It stands for Labour Market Integrated System which is a database of all existing jobs in the Slovak labour market, as well as counselling tools that are useful for finding a job corresponding to educational attainment, experience, knowledge and skills of the website user.
In the course of the project it is planned to exchange information between institutions at the international level on the current situation in the labour market (LM) in the partner regions and compare career guidance systems (CG) in the partner countries. 
