European Initiative: New Skills for New Jobs... and another new framework

The New Skills for New Jobs initiative by the Directorate General for Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion was set out to promote better anticipation of future skills needs in the European labour market, to develop a better matching between skills and labour market needs and to bridge the gap between the worlds of education and work. Another aim of the initiative is to connect national classification frameworks for professions, qualifications and competences in order to further develop an all-European job market and enhance professionals’ mobility across European borders.

Practical measures for reaching the above mentioned objectives will be, among others, the European Qualifications Framework, the European Framework for key competences for lifelong learning, and yet another new framework, the European Skills, Competences and Occupations taxonomy. ESCO is currently being developed, using the International Standard Classification of Occupations (ISCO) and still in its 0.0 version.

Not very surprisingly, the German National Agency views this new development with suspicion as declared in their official statement sent through their press mailing list last week (available here in German).

Yet another framework with the others staying valid and being developped further – what do we think about this?