Abstract:

The digital transformation of an organisation implies the adoption of novel technologies to enhance the manner the company provides its services, encompassing improvements such as increased transparency in transactions, task automation, data-driven decisions, high efficiency, cost reduction and environmental sustainability. Nevertheless, the adoption of emerging technologies is associated with the need for human competences to operate new systems. One of the biggest challenges for digital transformation in companies is the skill gap among employees. Therefore, organisations are faced with a dilemma of either invest in upskilling existing personnel or endeavour on the recruitment of new staff. While several companies exhibit awareness of the importance for continuous training of their workforce, most enterprises, especially small and medium sized (SMEs) remain negligent in this regard. The literature highlights various challenges associated with employee reskilling/upskilling. These include employee resistance to change, the financial burden on the company for training, and the imminent risk of losing an employee after his/her qualification. This work is intended to present the work in progress (WiP) developed under a co-promotion project aiming at the digital transformation of the logistics sector in Portugal. Counting with approximately 32 companies of the supply chain and logistics sector and 10 Educational Institutes, the project includes a work package for capacity building of the employees within the consortium. The purpose is to upskill and/or re-skill employees so they can be capacitated to deploy the new technologies needed by the companies to fulfill their goals of products and services creation. Simultaneously, our goal is to shed light on the pivotal role played by higher education institutions (HEIs) in the realm of lifelong learning while analyzing the associated advantages and drawbacks. The product of this work package is an academy specifically aimed at training in the logistics sector, which is intended to continue to operate after the project is completed, and continue the training and training of employees, in the context of lifelong learning. In this way, not only the project can deliver research and innovation, but its findings can perpetuate through lifelong learning of the workforce involved in the thematic area of logistics.

To create this academy, we implemented a methodology, that was divided in three distinct phases:
1) desk research of the technological trends for the digital transformation of the logistics sector,
2) the identification of training courses already available at the HEIs associated with the project and
3) a questionnaire addressed to companies, followed by an interview section, to realize which skills they require to develop the product and services proposed in the project.

Having completed those three steps, the following phase will contemplate the creation of the missing training offer in the HEIs. Despite this being a work in progress, the preliminary results lead us to conclude that there is substantial potential in integrating human resources training within research and development projects, particularly when developing solutions aligned with industry needs. Furthermore, we posit that establishing closer ties between industry and academia is a fundamental factor in fostering the practice of lifelong learning—a nascent trend in our society but indispensable for economic and social growth.

Keywords:

Lifelong learning, digital transformation, skill gap, upskilling, reskilling.