Abstract:

As the world economy moves towards a new technological structure, new requirements for labour force arise. Knowledge and skills lose their relevance rapidly. That is why an important task is to develop and constantly update the list of workers’ occupations, competencies and skills in demand. It is also essential to disseminate this information among actors involved in order to develop curricula and to inform people interested in choosing their educational path and career.
Finland provides a good example of labour market parameters monitoring and forecasting system. Its success to a large extent is guaranteed by a broad spectrum of contributors (state, employers, educational system, etc.).
In the meantime, in Russia labour market and educational needs quantitative forecasting is developed far better, than qualitative forecasting. One way of qualitative forecasting development is transfer of the best foreign practice.
One type of analysis and forecasting instruments used in Finland are so-called “occupational barometers”. This is a very convenient instrument for labour market current state assessment and informing actors in interest of job-seekers shortage/surplus by occupations. The barometers are drawn up by Employment offices together with employers. First, demand and supply for labour by professions for the following year is estimated. After that, all occupations are classified in three groups: job-seekers shortage/surplus and vacancies/job-seekers equality. Special posters with the results of labour market analysis by occupations are published twice a year publicly.
Obviously this instrument has many advantages. Due to this fact the method was implemented in Russia as a part of a large-scale research project “Forecasting skills demand in hi-tech industry” ordered by the Ministry of Education and Science of Russia.
Similarly to “occupational barometers”, new “skills barometers” were developed by researchers from Petrozavodsk State University. This is an instrument for monitoring and dissemination of information on occupational skills in demand in hi-tech industry.
The monitoring was carried out by the Center for Testing and Development “Hume technologies” of Moscow State University by means of surveying employees responsible for technological innovations implementation. Large and medium enterprises’ representatives filled in special questionnaires about three competence groups (general occupational, specific occupational and cross-functional competencies). The survey concerned different employees’ categories: production department, research department, engineering and department professionals, as well as executives and operational staff.
Survey results are structured by competence categories: shortage, surplus, balance. It allows to reason subsequent recommendations for vocational education system relating to vocational education and training content updating.
Applying the best Finnish practice and “skills barometers” allows obtaining up-to-date information on employees’ competences in demand by employers. Usage of this information guarantees timely curricula development to current economy’s demands. Besides, these tools contribute to information dissemination among different social groups and employers involvement into the qualified personnel training process. All of this makes it possible to eliminate structure mismatch common to Russian labour market.

Keywords:

Competencies, curricula development, occupational and skills barometers, labour market.