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Working and ageing
58 Guidance and counselling for mature learners

severity of the problem varies: problems are particularly expected by larger
enterprises with more than 500 employees (74%), but only 55% of small
enterprises with 10 to 19 employees anticipate problems. Especially enterprises
in the sectors transport, storage and communication (75%), construction (74%)
and real estate, renting and business activities (71%) expect problems. By
contrast, a markedly smaller share (23%) of enterprises in the sector ʻother
community, social and personal service activitiesʼ foresee problems.
Enterprises were also asked how they assessed their chances of
compensating for early retirement of older employees by hiring younger
employees. Of these enterprises, 35% view their chances as poor and 30%
as good. Medium-sized and large enterprises in particular judged their
chances positively. Enterprises in the financial intermediation sector were
especially negative in their assessment. By contrast, at nearly 80% skilled
trades viewed their chances positively. One reason that 49% of enterprises
which provide continuing vocational training cited for not being able to
compensate for early retirement of older employees by hiring younger
employees, is that these individualsʼ qualifications and skills are not a precise
fit for their enterprise; 34% say that the volume of labour supply is not
sufficient. All in all, this means that recruitment problems are already visible.
Of enterprises that provide continuing vocational training, 67% take the age
structure of the enterpriseʼs workforce into consideration in their personnel
and organisation development policy. Some 68% see the proportion of young
employees to older employees in their individual enterprise currently well
balanced.
The German additional survey also examined which employeesʼ
competences are fostered by different types of continuing vocational training
in enterprises (Moraal et al., 2009a). Individual competence dimensions taken
together depict occupational competence and are not to be viewed as isolated
variables (Hensge et al., 2008). The survey broke occupational competence
down into the following four dimensions:
(a) social competence (such as ability to work on a collaborative basis with
colleagues, ability to deal competently with customers);
(b) personal competence (such as ability to work alone, assumption of
responsibility);
(c) methodological competence (such as ability to solve problems, better time
management, organisational skills);
(d) technical competence (such as specialised knowledge and skills specific
to a task or job).
Using this method, the study examined whether not only technical
competence but also transversal competences such as social, methodological