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How to find hardwood competence – possibilities for

businesscompetence

Oscar HultåkerSwedish University of Agricultural Sciences

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Background

The hard wood harvesting industry• Bulk of actors in forest harvesting are SMEs and their employees

• Lack of competence on hard woods, especially regarding forest harvesting.

• Lack instruments to assess competence not fitting into national classification schemes.

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Background contd.

Previous studies• Need to increase the hard wood competence, esp. in forest harvesting. (Kastenholz, 2011)

• Forest contractors might be rather well educated, at least in the transition economy countries. (Hudson, 2008)

• Need to increase industry capacity to assess competence of forest workers and of contractor firms. (Bohlin & Hultåker, 2005; Lewark, 2009)

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Vision and focus

• A functioning tool for assessment of hard wood competence primarily targeting forest contractor SMEs and their employees.

• Full-filling needs of the forest contractors’ clients.

• Assessing forest worker competence is important in order to ensure quality. A functioning Pan-European assessment tool will make mobility between countries easier.

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Limitations

• National differences in e.g. educational system, vocational certificates, administrative systems, etc. (Hudson, 2008)

• Organisations raise different internal requirements for identical issues (Hudson, 2008)

• A cross border system can therefore only include common issues. Every other requirement has to be complemented at national or organisational level

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Models

• Lack of instrument for assessing forest worker competence of hard wood harvesting or contractor firm competence

• Lack of a well established comprehensive instrument for assessing general competence of forest workers on harvesting

• Possible models: PEFC, COMFOR

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Scientific base

Resource or competence based view of the firm• Competence as a collective asset of the firm.• Characteristics of competence:

– Utility– To be of use for customers– Difficult to imitate– Is not consumed in the production process.

• Competence has to make sense in the context where it has to be used.

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Scientific base contd.

An educational perspective• Formal competence vs. actual competence includes.• Dimensions of competence:

– Facts– Skills– Understanding– Values and attitudes– Interaction and exchange

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Validation• Dimensions of validation

– Convergent and divergent systems– Summative and formative systems– Formal and non-formal systems

• Diversity of aims, methods and results.• Departure from individuals’ actual competence or from industry requirements.• Generally rather comprehensive schemes.

Scientific base contd.

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Method

Case studies with the aim to catch a wide pallet of perspectives on:

– State-of-the-art– Experiences of evaluation of a preliminary assessment tool

• Data collection by national partners.• Low degree of standardisation.• Primary data compiled by national partners.

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Results - State of the art

“If you are an experienced forest worker you get a work even without documented experience.”

• Formal competence level can be very low.• Forest contractors might be better educated than their employees.• National differences and even more local requirements of certificates.• Workers safety and societal issues more strictly regulated.• Certification systems might be governmental or stake holder driven

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Synthesis of data andlitterature

• Difficult to pre-define exact competence due to different national and local requirements.• Focus should be on the actual competence in relation to the competence required.• Focus on individual as well as firm competence.• Focus should on informal competence of the forest workers.• Possible to use both as a summative system and a formative system.

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Themes included

• Technique and equipment– Equipment for manual and mechanised work; experience of operation

• Education, training, and other qualifications– Personnel, what courses they have taken; duration and examination

• Skills– Knowledge and capacity to select the appropriate procedures

• Understanding– Comprehension of forest to industry wood chain

• Values and attitudes– Sharing of common values and attitudes within company and sector

• Interaction and exchange– Communication and exchange of experiences with co-actors

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Assessing individualforest workers contd.

• Focus on forest workers’ current competence in relation to the requirements.

• Identifying development needs.

• Identifying unused competence.

• Should preferable be used by the contractor and the individual forest worker in co-operation in order to open for mutual reflections on requirements and training needs.

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Assessing individualforest workers

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Assessing the contractorfirm

• Focus on the collective bulk of competence of the firm.

• Documenting and assessing competence.

• Identifying unused competence resources.

• Should preferable be used by the contractor in co-operation with his employees in order to open for mutual reflections on firm competence, development needs and capacities.

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Assessing the contractorfirm contd.

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Final remarks

• Results are hampered by the lack of any single accepted assessment tool for general competence requirements of forest workers.

• The different national or local legislation, rules, norms, and customs will probably make it difficult to develop a full scale common Pan-European validation system.