The last few years have seen an increasing moblity of workforce across European borders, and increasing turnover in individual enterprises, not least in the electro-technical industry. Enterprises are thus becoming increasingly aware of the need to be able to accurately and efficiently assess the knowledge and skills in potential and existing employees.

Experiences from the AKS project group have shown that the European electro-techinical industry will benefit from establishing å harmonised documentation procedure to aid identification and validation of accumulated knowledge and skills in potential and existing employees. The procedure will also form an integral part of the continual professional development of existing employees.There seems to be an increasing interest for the subject also in a European perspective.

The last few years have also seen a considerable turnover rate among electricians, especially in Norway, Sweden and Denmark. This has caused concern in the industry. One reason for the turnover is a lack of workers, but also to blame is the very low rate of unemployment in that sector.

But there are other important reasons - Electro-technical companies have traditionally valued their workforce mainly as a static mechanism for income, which up to now has been a very successful attitude; but they have not kept up with the increasing need to nurture continued learning among the workforce. Younger people have an increased propensity to change or adapt, and an inclination toward continued learining. In the future, companies will have to exploit these characteristics in order to succeed. We therefore need to radically change the traditional attitude in companies - this prosject will be a contribution to achieving this goal.

This methodology will be used for accounting existing knowledge resources, on an individual and enterprise level:

The individual: The interests of the individual are central to this project. The system will be used to obtain a goal-oriented and precise definition of the employee's knowledge-development needs based on their professional needs and wishes, and private interests. The individual plan of professional development for each employee in an enterprise will always be set up in collaboration with the employee.

The enterprise: An enterprise can gain a competitive edge far beyond a traditional company, by better knowing the individual employee, and the total knowledge and skills that they possess, and making use of and nurturing these. From the electro-technical industry's point of view, if accumulated knowledge and skills can be quantified, it would be easier for individuals as well as enterprises to 'keep stock of' their resources, thus providing a better basis for their use and allocation, in such as a development plan for the enterprise.

A main goal of this project is therefore to supply the tools to increase awareness of non-formal and informal learining and its mutual benefits to the individual employee and the enterprise. The individual will be valued for their accumulated knowledge and skills; the enterprise will be more competitive by better knowing the resources in its workforce at the same time showing their adaptability. The enterprise will be able to evaluate foreign workers more accurately and swiftly. Similarly, it will be easier for the enterprise to establish itself abroad.