SKILLFUL project meticulously analysed emerging trends in future transport. A comprehensive analysis was undertaken, that did not just cover the impact of automation but, among others, also considered the impact of electrification (i.e. on required skills of technical maintenance and service staff), the greening of transport (i.e. on skills of relevant indicators monitoring personnel) and services personalisation, as well as Mobility as a Service businesses (i.e. on relevant new mobile applications development and/or business models set-up). For all the above trends employability was connected to future transport job requirements for all transportation modes and for multimodal chains (which by themselves constitute a key transport of the future trend), and for all levels/types of workers (blue collar, white collar, managers, operators, researchers, etc.). Moreover, the identification and benchmarking of existing and novel training/ education methodologies, tools and systems were implemented, which resulted to the identification of best practices that were integrated in novel curricula and training schemes developed in SKILLFUL.
The project also defined competences of trainers and design new profiles of teams devoted to facilitating the transfer of knowledge through innovative ideas/methods, encompassing requirements of both trainers and trainees for each of the developed training schemes and courses.
Emphasis was given to the conduct, completion and analysis of the pilot tests of the project that were organised in order to assess selected training schemes developed within SKILLFUL by experts and real users (active transportation professionals). The goal of the pilot testing was to prove the project’s concept and methodologies, as well as to evaluate its future impacts. Moreover, this pilot testing also contributed to the identification of best practices, application guidelines and policy recommendations based upon concrete project results.
In addition to the implementation of the SKILLFUL pilots and their results analysis, consolidation and impact assessment, the SKILLFUL Consortium also proceeded to the identification and suggestion of new business roles for the education and training chain related to the Transportation sector. Based upon the outcomes of relevant SKILLFUL project work six new roles of business actors were identified:
1. Transport Knowledge aggregators
2. Transport Lifelong training promoters
3. Transport Training certifiers
4. Transport Training infrastructure providers
5. Collaborative passion arenas in Transport
6. In vivo Altschool social networks
In the context of the work related to the definition and description of new business roles to the transportation and education/training chain, a questionnaire was developed and circulated from all partners to transport and education stakeholders and experts, as well as to the SKILLFUL Stakeholders Reference Group (SRG), through which the need for suggesting new business roles for the future education and training chain related to the transportation sector of Europe were confirmed by the respondents.
Moreover, during this period the risk analysis of SKILLFUL was updated according to the progress of the project and mainly based on the outcomes of the SKILLFUL pilots’ implementation and the feedback provided by all participants. In addition, the SWOT analysis was also updated, which is a useful technique for understanding the Strengths and Weaknesses of the project and its outcomes, and for identifying both the open Opportunities and the Threats that is probable to be faced during the project and after its completion.
