Skills Audit

CLIENT: Multinational microelectronics company: enhanced redundancy package for 600 employees ... streamlined system ... identify transferable skills ... make a case for training provision.

The multinational company was preparing to close its UK operation, with the loss of 600 jobs. As part of an enhanced redundancy package the employees were offered one to one interviews to help identify their transferable skills and to specify short training programmes that might improve their job prospects.

Members of the Hiltrain team worked alongside the company's HR department and Job Centre Plus to produce a questionnaire that would record our findings on transferable skills while at the same time providing all the information needed to process any Jobseekers Allowance claims following redundancy. We also helped devise a recording mechanism for HR to collate the training requests and forward them to funding providers.

With this structure in place, Hiltrain team members scheduled individual interviews of one hour each, with slots available from 9am to 10pm in order to be accessible to all shifts. At first only about 200 people booked slots and it seemed that we would complete the interviews in 2 weeks. After the first few days, however, word spread that the process was very worthwhile and we were required to significantly ramp up the number of available interview slots. In the end, the project was extended into a fifth week.

As a result of this programme over 500 employees ranging from electronics engineers and managers to process operators and part-qualified apprentices received a comprehensive audit of their current skills. For each person we made a case for any training we recommended, whether to update a skill or to document skills they already had.

The company's HR department was delighted with the quality of our work; feedback they received from the interviewees was invariably positive.