Competencies and competence development in industry 4.0

Abstract

The advance in digitization is also changing the way of working in the field of industrial manufacturing. Smart wearables and mobile smart devices e.g. smart glasses and smartwatches, support employees with context-sensitive information. The introduction of these technologies and the changes in work processes lead to new competence requirements for employees and new paths for competence development. This article in the journal Gruppe. Interaktion. Organisation. (GIO) aims to identify future competence requirements and ways of competence development for industrial workers. Therefore, 76 semi-structured interviews with participants from five expert groups were conducted. As a result, our study presents a competence model which builds on the well-established structure of professional, methodological, social and personal competences. Digital competences were added as cross-sectional competence. General IT application skills were identified as a core competence for employees in the industry 4.0. For competence development digital and self-initiated ways of learning are getting more important. The results of this study can be used to develop an operational competence management.