Design and development of a cross-European employability training for older jobseekers

The importance of social networking for effective job-search has been clearly established in various studies. Social networks (social capital) represent a constituent component of employability: the potential of an individual to gain employment and to stay employed. However, not everyone feels comfortable using informal search methods or networking. Besides, with the rise of social media, social networking increasingly takes place in online environments. To those less familiar with social media this constitutes an extra hurdle regarding effective deployment of informal job-search methods. As a consequence, especially older (45+) jobseekers are considered at risk of missing out on job opportunities. The web2jobs project aims at providing a solution by developing a cross-European training on the use of social media for job search, targeting older jobseekers. This paper presents the requirements for such a training, as they evolved from a needs-assessment carried out in eight European countries. While starting with a focus on social media for job-search, the needs assessment made clear that the training should address other dimensions of employability, next to the social capital/social networking dimension, as well. The paper analyses the requirements derived from the needs assessment in terms of all four dimensions of employability (i.e. adaptability, human capital, social capital, and career identity) and argues that both adaptability and human capital on the one hand and social capital and career identity on the other hand, act in concert. Finally, the paper outlines the web2jobs employability training resulting from an iterative design and development process, involving two pilots running in eight countries.