Companies offer staff more frequent but shorter training

According to Luxembourg's national institute for the development of continuing vocational training (INFPC), companies are investing in more frequent training sessions for their employees but opt for shorther sessons at a time.

In 2015, Luxembourg employees participated, on average, in five training sessions, each session lasting up to five hours.

Staff members received more training in 2015, with an increase of 9% compared with 2014, but courses were shorter in length by 4% compared with the year before.

According to the latest Observatoire de la formation (an annual report on national training trends produced by INFPC), large companies invest the most in training opportunities for employees, with managers and leaders receiving most of the support from employers.

In 2015, companies' direct investment in corporate training represented, on average, 2.4% of their payroll.

Overall, training initiatives have been on constant increase in Luxembourg since 2012.

On average, employees participated in five training courses in 2015, compared with 4.6 training courses in 2014 and 4.3 training courses carried out in 2013-12.

Nonetheless, as the frequency of training opportunities increases, the duration of each session shrinks.

While in 2007 employees participated in training opportunies lasting on average 8.9 hours, in 2015, only five hours were spent on improving employees' skills.

Inequalities

Larger companies with more than 1,000 people place the most importance on training employees, with an average of 7.4 courses per employee.

The sector benefiting the most from training opportunities are those active in scientific, technical and specialised activities.

Retail and automotive employees, as well as staff members of small-sized companies, spend on average 9.1 and 10.3 hours, respectively, in training.

Executives and managers receive more training, with an average of 7.2 and 7 courses, respectively, in comparison to skilled employees who receive, on average, 5.1 training oppotunities and unskilled employees who only attend 2.5 courses.

According to the INFPC, in 2015, the training cost per participant was, on average, €263 and cost €53 per hour, with IT and communication courses being the most expensive, costing up to €500 per participant per session.

In the financial and insurance sector, the cost of training is slightly lower than that of all companies, with €248 spent, on average, per participant.

However, the hourly cost of the trainings is the highest in these industries, costing €71 spent on average.

Employees in these two sectors also participate in the shortest courses, lasting on average 3.5 hours for each participant.

The 2015 results published by the Training Observatory come from the requests for public co-financing for training submitted by companies for the year 2015.