ULISSE – Understanding, Learning and Improving Soft Skills for Employability Erasmus Project

Project Title

ULISSE – Understanding, Learning and Improving Soft Skills for Employability

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for higher education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2018

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses; Labour market issues incl. career guidance / youth unemployment; Overcoming skills mismatches (basic/transversal)

Project Summary

Soft skills, according to ESCO’s (European Skills, Competences, Qualifications and Occupations) definition, are the cornerstone for the personal development of a person; the building blocks for the development of the “hard” skills and competences required to succeed in the labour market. Success in the labour market is seen to be more and more dependent upon possessing the hybrid skills – technical and soft skills – that employers increasingly value.
Soft skills can be distinguished into personal and interpersonal skills or interpersonal qualities and personal attributes that one possesses. This conceptualises soft skills in somewhat abstract terms and characterises them as innate. The idea on which this project is based sees soft skills as having “hard” component, which makes it possible to develop them by learning using appropriate tools, procedures and methods.
The human resource functions within companies often use soft-skills as a catch-all term without ever really defining them. But when placed in context – e.g. problem solving in relation to a systems failure on a production line – this might be regarded as a “not-so-soft-skill” (NSSS). This because there are tools, procedures and methods for learning how to solve problems. Of course, this needs to take into consideration the attitude of the person (their fortitude, determination, etc.), but there are other elements to problem solving too that can be learnt.
This lack of clarity has many consequences, not least that it is likely to lead to a poor match between applicants for a job and the content of that job, thereby wasting the time of the applicants and the recruiters. ULISSE project aimed to unveil the true meaning of soft skills by developing the concept of “NSSS” and creating a common language with respect to soft skills among the key actors involved (intermediaries, job seekers and employers).
Based on this, the project partners designed specific training paths for addressing the company’s NSSS needs, to increase the students employability and the job match-making. The training courses were focused on tools, procedures and methods, specifically designed to address this goal, ensuring effective and Pareto efficient results.
or designing the course, the partners first created a common lexicon of soft skills, through a data mining process: different databases, scientific papers and job vacancies provided by all the partners will be processed in a semi-automatic way using the Technimeter®.
Soft skills have then be unveiled, i.e. broken down (or “decomposed”) into more detailed and specific skills – representing their “hard side” – to be addressed efficaciously with tools, procedures and methodologies. The result was synthesized in a mind-map, expressing the “unveiled” soft skills and their relations.
To select the topics to address in the training course, the partnership conducted a gap analysis overlapping the skills in students’ CVs and the already existing University training with the results achieved in IO2. The workshops designed and then piloted in all the project countries involved 63 students and blended theory, methods and tools, exercises, practical work. The partnership has given open-access to all the learning materials, ppts, exercises and methodologies adopted during the course, now available on the project website “www.ulisseproject.eu”.
Partners also elaborated an innovative evaluation methodology, keeping into account two elements learned by their experience: i) the bias due to the common misunderstanding on the true meaning of them and ii) that the real outcome is the actual implementation of the tools, procedures and methodologies in every-day working-life. This methodology was based on a three-step procedure, assessing the students before the training course, at the end of it and one month later.
Finally, the partners developed an IT tool called Soft Skills Detector (http://ulisseapp.s3-website-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/home) aimed at helping companies to describe their job vacancies in a more effective way, thus facilitating the matching of job supply and demand. The toolkit has been designed and then piloted with a limited number of companies, before releasing the final version in English and all partner languages.
The key target groups for the project were employers, employment intermediaries (headhunters, recruiters, other Career Services (CS), etc) and job seekers, in our case University students/graduates. Employers benefited from the Soft Skills detector developed by the partners for supporting them write job vacancies in a more effective way. Universities benefitted from all the research activities carried out on soft skills and the training materials and assessment methodologies. CS increased their effectiveness in their intermediary role to help students design their career path; while students benefitted from the courses and materials delivered in increasing their employability.

Project Website

http://ulisseproject.eu

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 379323,8 Eur

Project Coordinator

UNIVERSITA DI PISA & Country: IT

Project Partners

• ERRE QUADRO SOCIETA A RESPONSABILITA LIMITATA
• LATVIJAS UNIVERSITATE
• INSTITUTO POLITECNICO DO PORTO
• UNIVERSIDAD MIGUEL HERNANDEZ DE ELCHE