As European countries are opening their doors to people from all over the world, the labor market is changing and adapting to the needs of those who have decided to look for better employment opportunities and raise their children abroad. This is one of the reasons the EmployMe project was born.

The EMPLOY ME project aims to improve and enhance the employability skills of young 2nd generation migrants through the development of innovative training content. Research shows that this group has a tendency to be excluded from the job market, and we aim to address this need for integration, and ultimately lead to strengthening the community. The project targets two different groups for greater impact: young migrants themselves and local youth workers, educators and experts in the field.

As part of the piloting of the EmployMe Toolkit, all partnering organizations from the cross-national consortium separately organized testing events to evaluate the EmployMe website and its Employability Toolkit. The first part of the testing involved in-field experts and youth workers working with the target group of the project. The second part of the testing focused on the immigrants themselves since the project was inspired by the specific needs and challenges they face in their new home countries.

Piloting With The Experts And Their feedback

In the Expert testing, experts from all partnering countries joined in (Lithuania, Greece, Belgium, Cyprus, Spain, Bulgaria, and the Czech Republic). In total, the Employability Toolkit was evaluated by 28 professionals. Most of them work in organizations helping with the integration of third-country residents in the partnering countries. Some of them are youth workers and educators, while others are human resources specialists actively hiring immigrants (specifically in the IT sphere). All of them had the chance to learn more about the EmployMe project and to personally test the platform, the theoretical resources, and practical activities. After that, they gave us their valuable feedback.

Here is what we learned from them:

• Generally, the governments of the above-mentioned EU countries welcome people from abroad but they could come up with a more “friendly” system for the newcomers, where they could have access to educational resources and employment opportunities
• They also suggested that in many cases people do not know their rights and often need psychological and health support. This is another area that the EU governments should step in to make the integration process easier.
• Native-language lessons should be provided to all members of immigrant families. Not only to the parents but also to their children. For grown-ups, it means better employment opportunities, and for youngsters, it means better education and improved socializing.

Piloting With The Immigrants And Their Feedback

The second stage of the piloting was also successful! In total, 123 immigrants living in Lithuania, Greece, Belgium, Cyprus, Spain, Bulgaria, Czech Republic gathered for the testing. They were invited to play around with the Employability Toolkit and give their opinions. Everyone was quite excited to see that their needs were being explored and met even on a smaller scale. They were enthusiastic to explore all the modules that featured topics such as “Teamwork”, “Negotiation skills”, “Leadership”, “Business acumen”, “Motivation” and others. They were able to test what personal competencies they could improve. Each module starts with a brief introduction and ends with a practical exercise. The practical activities caught the attention of everyone as they are both fun and informative ways to explore and build the above-mentioned employability skills that every employee needs for their personal and professional development.

Some important insights they shared with us

• They were happy that the platform can be worked with not only in English but also in the respective languages of the countries they are currently residing in (Lithuania, Greece, Belgium, Cyprus, Spain, Bulgaria, Czech Republic), as this gives them the chance to work on the development of their employability skills and practice their foreign languages
• They were happy that someone was trying to understand their needs and create an online portal to help them learn and grow
• They shared that they would love to be provided with more practical and hands-on resources where they could firm up their knowledge.

Employability Virtual Academy Will Be Live Soon!

The good news is that we are already prepared for their needs and we are currently preparing our Employability Virtual Academy which will offer more activities and interactive tools to help immigrants develop the employability skills they need for better work and career opportunities.

The EmployMe project is only getting better! Stay tuned for updates!

MINTIES BITĖS:

NSAG: 7

YOUTH: 22

JOBALITO REC TECH:

NSAG: 4

YOUTH: 21

Innovation HIve

NSAG: 3

YOUTH: 21