City of Barcelona – Catalonia, Spain

Pilot Name: Care sector upskilling and training

Description:

Capacity building of social enterprises, sharing economy, third sector, citizen’s organizations, crowdfunding initiatives, etc.

New job profiles and skills will be designed and prototypes will be made about the new trends on skills and profiles from the care services (addressed to elder and dependent people). With the outcomes from the design and prototype of new and polyvalent skills and professional profiles, adapted and innovative training plans will be designed.
New models of provision of care will be analyzed and prototypes will be built adapted to the new needs of elder and dependent people and caregivers according to the place where they receive the care services: at home, in residential centers or in day centers.

Activities:

The implementation of this pilot action will have several phases:

1). Deep analysis of the actual situation of the care sector – field of services of attention to dependent and elder people taking into account new proposals of reorganization of care.
2). Definition of a catalogue of professional profiles related to the services
3). Design of a professionalizing educational plan

Update of Barcelona Activa’s Pilot Action Information in +Resilient webpage (January 2021)

  1. Pilot Action main goals 

a)Deep analysis of the current situation of the care sector – specifically those services of attention to dependent and elder people.  

b)Definition and adaptation of  the  catalogue  of  professional  profiles and skills related  to  the  services  of  the care sector 

c)Design of training  plans adapted to the new needs of the sector ->upskilling 

  1. The framework of the pilot project 
  1. Working method 

5. Main Findings and outcomes of the pilot action 

  • Due to the social and demographic evolution of the Western countries, the Care Work is going from being a circumscribed activity in the family sphere, very feminized and with little public recognition to being considered a strategic sector in terms of job creation. Furthermore, there is a greater social concern about the professionals work, since access to care work is consolidating itself as an increasingly universal right. 
  • The care sector has been included as one of the 9 strategic sectors of the city thanks in part  to the development of this pilot action (but also because of the social and demographic situation and the pandemic)  and to the collaboration of different departments of the City Council and Barcelona Activa 
  • The pilot action is trying to help to  generate a positive image of the sector as the jobs related to it are perceived as very hard work and as a low-prestiged jobs. This depends on guaranteeing the minimum wage conditions to achieve the quality of the service but also in the fact that the caregivers will have the chance to make professional careers and won’t leave the sector as soon as they can get another job.