Work community development plan
Together with the employee representative, the employer must create and maintain a work com-munity development plan. The purpose of the work community development plan is to act as a tool in the organisation of a dialogue about the way the personnel is used, the personnel structure, the personnel’s competence needs and competence development and the maintenance of wellbe-ing at work.
The development plan is intended to be a dynamic document, the content of which is updated over time. The plan may be updated in connection with the regular dialogue meetings, but there are no provisions regarding how often this should take place. The need for updates de-pends on the situation of each company and the changes occurring within it.
Redundancies may result in a need to amend the development plan
When the employer terminates the employment contracts of employees for financial or produc-tion reasons, the necessary changes are made to the development plan in connection with the dia-logue. This happens only after the change negotiations when the employer knows the number of employees whose contracts will be terminated and the training needs of the remaining employees in more detail.
Content of the development plan
The work community development plan must include the following:
- Description of the current situation and foreseeable development trends and changes that may influence the personnel’s competence needs and wellbeing at work. When the plan is created, it can be discussed how questions related to competence and wellbeing at work are seen at the workplace.
- Goals and actions that are used in developing and maintaining the personnel’s competence and promoting the personnel’s wellbeing at work. In practice, actions related to the per-sonnel’s competence development may refer, for example, to workplace practices that support on-the-job learning (such as interaction and the transfer of tacit knowledge). In the promotion of the personnel’s wellbeing at work, it is primarily a question of goals and ac-tions that may be significant for the personnel’s job enjoyment and job satisfaction. These could be, for example, remote work opportunities, factors or arrangements supporting work-life balance, the development or streamlining of workplace processes, practices or other such things, factors improving the work community’s functionality, interaction or flow of information, leadership-related questions, career advancement opportunities or the opportunity to influence the content of one’s own work.
- For each action, the division of responsibilities and the implementation schedule. The divi-sion of responsibilities refers to recording which parties or persons play an active role in the implementation of the actions or preparations mentioned in the plan.
- Follow-up arrangements. In practice, follow-up may be carried out in connection with dialogues.
Principles of using external labour as part of the development plan
The work community development plan must also include the principles of using external labour. In the dialogue, the purpose is that the employer and the employee representative discuss what kind of work, and to what extent, needs to be commissioned to external labour as subcontracted work or temporary agency work.
Other aspects must also be taken into account in the development plan
When creating and maintaining the work community development plan, attention must also be paid to, as necessary:
- the impacts of technological development, investments and other changes in the compa-ny’s operations on the work community;
- specific needs of employees at different stages of life as well as needs to maintain the work ability of elderly employees and employees who are at risk of incapacity for work and the access to the labour market of employees at risk of unemployment;
- work community leadership.