PRODUCTIVITY ECOSYSTEMS FOR DECENT WORK: A COURSE FOR POLICY-MAKERS AND PRACTITIONERS

This training course aims to enhance the skills of policy makers and practitioners in assessing and designing policies to improve productivity and working conditions in SMEs. The course hopes to inspire policy makers and practitioners to adopt a systemic approach to SME productivity that encompasses an effective combination of macro and meso-level policies, the creation of a conducive business environment and the strengthening of SME support institutions, together with intervention at the enterprise level. Special attention will be given to strategies that promote productivity at the corporate level and ways to scale-up corporate-level productivity programmes. OBJECTIVES By the end of this course, participants are able to: • identify the drivers of productivity in SMEs; • identify some of the linkages between productivity and working conditions in SMEs; • review productivity measurement methods and indicators; • examine the role of framework policy measures and SME targeted policies in enhancing SME productivity and working conditions; • analyse firm-level interventions to enhance productivity and improve working conditions; • analyse policy options to improve SME productivity and working conditions; • discuss and examine methods to share the gains of productivity enhancement in SMEs CONTENT WEEK 1 Session 1 Defining productivity, its drivers and its measures Session 2 Exploring the productivity Ecosystem Session 3 Enterprise-level interventions Self-learning : Why productivity matters for SMEs SME policies for productivity enhancement WEEK 2 Session 4 Meso-level interventions Session 5 Macro-level interventions for productivity enhancement Session 6 Sharing the gains of productivity enhancement Self-learning : Access to finance for SMEs Skills development strategies for SME productivity