Hitachi Solutions, Ltd.
Designing training programs for young engineers not only with ITSS, but also with GAIT’s objective markers.
Hitachi Solutions, Ltd., with an enormous pool of 8000 engineers, plays a central role in the Group Business. The enterprise has started using GAIT to assess in detail, the IT knowledge of young engineers. The GAIT score report enables them to select technical trainings objectively and is expected to be helpful for engineers to acquire a balanced knowledge of IT.
The extensive use of Cloud technology in the industry led to the diversification of skill sets required for a SIer engineer. Fundamental knowledge still stays essential, but the insight to a variety of other fields such as security and virtualization has also become the need of the time. Providing well-balanced knowledge to the engineers is a common problem faced to a majority of SIer companies.
In order to solve this problem, Hitachi Solutions, Ltd. adopted the GAIT program .The IT enterprise which is core of the information and communication business of the Hitachi Group, provides one-stop “hybrid integration” with variety of suitable solutions combined from the viewpoint of total optimization. To support this kind of business, the enterprise visualized the human resource requirements and has started managing the human resource strategically in accordance to it.
Mr. Yoshihiro Matsuda
Manager
Human Capital Development Department
Mr. Yohei Noda
Assistant Manager
Human Capital Development Department
In-depth assessment of IT knowledge is essential for young engineers.
Mr. Yoshihiro Matsuda, Manager of Human Capital Development Department said that “We have been using IT skill standard (ITSS) to visualize the IT skills portfolio of our engineers. But found that it lacked the level of details and particulars that they needed to assess for engineers who had less than five years of experience. “We required more details to provide the young engineers essential guidance of IT knowledge which would have a significant impact in their carrier.”
GAIT caught Mr. Matsuda’s attention in the autumn of 2012. The quantified details of IT knowledge provided by GAIT sparked him with an idea to use GAIT as a supplement to ITSS for young engineers. They conducted their first assessment with 140 new hires that joined Hitachi Solutions in year 2013.
Mr. Yohei Noda, Assistant Manager of Human Capital Development Department said “GAIT helped me realize there is a bias of knowledge amongst young employees. It was not only a result of the difference in the initial knowledge, but was also related to the 3-month training provided to the new hires. For example, the training included DB and application contents that resulted in a relatively good score. On the other hand, the level of required knowledge for virtualization and network in the exam was higher than what was taught in the training curriculum, therefore led to a low trend of scores.”
“The ability to expose this kind of bias makes a big difference in judging the kind of trainings to be provided to the employees.” stated Mr. Noda.
We want to use GAIT’s Score Report for the training and development of young engineers.
Hitachi Group is well equipped with hundreds of training curriculums. However the selection decision of training modules is entrusted upon individuals leading to the risk of missing out learning opportunities of the important IT skills.
The practical knowledge attained by less experienced engineers on the projects is limited to specific area of expertise as they are performing current tasks with the knowledge they already pose. That is one of the reasons they tend to take business trainings instead of technical trainings. However this restricts them to take an active part in new and unfamiliar projects that are soon to come.
GAIT helps solve this problem by visualizing the area of knowledge that needs to be worked upon, making it possible for the Human Capital Development Department to guide necessary training modules for the engineers. The company’s HR development is based upon the PDCA （Plan-Do-Check-Action）cycle and by strengthening the ‘Check’ phase with GAIT, the action phase changes significantly.
“We also value the support system of Japan Third Party” added Mr. Noda. Network issues were faced during the examination. Upon reporting, the person in charge rushed to provide support on the same day. Within a week the cause of the problem was determined and a solution was suggested. The exam was successfully carried out in a work around method.
Hitachi solution plans to compare annual changes in GAIT results of young engineers until they enter their fifth year in company. “I would like to improve the technical capabilities of young engineers by creating a training model that focuses on providing a well balanced knowledge of IT first and later focus upon specialization in various fields.” said Mr. Matsuda.
Please note that titles and names of departments mentioned here were current at the time of interviews but may have changed since then.
- Company Name: Hitachi Solutions, Ltd.
- Head Office: 4-12-7 Higashishinagawa, Shinagawa-ku, Tokyo 140-0002, Japan
- TEL: 03-5780-2111
- http://www.hitachi-solutions.co.jp/
- Date of Establishment: September 21, 1970
- Capital: 38,758,139,571yen
- Total Employee: 15,452 (consolidated) * As of March 31, 2013
- Main Business: Software services, Information processing hardware sales
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