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The latest OECD Economic Survey of Slovenia (September 2017) encourages Slovenia to boost investment and productivity through better skills and regulation. What are the measures Slovenia needs to implement to achieve this?

OECD survey shows that Slovenia has sufficiently skilled workforce. Key challenge is how to foster competitive economic environment, create efficient work processes within organizations as well as sufficiently reward talents to be able to utilize such knowledge and skills. In this context, we could say we have an overqualified workforce in Slovenia which is underutilised and consequently dissatisfied. This contributes to the growing trend of brain-drain, with mostly highly qualified people moving to more developed and more productive working environments abroad. Another challenge is prequalification of employees from those industries that do not offer a competitive advantage in a global context, such as the textile industry, certain manufacturing industries, mining etc. Companies and the government should lead a proactive human resources strategy, recognise the discrepancies and prepare action steps to re-train the workforce to other, high value-added industries. Our school system should develop more cross-functional skills and less purely technical expertise. The Finnish school system, which ranks as one of the top in the world, has already banned typical school subjects and therefore instead of "teaching by subject", children are "taught by topic". They are encouraged to analyse daily world events from different perspectives. For example, a teenager studying a vocational course might take "cafeteria service" lessons which would include elements of math, languages (to help serve foreign customers), writing skills and communication skills. This is proactive development of a different, yet much needed, skill-set from early age on.

The OECD survey encourages Slovenia to "develop and attract highly skilled workers". What are your thoughts is Slovenian business environment, including the tax regulation, driving them away? 

Slovenia needs more initiatives in the area of cooperation between the economy and re- search institutions, accompanied by incentivising mechanisms for such cooperation. We have highly-skilled institutions and individuals who develop state of the art inventions and innovations, but we fail in the implementation of these into business and benefitting from the economies of scale. Such environment, combined with unattractive compensation and taxation system, is not able to compete with other markets to attract highly skilled talent. Our taxation system for the middle class is very demotivating and frustrating. Smart, educated and skilled individuals invest time and energy in their education and career, to being as productive as possible, and in return they get a pay-check with the same amount as a mechanic in Germany. Such a system does not only not attract talent from abroad, but it also drives local talent out of the country.

Slovenia's unemployment rate is currently 6.5% and declining. Although the labour market has recovered, we face the issue of an ageing workforce. According to the OECD survey, more than 60% of older people (55-64 year olds) are unemployed or retired. How should this be managed? 

This is a serious socioeconomic issue. We need to act now at both - on a national level and within organisations. Aside from stimulating longer working, state unemployment services need to invest more into skills' development and the re-training of older, unemployed workers who need to be build their ability in digital skills, foreign languages etc. They also need motivation and self-esteem to re-enter the labour market. Organisations should foster an open culture and respect towards older employees who bring valuable life experience and wisdom to their teams. In order to leverage multi-generational diversity, some companies already train employees and raise awareness on the positive effects of generational differences. While millennials could help the older generation to become more digitally literate, Baby Boomers and Generation X can provide crucial advice to their younger colleagues on how to navigate the office hierarchy, develop leadership skills and behave professionally. In order to facilitate these learning processes, more and more companies are implementing (reverse) mentoring programs.