A Common Sector Commitment to Anticipation and Action

Published on: 02/11/2023Updated on: 02/11/2023

To develop solutions in a sector under significant pressure, IPERIA and the individual employment and domestic work branch met on October 5 for a day of discussions and perspectives. By sharing ideas, experiences, and commitments, we identified key observations and initiatives that support the sector's professions, enhance their appeal, and serve diverse audiences.

A Sector Under Pressure

"2030 is tomorrow!" Marielle Brouard, chair of the Joint National Employment and Training Committee (CPNEFP) of the professional branch, emphasized the urgency to accelerate momentum as projections indicate a deficit of 800,000 positions in the domestic work sector by 2030. Alongside her, CPNEFP Vice-Chair Véronique Delaitre reaffirmed the branch's confidence in a sector that "has proven its ability to tackle challenges head-on." To map out trajectories for the 1.3 million employees who support 3.3 million individual employers at home, numerous partners and key stakeholders followed, providing concrete responses to tomorrow's challenges.

A Future to Brave

A futurist, Philippe Cahen, provided insight into the dizzying question of the future. His role? To examine weak signals, analyzing emerging movements today that could shape tomorrow through their influence.

"The approaching world is completely different, and it's moving very fast," he observed, adding that "time is slow, long, and short simultaneously". For Philippe Cahen, the solution lies in frugality - living better with less. His observation is a "societal mutation in which we will slow down". According to the futurist, three barriers block our momentum:

The race for over-qualification
A world dominated by artificial intelligence (AI) but lacking in emotional intelligence (EI).
Recognition of people and professions

This last point is at the heart of the domestic work sector's challenges. For nearly 30 years, stakeholders have worked for employee recognition and professionalization.

A Sector That Takes Action

"We are a sector of proof - if we don't prove it, we don't get it. And we have proven that it was possible": Marie-Béatrice Levaux, Chair of the National Joint Council for Social Dialogue (CNPDS), recalled the numerous movements and multiple advances the sector has initiated over 30 years and the urgency to keep looking forward. "We have often gone against preconceptions. We no longer have time to convince skeptics. Now is the time for action," she added.

To illustrate the sector's dynamism and determination, Stéphane Fustec, CNPDS Vice-Chair, highlighted the adoption of a new Collective Agreement, effective January 1st, 2022, and its benefits, including a retirement bonus, construction of a joint system, new social rights, and improved income. He was pleased that the sector now has "its own Social and Economic Committee" through the Social and Cultural Activities department: "significant progress and an attractiveness factor."

New Target Audiences in Sight

Attract. Unite. These are two challenges to meet tomorrow's needs. The morning's discussions highlighted several action drivers toward a common goal: convincing new audiences to join the sector.

As a partner in these discussions, Pôle Emploi expressed its desire to become more open to domestic work professions while noting a significant step to take: "We are not professionals in these fields, so we need to surround ourselves with sector references. This means having advisors informed about the sector to spread information across regions," explained Anne de Vasconselos, Business and Professional Federation Partnership Relations Manager. Céline Spiguelaire, Head of Regional Economic Development, added the need to "deconstruct preconceptions and take action with potential candidates like migrant audiences through LabMigration, which offers individualized pathways".

Marina Cosset, director of PLIE des Hauts-de-Garonne, presented another action driver for attracting new audiences: PLIE (Local Multi-year Plans for Integration and Employment), which specializes in helping disadvantaged job seekers, including young people, return to the workforce.

For his part, Hugo Villand, Development and Partnerships Manager for the French Apprentices Association, emphasized the sector's need to reach out to young people: "They are drawn to meaningful professions - that's a card we can play". While aware of the barriers to domestic work professions for this audience (lack of awareness, poorly perceived conditions (physical demands, working hours...)), Hugo Villand welcomed the signing of a Collective Agreement as a sign of improved working conditions and thus attractiveness to younger people.

Increasingly Innovative Support

Sure, we can attract them – but then what? Without support, there is no salvation. On this topic, Nadège Turco, Deputy Director of IPERIA, reatated our desire to "help project a positive image to (future) employees of how the sector perceives them." How? By offering individualized support, helping them identify their skills, and develop new ones.

René Bagorski, Director of Professional Certification at France Compétences, reiterated this body's regulatory mission and discussed the ongoing work of processing applications and mapping different certifications to promote individual mobility. Flexibility, evolution, and adaptability: through active monitoring and redesigning its certification framework, IPERIA strives to meet France Compétences' expectations and the evolving needs of individual employers and employees.

Skills promotion also occurs through RPL (Recognition of Prior Learning), represented at this national event by Olivier Gérard, Project Manager France VAE. The recent overhaul of this system aims to make it more effective while preserving its core objective: putting people at the heart of the system. Olivier Gérard recalled the creation of the "pathway architect" role by IPERIA for the sector, which allows everyone to benefit from personalized support in building their professional development path.

Another tool mentioned for skills recognition was Open Badges. Philippe Petitqueux, General Secretary of the Reconnaître Open Recognition Alliance association, explained that their objective is to make the informal visible: a skill, know-how, interpersonal skills, participation, role, achievement, commitment, contribution, project, or interest.

Last but not least, Nadège Turco developed the mission of Sector-specific career guidance and development consulting (COEPS), implemented to give (future) employees "the foundations of a professional development path to secure their employment or attract them to the sector." Enhanced, more structured, and personalized support to effectively highlight skills once again.

The Key Role of Professionalization

In conclusion to these exchanges, Baptiste Lenfant, General Delegate of the Domicile & Compétences group, commended the contribution of training organizations "who have made professionalization one of the major pillars in structuring this sector for 30 years".

He shared two investment focus areas. The first concerns "professional certification, which represents triple recognition - personal, professional, and social - the backbone of the branch's professionalization policy. It is at the heart of all programs being launched such as RPL or LabMigration". The second priority set by Baptiste Lenfant, which "requires greater engagement” is the question of professionalizing support and prevention in-home care," adding that "the aging question is at the heart of societal issues. Our action must be more focused on these subjects".

Challenges, goals, perspectives: to see where the trajectories set by various stakeholders in the individual employment and domestic work branch will lead us; see you in 2024.

To (re)watch the day's exchanges: