Positive Vocational Education and Training (VET) experience can generate benefits to individuals beyond those of income and employment; the learning content can foster confidence and self-esteem in learners and offer topics relevant to the individual’s engagement with their family and society. VET provision should not be geared solely towards giving people the ‘know-how’ or ‘the skills to do their job’ but should improve individuals’ competencies, including the ability to meet complex demands and the habits of self-direction. Individuals in a VET setting also have the opportunity to learn from other learners, make new social groups and possibly modify the previous ones. These interactions are extremely important for knowledge transmission and improvement in essential employability skills which could lead to wider benefits or outcomes for learners. This paper attempts to discuss a new framework called Attitude-Skill-Knowledge (ASK) model and its implementation results in a leading automobile organization.

It is an established fact that the skill level and educational attainment of the workforce determine the productivity as well as the ability to adapt to the changing industrial environment. The Indian workforce does not possess these marketable skills which is an impediment to securing decent employment for a better economic condition. While India has a large young population, even after six decades, only 10% of the Indian labor force—8% informally and 2% formally have acquired vocational skills, whereas the percentage in industrialized countries varies between
60% and 96%. About 63% of the school students drop out at different stages before reaching Class X. Only about 3.1 million vocational training seats are available in the country, whereas about 12.8 million enter the labor market every year. Further, the largest share of new jobs in India is likely to come from the unorganized sector that employs up to 94% of the national workforce, but most of the training programs cater to the needs of the organized sector (Planning Commission of India, 2006 and 2008; and DGE&T, 2010).

Problems arise due to a mismatch between demand and supply; 90% of employment opportunities require vocational skills, but 90% of our college/ school output has only bookish knowledge.

Management Research Journal, Industrial Employability, Vocational Training, Attitude-Skill-Knowledge (ASK), Vocational Education and Training (VET), Apprenticeship Training Scheme (ATS), Craftsman Training Scheme (CTS).