Heidemarie Müller-Riedlhuber
Founder and senior consultant at WIAB
She holds a master degree in Russian, together with a combination of Journalism, Political and Social Science, and a Master of Advanced Studies in Electronic Publishing.
She has been working as a product manager for e-publishing and blended learning and as a technical project manager. Since 2003 she is conducting national and European consulting and research projects in the field of labour market, gender, vocational and educational information. Furthermore, she is conducting projects in the field of competence description and validation, taxonomy development, software evaluation and online publishing.
Main priorities:
- Consultancy for national and international organisations (e.g. IAEA, AMS Austria, Climate-KIC, ANSE, VHS Vienna) in the field of labour market, vocational and educational information, the certification of non-formally and informally acquired skills and competences, the development of competence frameworks and taxonomies, the use of European standard classifications and transparency instruments.
- National and European projects, for example in the field of vocational information (e.g. studies on apprenticeship occupations for the Austrian Public Employment Service), the description and validation of competences (e.g. Certified Professional), taxonomy development, maintenance and translation (e.g. European Dictionary of Skills and Competences, DISCO; Guidelines for ESCO, the European Classification of Skills/Competences, Qualifications and Occupations).
- Studies for example on lifelong guidance, shortage occupations, the recognition of competences, teaching of basic competences, European databases of qualifications, European taxonomies of competences.
Currently, Heidemarie works as a consultant for the Austrian Public Employment Service (development of the vocational information system AMS-BIS) and for the Climate-KIC network (European rollout and quality assurance of the Certified Professional certificates). She is conducting projects in the field of vocational information (e.g. AMS-Berufslexikon) and is the project leader of the Erasmus+ project TRACK (training and recognition of the competences of informal caregivers) and the Sector Skills Alliance project PRODOME (certification of the competences of domestic housekeepers) at WIAB.
Petra Ziegler
Founder and senior researcher at WIAB
She holds a PhD in Contemporary History, a master degree in History, together with a combination of Political Science, Russian and Eastern European History, and graduated from a postgraduate programme on applied social sciences.
She has been conducting research activities in the field of labour market and gender research since 2003, in the field of educational research since 2007. She has been involved in research and consulting projects on national level (with public or private recipients) and on European level.
Main priorities:
- Managing European and national projects in the field of labour market and (vocational) educational research as well as occupational information.
- Conducting qualitative and quantitative studies, e.g. on lifelong learning, validating non-formally and informally acquired skills and competences, integrating elderly people into the labour market, possibilities to include low-skilled persons into further education and training, and strategies how to deal with skill shortages.
- Scientific consulting and evaluation.
Currently, Petra is a partner within Erasmus+ projects, such as RefuSkills and RefuNEET, that are focusing on early competence assessment of and effective guidance for refugees. Besides this, she is managing several research projects, e.g. on the relevance of basic skills and competences in VET colleges, on strategies for dealing with skill shortages or on validating non-formally and informally acquired skills and competences – focusing on low-skilled persons.