How Do We Measure Up? Benchmarking the WorldSkills Competition

Imagine an international event with 696 competitors and teams from thirty-eight countries competing in over thirty-nine skills ranging from cabinet-making to web-design—judged by 636 experts and watched by 2,500 VIPs and observers and 120,000 spectators, about three-quarters of them children and young adults. Those, in summary, are the statistics of the thirty-eighth WorldSkills Competition held over four days in Helsinki in May 2005. WorldSkills is the world’s biggest skills competition where nations compete against each other. Like the Olympic Games, the WorldSkills Competition is not primarily about winning medals. It is a celebration of excellence that encourages and promotes ever greater achievement. And it is about international exchange and participation.