Nowadays, many European citizens face high risk of unemployment due to fast changing requirements of the job market. Technological changes, decreasing relevance of traditional working competencies and key meaning of new ones put many Europeans in high unemployment risk (i.e. due to automation or inadequacy of their competencies) or employment out of their competence profile (skills mismatch) leading to decreased productivity and life quality (Rathelot & Rens 2017). Especially constant innovation related changes, new technologies or business models, create the need for fast adaptation and developing corresponding competences which are not immediately available at the job market.In this scope, taking into account especially the major role of SMEs for EU economy, open innovation (OI) provides companies unique chances to engage in forefront innovation in face of often insufficient resources (Vanhaverbeke 2017). This however requires recruiting specialised staff that could support OI processes. Despite increasing (and expected to increase further) role of such positions as OI specialist/manager, networks and partnerships coordinator, knowledge manager, managers struggle to source recruits with required competences in this scope, while many EU adults face unemployment or high unemployment risk (Dabrowska and Podmetina 2014, Cedefop 2018). The OPI project aims to develop and test a comprehensive methodology and tools for requalification of human resources to obtain professional competences for those future oriented positions in open innovation scope. Due to, from one side, high importance of OI especially for strongly SMEs based economies and from the other, limited understanding of the OI processes, their benefits and job market opportunities among many job market stakeholders, the OPI project will aim at building labor market intelligence and competences in the area of open innovation that will allow to effectively develop supply of skills to fill the market gap while capitalising on existing pool of human capital. To this end, OPI will develop solutions that will focus on capacitating HR professionals to provide quality career guidance and counselling in the area of open innovation opportunities and requirements together with ready to use requalification/upskilling tools for unemployed and adults in risk of unemployment. The project will approach the issue from 2 perspectives. First, it will improve awareness of OI related professions, of their relevance and specifications among the staff related with HR development and guidance (staff of HR agencies, employment offices, NGOs fighting unemployment issues and firms' internal HR staff) and capacitate the staff to prepare employees and job seekers to adapt to new types of positions. In this scope, the project will not only extend and develop the competencies of the HR personnel supporting adult learners, but will also provide them with ready to use digital tools to diagnose re-qualification potential and further on, an on-demand OI upskilling program developed for the specific needs of OI competence building of unemployed/adults in unemployment risk. Second, it will directly address the needs of unemployed and staff in the need of requalification or upskilling to obtain key for modern and future market competences which is highly obstructed by lack of awareness of OI in the target group and lack of access to high quality learning opportunities in the OI area. It will allow them to gain practical competencies responding to the market needs. By providing specific methodology based on empirical research of market, its future orientation and target group needs, the project will support the individuals in obtaining key competences highly relevant for employability and innovativeness in a long-term. In OPI scope they will not only gain access to their needs oriented program for development of in-demand professional competences, but by capacitation of the specific HR support staff they will gain access to guidance in the area and will obtain critical motivation related with realistic recognition for the competences relevance in their job market environment (EIB 2019).Specifically, the project will deliver:-Study of local state of open innovation competencies,-Methodology and tools to build open innovation understanding among HR specialist and build their ability to guide job seekers or employees through upskilling/requalification to take position in scope of open innovation, -Diagnostic tool to evaluate human capital in scope of open innovation,-E-learning solution for building unemployed/employees in high unemployment risk competencies to take roles in scope of open innovation,-Comprehensive requalification guide for HR professionals and adult educators.

"INCREASE project is a direct response to reported employment risk of automation and SME problems in providing innovation and ensuring sustainability of innovation strategy. EU low-R&D intensive companies struggle with skilled workers availability, organisational problems and lack of innovation expertise. While ensuring staff engagement across functions is crucial for SME innovation, non-R&D SME staff presents significant lack of innovation understanding and skills. From the other side tech-innovation brought widespread risk of automation which is no longer limited to manufacturing and agricultural industries, but is accelerating fast across industries, especially in service, craft and other low-tech sectors. To support low-skilled adults in the risk of automation in increasing their employability and low-R&D intensive SME in increasing their innovative capacity the project aims at:-providing non-R&D employees with understanding how to contribute to innovation and relevant innovation skills,-building awareness of non-R&D employees of importance of innovation and related skills for their professional growth and employability,-developing innovative and entrepreneurial mindset among non-R&D staff,-building awareness of SME managers of importance of building innovation capacities among non-R&D staff and how to integrate them in innovation processes.The project complies with the priorities for 2019 of Erasmus+ program in that it promotes inclusion, and equality in the fields of training as well as shared values and equality of chances equality and social inclusion.To realize the objectives INCREASE will provide open user oriented skills development path in innovation area that will allow in time and cost effective way develop innovation skills among low skilled adults and increase capacity of SME for inclusive innovation. It specifically aims at upskilling low-skilled adults from non-R&D SME staff in high risk of automation. By development, test and delivery of targeted methodology and integrated online digital tools, it aims specifically at increasing the supply of high quality skills development programs in innovation area that will suit individual needs of low skilled Europeans, facilitate their access to upskilling pathways in innovation area and increase the human resources poll with innovation capacities. In that way the project is expected to provide a solution for increasing employability of low-skilled adults in automation risk. Further, by supporting SME in overcoming innovation barriers it is expected to contribute to increasing innovativeness and competitiveness of SME.To provide high quality comprehensive solution the partnership includes broad international spectrum of partners with diversified profile and expertise.- University ""Ştefan cel Mare"" of Suceava (Romania) - E&D Knowledge Consulting Lda. (Portugal)- Asociación Valencia Inno Hub (Spain)- Lappeenranta-Lahti University of Technology LUT (Finland)- Warp Innovation (Austria)- Danmar Computers zoo (Poland)- Asociatia de Dezvoltare Economico-Sociala (Romania)."