Towards digitalization in production in SMEs – A qualitative study of challenges, competencies and requirements for trainings

Digitalization is offering enormous opportunities for the manufacturing industry. Nevertheless, SMEs face major challenges in exploiting the potential of the digital transformation especially due to the lack of trained personnel in this respect. This study aims to identify challenges, required competencies of the workforce and requirements for trainings to successfully implement digitalization in SMEs. Therefore, semi-structured interviews were performed with more than 40 industry representatives - CEOs, production managers, interest representatives and consultants. These interviews were analyzed using the software MAXQDA and requirements and recommendations for SMEs were derived.