Because of the rapid pace of technical progress, continuing education is the key to lifelong learning and Work 4.0. We will •w  ork with trade unions and employers to create means of more flexible and individual­ ised digital continuing education, in order to provide employees with industry-wide, practical IT-related basic knowledge and supplemental knowledge on communications and project work. BMWi has already developed an approach to digital continuing education in a half-day format, particularly for SME employees. This plan will be introduced in the near future to the major actors in the area of continuing education and discussed with respect to how to conduct trials. BMWi would also fund these trial runs for a short time. One condition would be commitment from continuing education participants; • p lace particular focus on SMEs, showing them ways to quickly and continuously train their employees. Rapid advances in technology require bigger efforts for further training, even for well-established companies and experienced employees. The Mittelstand 4.0 Centres of Excellence will provide help and instruction in digital training; • c ontinue to develop evaluation and perhaps certification systems for continuing education for employees without access to a company continuing education programme, in order to increase the attractiveness and transparency of such offers, and contribute to an effort to make continuing education generally more flexible. This includes setting up online courses for continuing education during employment; • a lso expand media literacy and enable everyone to use the resources offered by the Internet to continue learning on their own, and to be able to judge the quality of digital information and education being offered. www.de.digital 53