Vocational Education and Training was part of his work in the private sector, where he oversaw the strategic development and rollout of work-based vocational programs.

But heading an agency like Sedefop, the European Centre for the Development of Vocational

Training, presented an altogether different challenge.

Yugen Zibel did not hesitate for a moment.

He took the challenge head-on when he was appointed to the role of SEDEFOP executive director in 2019.

Today, he will tell us all about what it means to be at the helm of such an organization

during these challenging times for us all.

I'm Rosie Vooduri, and this is the second episode of the SEDAFOP podcast, skillset and match.

Mr. Zibel, welcome to our podcast studio at the SEDAFOP podcast skill set and match. Mr. Zibyl, welcome to our podcast studio at the SEDAFOP headquarters in Thessaloniki.

Hello, thanks for having me.

And let's start on a personal note.

As pointed out in the introduction, you joined Sedefop, which is an EU agency, just over two years ago from the private sector.

How was the transition to a public organization and how valuable has your previous experience

been when dealing with SEDAFOP issues?

There's a lot of stereotypes about differences between work in the private sector and

working for an EU agency.

As a matter of fact, here I'm a general manager of a large operation, and this is very enriching.

And the fact that we also are governed, for instance, by a large tri-partite management board,

and that we have to respect a large set of regulations and rules throughout the year

as it's normal in the public sector. It's not so different to the private sector. We're also a lot of

issues, especially if you work like I in large corporations, you know, there's a lot of

politics going on there as well. So that did not really make it such a big difference for me. The difference was rather

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