• training
• sales growth
• productivity
• micro firms
• Italy

In a globalized and fast growing world, the role of the human capital is determinant. One of the main tool in order to upgrade the skills of the workers and foster the accumulation of human capital, is training. Its increasing importance is stressed at the international level by the New Skill Agenda for Europe and by Europe 2020 for a sustainable and smart growth. However, studies of the European Commission reveals that the European employers do not spend enough in upgrading the skills of their employers. This is especially true for what concerns micro and small firms, where the provision of training is even lower. The aim of this dissertation is to analyze the impact of training on sales growth and productivity in the Italian micro firms. The analysis exploits data from the Trend Dataset, created by the collaboration of ISTAT and CNA, that provides quarterly information about important economic variables, for the period going from 2013 to 2017 for three Italian regions: Marche, Umbria and Toscana. The empirical analysis consist of two different models: the first one that studies the effect of training on the firm’s growth, while the second one that studies the effect of training on productivity. The methodologies employed include the OLS as the baseline model and the fixed effect estimator, capable of treating the unobserved heterogeneity.