GEPP (formerly GPEC): definition, obligations and implementation

What is GEPP?

GEPP is both an HR management process and a mandatory bargaining topic. It consists of comparing the company's future needs, derived from its strategy, with the jobs and skills it has, then closing the gap through action on training, mobility, recruitment and career paths.

GPEC or GEPP: what is the difference?

GPEC (gestion prévisionnelle des emplois et des compétences, forward planning of jobs and skills) refers to the system for anticipating job and skills needs. The Labour Code has folded it into a broader negotiation, titled "management of jobs and career paths": GPEC is now only its first topic (Article L2242-20, 1°).

	GPEC	GEPP
Purpose	Anticipate job and skills needs	Anticipate these needs and organise the career paths that meet them
Place in the Labour Code	First topic of the GEPP negotiation	Title of the mandatory negotiation (L2242-2, L2242-20)
Topics covered	Anticipation system and support measures	Anticipation, internal mobility, training priorities, use of precarious contracts, information for subcontractors, careers of union representatives

In practice, many companies still use "GPEC" for the process; the legal term for the negotiation is GEPP.

Which companies must negotiate on GEPP?

The obligation applies, where sections of representative trade unions have been set up (Article L2242-1), to:

• companies and groups of companies with at least 300 employees;
• EU-scale companies and groups with at least one establishment or company of at least 150 employees in France.

Frequency. The negotiation takes place at least once every four years (Article L2242-2). Without an agreement setting the schedule, it takes place every three years (Article L2242-13); if the employer has not opened it for more than 36 months, a representative trade union can require it.

Experienced employees. Since Law No. 2025-989 of 24 October 2025, the same companies must also negotiate on the employment, work and improvement of working conditions of experienced employees, at least every four years (every three years without an agreement). This negotiation is separate from GEPP but covers related subjects.

Companies with fewer than 300 employees have no obligation to negotiate, but nothing prevents them from adopting the approach. Their OPCO (skills operator) has a duty to help small and medium-sized companies define their training needs (Article L6332-1).

What does the GEPP negotiation cover?

Article L2242-20 sets the content of the negotiation, conducted in particular on the basis of the company's strategic orientations:

1. setting up a system for forward planning of jobs and skills, including with regard to the ecological transition, and the related support measures (training, top-ups to personal training accounts, validation of prior experience, skills assessment, support for mobility);
2. where relevant, the conditions for internal professional or geographical mobility;
3. the three-year priorities for vocational training and the objectives of the skills development plan, including priority categories of employees and jobs, and the criteria for topping up personal training accounts;
4. the outlook for using fixed-term contracts, temporary agency work, part-time work and internships, and ways to reduce precarious employment;
5. informing subcontractors about strategic orientations that affect their trades, jobs and skills;
6. the career progression of employees holding trade union responsibilities.

A review is carried out when the agreement expires.

In companies with at least 50 employees, the social and economic committee (CSE, the employee representative body) is also consulted on forward planning of jobs and skills, training priorities and the skills development plan, as part of the consultation on strategic orientations (Article L2312-24).

How do you implement a GEPP approach?

1. Start from strategy. Identify, over three to five years, the changes in activity, technology, regulation and organisation that will alter jobs.
2. Describe jobs and skills. A shared skills framework sets the vocabulary and expected levels.
3. Measure the current state. Skills mapping positions each employee and team against the framework. Career path interviews are a regular source of input.
4. Project needs. Cross future needs with the age pyramid, expected departures and hard-to-fill jobs, to identify sensitive jobs (growing, shrinking or changing).
5. Choose the levers. Training, internal mobility, retraining periods, recruitment, knowledge transfer between generations.
6. Turn it into a plan. Training actions feed the skills development plan, whose objectives are set by the GEPP negotiation.
7. Monitor. Indicators of gap reduction, completed moves, positions filled internally, review when the agreement expires.

How does it relate to the skills development plan?

GEPP sets the three-year direction; the skills development plan is its operational, usually annual, translation. The law links them directly: the GEPP negotiation covers the plan's objectives, including priority employees and jobs (Article L2242-20, 3°). Without GEPP, the plan mainly responds to immediate requests; without a plan, GEPP remains a statement of intent.