Donaldson

Donaldson builds filtration systems and technology that keep air and fluids clean for industry, transport and process installations. The Belgian site combines production with engineering and a European support role. Operators and technicians on the floor work with certificates that expire; engineers, quality and the commercial team follow product, standards and language training. Two training rhythms in one workforce.

With the annual accounts, the National Bank asks for the training section of the social balance sheet: codes 5801 to 5853. Three blocks — formal training, less formal and informal training, and initial vocational training — each with the same three figures: the number of employees involved, the hours followed and the net cost. Every figure separately for men and for women. The net cost is not what the invoice says: it is the gross cost plus the contributions paid minus the subsidies received. Pull that together only in March out of loose Excel lists and you start again every year.

Whether a training is sorted as formal or informal determines which block it lands in. That same definition applies to the training plan, which is mandatory from twenty employees, has to contain at least formal and informal training, and whose content must be settled by 31 March at the latest. In Smart Lions that classification happens once, at recording, together with the hours, the participants, the cost and the subsidy. Since the Federal Learning Account was abolished on 1 January 2026, that same record is also your evidence for the individual training entitlement of five days per full-time employee.

The training figures in the National Bank's code order, with the subsidies already netted off in the net cost. That is the training section, not the complete social balance sheet: the other sections stay with your accountant. Then the training plan as an export for the works council, with a separate anonymised copy for the FPS Employment, the training entitlement per employee in days calculated on the joint committee, and certificates with an expiry date that send a reminder themselves before they lapse.