“MY LADIES AREN’T INTERESTED IN LEARNING”:MANAGERS, SUPERVISORS AND THE SOCIAL CONTEXT OF LEARNING

ANNE MUNRO, LESLEY HOLLY and HELEN RAINBIRD

Abstract – This paper is based on a research project which examines the opportuni-ties for and barriers to workplace learning amongst low-grade staff in the UK publicsector. It examines the key role of managers and supervisors, who make many of thedecisions about individuals’ access to learning opportunities. Their perception of staff’swillingness and need to learn is influenced by factors such as age, gender or the like-lihood of career development. It is these managers who control the immediate workenvironment and the flow of information about learning opportunities. Innovativeexamples of workplace learning are described, yet the paper concludes that the realityfor many low grade manual and routine clerical staff continues to be one of limitedopportunities for workplace learning.

Zusammenfassung – Der Artikel basiert auf einem Forschungsprojekt, das imVereinigten Königreich die Möglichkeiten und Grenzen des Lernens am Arbeitsplatzbei Personal im öffentlichen Dienst mit geringer Ausbildung bewertet. Untersucht wirddie Schlüsselrolle von Managern und Aufsichtspersonal, die viele der Entscheidungenüber Zugang des Einzelnen zu Bildungsmöglichkeiten treffen. Ihre Wahrnehmungvon Bereitschaft und Bedürfnis des Personals zum Lernen wird durch Faktoren wieAlter, Geschlecht oder der Wahrscheinlichkeit zur Karriereentwicklung beeinflusst.Genau diese Manager kontrollieren die unmittelbare Arbeitsumgebung und denInformationsfluss über Lernmöglichkeiten. Innovative Beispiele des Lernens amArbeitsplatz werden beschrieben, trotzdem schliesst der Autor jedoch, dass die Realitätfür viele wenig ausgebildete Arbeiter und Angestellte in Routinebürojobs weiterhinbegrenzt Möglichkeiten zum Lernen am Arbeitsplatz bereithält.

Résumé – Cet article qui se fonde sur un projet de recherche réalisé auprèsd’employé(e)s à faibles qualifications dans le système publique britannique examineles possibilités d’apprendre sur le lieu de travail et les entraves à un tel apprentis-sage. Il analyse le rôle clé des dirigeants et superviseurs qui prennent la plupart desdécisions relatives à l’accès des individus aux opportunités d’apprendre et de se former.La façon dont ils perçoivent la disposition du personnel à apprendre et ses besoins enla matière dépend de facteurs tels que l’âge, le sexe et la probabilité d’une futurecarrière. Ce sont ces dirigeants qui contrôlent l’environnement professionnel immédiatet le flux d’informations concernant les possibilités d’apprentissage et de formation.L’article cite en outre quelques exemples innovateurs mais conclut que, dans la réalité,beaucoup d’employés qui effectuent des tâches manuelles peu qualifiées et répétitives,bénéficient de possibilités très restreintes d’apprendre et de se former sur leur lieu detravail.

Resumen – Este trabajo está basado en un proyecto destinado a investigar las opor-tunidades y barreras que existen en cuanto a la capacitación en el lugar de trabajo delos empleados públicos de niveles inferiores en el Reino Unido. El artículo examinael papel clave que desempeñan los ejecutivos y los supervisores, puesto que son losque toman muchas de las decisiones relacionadas con el acceso de las personas a las

International Review of Education – Internationale Zeitschrift für Erziehungswissenschaft– Revue Internationale de l’Education 46(6): 515–528, 2000. 2000 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.

oportunidades de formación. Su percepción de la voluntad del personal y de sunecesidad de capacitarse es influenciada por factores tales como edad, género o pro-babilidad de desarrollo de la carrera. Son estos ejecutivos los que controlan el entornode trabajo inmediato y el flujo de informaciones sobre las oportunidades de perfec-cionamiento profesional. El artículo describe ejemplos innovadores de formación enel lugar de trabajo, pese a su conclusión de que, para un gran número de trabajadoresy de empleados de niveles inferiores, la realidad sigue siendo una de oportunidadeslimitadas de formación en el lugar de trabajo.

This paper provides an overview of some of the initial findings from a researchproject “The future of unskilled work: learning and workplace inequality”which is funded under the Economic and Social Research Council’s (ESRC)“Future of Work” programme.1 The project has a dual focus: on the changestaking place in unskilled work in the public sector which are leading to newinitiatives in training and development and on the workers who occupy unqual-ified manual and routine clerical jobs. Here we demonstrate the importanceof supervisors and managers as “gatekeepers” to learning in the workplace,arguing that their perceptions of workers’ requirements for education andtraining are crucial. Employees whose jobs are classified as unskilled earnlower rates of pay and have poorer conditions of employment than those whoare in skilled and professional grades. This disadvantage in employment isreinforced by access to learning opportunities: because career paths are rarelyattached to unskilled work there may be few opportunities for job mobility.The training and development needs of these workers may therefore be per-ceived as being restricted to those that are immediately job-related or thosethat are required by law (such as health and safety). Positive examples ofworkplace learning are described, while barriers are also identified.

In the research “skill” is regarded as a socially constructed and the conceptof “unskilled” is used to describe a range of occupational groups, but is not

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intended to imply that technical competence is not necessary to do these jobs.In the health service non-qualified is a preferred term, although this too hasproblems. The evidence on the transformations affecting unskilled work pointsin a number of different directions. On the basis of survey material Galliehas suggested that while the employer response to competition has beenupskilling and job enrichment, there are fewer opportunities open to semi-skilled and unskilled workers (1996). In contrast, Waddington and Whitstonargue that work intensification lies at the core of workplace relations ratherthan empowerment (1996). McLaughlin points out that while many unskilledmanufacturing jobs have disappeared through restructuring and new tech-nologies, there are nevertheless many jobs in the service sector where thedemand for skills will continue to be low and where some employers may beactively deskilling segments of their workforce (1985). Through the case studyapproach it is possible to identify such trends to work organisation and relatethis to the role of workplace learning.

The empirical research was carried out at six case study organisations, threeNational Health Service (NHS) trusts and three local authorities. The six wereidentified with the assistance education officers from the trade union Unison,2

all having worked in partnership with the union on employee developmentprogrammes aimed at the least skilled sections of the workforce.3 They areorganisations which are engaged in innovative practices as far as adult learnersare concerned and therefore provided an appropriate context to consider howlearning in the workplace may be facilitated or inhibited. Interviews were con-ducted with senior and middle managers and staff in the categories identi-fied. The findings presented in this paper draw on an initial analysis of thefirst four case studies completed, three NHS trusts, two community basedand one general hospital based, and one local authority. The organisationshave been given fictitious names to preserve their anonymity.

In order to address these issues the paper firstly identifies some of thefeatures specific to the public sector before outlining the organisational contextfor workplace learning, before considering positive examples of job enlarge-ment and secondly barriers to workplace learning.

The work context in the public sector

Local government and health service trusts were chosen as sites for theresearch for a number of reasons. Firstly, they are sectors which are under-going substantial changes in the organisation of service delivery and arehaving to implement them in a context of budgetary constraints and controlsimposed by central government. Secondly, there are significant changesoccurring in manual work and routine clerical work which have consequencesfor training and development, such as the introduction of generic working,job enlargement, reductions in levels of supervision and changes in theinterface with users. Thirdly, public funding and accountability have placed

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greater emphasis on compliance with initiatives such as Investors in Peopleand the accreditation of employee competence through National VocationalQualifications. These developments are taking place in a context of changingindustrial relations structures with the move towards local bargaining on someaspects of the employment relationship in the health service and the new singlestatus agreement in local government. The unions organising these grades ofworkers have taken initiatives to put training on the bargaining agenda. In par-ticular, Unison, nationally the largest trade union and a significant force inthe health service and local government, has a large education department andhas been at the forefront of initiatives on adult learning and employee devel-opment and in developing partnerships with employers to create opportuni-ties for non-traditional learners (Munro, Rainbird and Holly 1997).

This is a period of dramatic change to unskilled work in the publicsector and reorganisation appears to be moving in two directions. The firstis the removal of sectors of the workforce to the private sector, in localauthorities through compulsory competitive tendering under the ConservativeGovernment and in the health service through market testing and possibly inthe future through the Private Finance Initiative. At this stage, it is not clearwhat the impact of the Labour Government’s “best value” practice will be onworking patterns in local government. The second trend can be found whereservices have remained in-house. Here, many managers have pursued a moveto generic work organisation (multi-skilling or multi-tasking). This involvesbreaking down traditional lines of demarcation between different tasks.Generic working is taking a myriad of different forms which are still emerging,combining manual and clerical work, combining jobs previously regarded asmale or female, such as cleaning and portering in the health service, or evencombining manual and semi-professional caring activities. Such developmentsare facilitated by local collective bargaining, the harmonisation of conditionsand the introduction of single pay spines. These changes may be driven bythe need for cost efficiency, changes to service demands, reduced needs forcertain staff through technological change, the shortages of skilled staff, or acombination of these. As the boundaries between skills and between occupa-tions are challenged, the project as a whole provides a rare opportunity toexamine the dynamic way in which work is shaped by social divisions suchas class, gender and race. In this context, access to training and developmentcan take on a new significance and there may be opportunities for the devel-opment of new routes into occupational qualifications and job mobility. Herewe particularly focus on the ways in which supervisors and managers formthe link between the individual worker and the wider organisation.

The organisational context for workplace learning

All of the organisations included in the research aim to create an employ-ment climate in which development is considered appropriate for all sections

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of the workforce. This is evident, for example, in their attainment or com-mitment to attaining the Investors in People (IIP) standard. IIP was formedin 1994, a business-led, government supported body which aims to promotenational standards of practice, linking training to the business or service needsof organisations (Harrison 1997). There were a range of approaches to issuesof development in the case study organisations, for example some haveadopted formal systems in which all staff were expected to have personaldevelopment plans and have regular development interviews with their linemanager. In contrast others have less formal systems where line managers orteam leaders take a key role in identifying individual employee’s developmentneeds. In either context development needs may be linked more or less tightlyto service delivery needs and the changing skill mix within teams.

When senior managers were asked why their organisation had increasedtraining and development opportunities for lower grade staff, there were anumber of explanations. The main responses concerned the need to improveefficiency and quality of service, and training and development was seen ascentral to this objective. Some managers, particularly in the local authoritysaw training as central to equal opportunities: “What is the point of trying toget an equal opportunities climate and a climate of respect and choice if somestaff have not had a chance to think through these issues? They need spaceoutside of the workplace.” Some senior managers expressed some concernabout the difficulty of establishing the cost efficiency of programmes such asReturn to Learn or National Vocational Qualifications (NVQ). Interestinglyalmost all staff spoken to throughout the research were very conservative aboutonly wanting training and development which had a relevance to their work,one said “I would feel cheated if I couldn’t use it in the job”. However,defining what is relevant to work is less clear with staff taking a much widerview than many line managers who were more likely to focus on immediateoperational issues.

During the research it was possible to identify some particularly innova-tive development initiatives which have enabled some staff to progress fromunskilled occupations through to professional training. However, it equallybecame clear that this ethos of development and learning is not present withinall departments, sections or workgroups within these organisations. This paperbegins to identify some of the barriers to workplace learning and develop-ment, focusing on the social context of learning and staff responses to this aswell as exploring the views expressed by managers and supervisors.

The different forms of workplace learning

When starting a job employees may receive formal induction training, butmore frequently staff are “thrown in at the deep end”. Many said that if theyare lucky, they receive a short period of instruction on the technical require-ments of the job. In many areas of public service there are mandatory courses

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which staff must complete and regularly up-date (eg. lifting and handling, firesafety, food hygiene, resuscitation and first aid etc.). However, a number ofstaff claimed never to have been on even the mandatory courses. Some staffperceived a gap between the organisational rhetoric of training and develop-ment and their own personal experience.

On-going workplace learning may include both formal training and devel-opment courses and programmes and structured and informal on-the-joblearning that takes place on a day-to-day basis. For many people covered bythis research the majority of their workplace learning comes from on-the-jobactivities, including more formal instruction by colleagues or supervisors andthe informal “work it out as you go along” approach which was particularlywidespread. We found that supervisors were crucial to the access of informalas well as formal learning opportunities.

Formal training programmes such as the National Vocational Qualificationare becoming much more widespread. An NVQ represents a statement ofcompetence confirming that an individual can perform to a specified standardat one of five levels (from Level 1: semi-skilled, to Level 5: higher profes-sionals) in a range of work-related activities. NVQs incorporate standards laiddown by the various industry lead bodies and are accredited by the NationalCouncil of Vocational Qualifications. Some employers now looking for anNVQ Level 2 in Care as an entry requirement into work as a care assistantor equivalent. The NVQ programmes usually combine some classroom basedstudy with on-the-job assessment of competencies. Less common are pro-grammes linked to general development and not directly task related, such asthe Return-to-Learn4 programme run in partnership with Unison. In additionmost training and development departments provide a range of short coursesin-house, often lasting for a day or half a day. These may be on a range oftopics such as restraining violent clients, and may be open to all staff or forspecific occupational groups. These courses are usually advertised via atraining booklet, usually kept by the line manager, but many staff claimednever to have seen this, which raises issues about where such information iskept and who has access to it.

In addition we found that a number of staff engage in external courses intheir own time and often at their own expense, even when the course appearsto be work-related. For example some care assistants were studying coun-seling and clerical staff were studying computer skills at their own expense.The employers were supporting a relatively narrow range of learning oppor-tunities and often relied on staff bringing with them a considerable level ofexpertise in their area of work.

Positive examples of job enlargement and workplace learning

There were in the research a number of significant examples of job enlarge-ment and enrichment, particularly in the health care worker role. There were

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also cases of new routes of job progression crossing job boundaries whichhave traditionally been major barriers. In the radiology department of GeneralHospital new technology had removed the need for technical assistants.However, the role has been developed with a focus on patient contact, ratherthan removing the job altogether. The assistants may be asked to assist withbiopsy in ultrasound or the CT Department and this was one of the grayerareas, some people expressing concern about being involved in this level ofwork. Managers acknowledged that while work may be more interesting, aspeople take on additional responsibilities they also may feel exploited.

Another example from the same hospital is that of the new role of NursingTherapy Assistants being developed in Neurology as a pilot scheme. Theward is staffed by a team made up of qualified nurses and care assistants.Occupational Therapists and Physiotherapists, who work Monday to Friday,come to the ward to treat patients. The new Therapy Assistant combines thethree roles of care assistant, Occupational Therapy helper and Physiotherapyhelper, a horizontal expansion of the role – it could be seen as job enlarge-ment and/or job enrichment.

The attitude of other groups of workers and their trade unions is of con-siderable significance in contexts in which the job roles of lower skilled oper-atives are being extended (cf. Cockburn 1983; Rainbird 1988). Although theattitude of nurses varied enormously in the fieldwork, it appeared that it wasthis divide between qualified and unqualified nurses that was the most sen-sitive to encroachment. At Northern Community Trust a senior managerdescribed the difficulty of recruiting qualified nurses, and the void createdby the removal of the old enrolled nurse grade (SEN). She described the trustas increasingly relying on support workers who needed to be better trainedbut in a context in which they had to “cut across professional divisions”, whereno one wants to part with skills at the bottom range of their job. The openingup of progression routes into qualified work raises a different set of issues,although these routes are not yet well established. A number of managersclaimed that they had established career progression between domestic serviceand care assistant roles, although there was no specific evidence to supportthis. In theory it is possible for someone to move from cleaning through tobecoming a qualified nurse, yet such career mobility is likely to be a realityfor very few people. However, one woman had made a move from domesticservice to a clerical job at London Community Trust after taking part in theReturn to Learn course.

Another interesting example is that of the ex-porter at London CommunityTrust. Traditionally porters have a degree of geographical mobility andflexibility in terms of the use of their time. During the 1990s the porters usedthis flexibility to familiarise themselves with and experiment on the newlyarrived computers. Clerical staff had less opportunity for this “learning bytrial and error” method, and the porters became the hospital experts on thecomputing systems. When a reorganisation removed the role of porter one ofthem joined the administrative staff, teaching other clerical and administra-

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tive staff about the computer but still carrying out the occasional “odd job”around the hospital. This is a particularly interesting case of occupationalmobility from a predominantly male to a female area of work, but also froma manual to a white collar job. Significantly, the organisation of work inthe porter’s job provided the space to enable this self-directed informallearning.

These examples illustrate that there are real opportunities for job progres-sion and opportunities for education and/or professional development. Wherestaff have had positive experiences of learning in the workplace they mayhave very positive attitudes towards management and the organisation andfeel that training opportunities are a recognition by management of the valueof staff. However, where there is a feeling of unequal access to training oppor-tunities or a feeling of barriers to education and training staff expressed fairlynegative feelings. The next section consider some points which relate to theNVQ programme and the following section will look specifically at thebarriers to workplace learning.

The NVQ programme

There has been considerable debate concerning the value of the NVQ, whichwas reflected to some extent in this research (Hevey 1997). Most seniormanagers have made a commitment to NVQ as the appropriate way forwardfor the non-professional staff. In the health service it was the NVQ in Carewhich was most frequently used, with all of the trusts being accredited centresfor assessment. However, middle and line managers were less confident aboutthe value of different levels of NVQ, some expressing doubt about the stan-dards of some candidates who were achieving Level 3. Other managers dididentify a range of benefits: “it draws them out and makes them feel part ofthe team”; “it develops a professional attitude”; one also saw benefits in termsof staff behaviour, “it makes them less bolshy”.

Staff were almost all positive about the NVQ in Care. Most staff who hadcompleted it felt that they had grown in confidence, and felt that managers,clients and relatives all treated them differently, giving them more respect.Increasingly, Level 2 in Care is classed as a desirable qualification for entryinto care work and staff are frequently pragmatic about needing the qualifi-cation for any job change. Across all of the organisations the problems withthe NVQ programme were similar. The shortage of assessors was the mostfrequent problem (cf. Fearfull 1997). For the NVQ in Care qualified nursesare usually the assessors, but few nurses saw any value to themselves ofbecoming assessors. Most of the trusts also had a high turnover amongstqualified nurses, which made it very difficult to maintain sufficient assessorsto facilitate the programme. Another frequent problem with NVQs is that staffmay not have opportunity to carry out the tasks for which they need to beassessed. For care assistants who usually work alongside qualified nurses

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this tended not to be a problem, although it does require that the qualifiednurses are prepared to co-operate with care assistants making inroads intowhat has traditionally been their own realm of activities. However, it doesmean that it is nearly impossible for anyone outside of the job to completean NVQ in Care. At London Community Trust, one domestic who wanted tomove into care work and felt she needed NVQ Level 2, completed a place-ment in her own time to gain access to the practical side of the work. Everyonefound the NVQ programme bureaucratic and full of jargon, which they foundoff-putting.

NVQs in other areas of work had not taken off in the same way as care.Some people were taking Customer Service, but one senior administratorthought it would be demeaning to send the administrative and clerical staffon an NVQ as they were already working at higher levels. Hospital Trust isworking with the local college to take on young trainees who are doing Level2 in Administration and finding it a successful route for recruitment, but isless likely to use the programme for developing existing staff.

Conflicting messages and barriers to workplace learning

Even where the organization’s positive approach to workplace learning isreflected in the particular department, there may still be barriers to individualor groups of staff ’s experience of learning and development. Where expec-tations of training have been raised, but that training is not delivered stafffelt very disillusioned. In certain situations staff were perceived by managersas having little motivation to learn and progress but in practice they havefew routes for achieving occupational mobility. The most widespread problemwas in getting time off work for study or attending courses. Getting linemanagers to release staff from work is the archetypal problem for humanresource and training managers because it interferes with the day-to-dayrunning of the service. This is particularly a problem for “front line staff”involved in patient contact, although there was also a general feeling that moreeffort was put into enabling qualified staff to attend courses than unquali-fied. Some managers operated a “two at a time” policy for example whichlimited the number of staff who could attend courses at any point in time.Where it was a small site, managers often tried to bring in speakers to addressgroups of staff in the workplace.

As argued earlier, not all the changes in work organisation currently takingplace result in a demand for higher levels of skill and there can be losers andwinners in regrading exercises. There were cases where staff perceived them-selves to have been deskilled and as a result had lost the motivation for addi-tional training and development. At London Community Trust, when theenrolled grade of nurses was removed the existing SENs were offered thejob of care assistant, with the possibility of taking a conversion course tobecome a fully qualified nurse. The result for those who became care assis-

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tants was that they could no longer perform many of the routine nursing activ-ities which they had been doing for many years, for example change adressing. Many felt demoted and degraded, “I feel very bad, I am like adomestic, I am very cross . . . I don’t think I will ever forgive them . . . ithas made my life so miserable”.

The sub-contracting of specific elements of jobs as a cost-saving measurecan equally result in the degradation of the skill content of work. Maintenancestaff from Northern Community trust described how they had previously beenclassed as skilled workers, as carpenters or electricians, but how work hadbeen reorganised so that they only dealt with basic routine activities andprivate contractors were called in to deal with any more complicated task.As their pride and dignity in work had been removed, it was almost like aninsult to them to discuss what training they might “need”. There are alsoinstances where training can act as a demotivator, where it is used to increaseresponsibilities without increasing reward.

In other instances, attempts to foster a work environment supportive oftraining and development may be undermined by changes in other aspects ofthe employment relationship. In the health trusts, changes in the form of theemployment contract, involving a deterioration in conditions were reducingthe incentives to staff to change jobs within the organisation. Most healthservice trusts are moving away from the older type employment contract whichallows for extra payments for evenings, weekends and holidays towards con-tracts in which flexible working hours are expected with no extra payments.All new staff are appointed onto the newer type contracts, but established staffsee little point for training and development since any job change would movethem onto new contracts and reduced wages.

Some staff had started training or development programmes but for variousreasons could not complete them. One clerical worker began an NVQ Level3 in Administration which she described as “rubbish”. This programme wasprovided in conjunction with a local college and the staff felt that the tutorsdid not understand the nature of the health service context. In this case thestaff had been waiting for the tutors to contact them for so long that they hadassumed that the programme had been cancelled. Similarly, an HCA describeda situation in which her NVQ assessor had resigned from the organisationleaving the care assistant and her colleagues no opportunity to complete theirprogramme. In these circumstances many give up, only those totally com-mitted to development persist.

Even where large organisations positively encourage the training and devel-opment of staff, this may not extend throughout the organisation to the detri-ment of particular departments, workgroups or occupational groups. Therewas a widespread view among staff themselves and line managers thatonce staff were within a few years of retirement there was little point inpursuing training and development, particularly where staff appeared to havethe necessary technical competence to do their job, this is reflected in the

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title of this paper, a quote from a manager in the health care sector. Age wasone of the prime reasons given for disinterest in training.

There are major sectors of the workforce who seem largely ignored whenit comes to training and development, such as the clerical staff. In one depart-ment when a new computer system was introduced the staff had to go ontraining in their own time, although it was paid for by the trust. There weresome very small pockets of exclusion, such as catering staff based in com-munity homes, where there would be just one or two staff who often feltisolated, with no one in the home who really understands their occupationalarea. Their line manager is often the senior administrator, who may havelittle specific knowledge about catering. In one home a course had been organ-ised in the home for all of the healthcare assistants on nutrition, yet no onehad thought to invite the two catering staff. Other small groups of staff feelthat they get forgotten about. In some cases staff worked with more than oneteam and neither would take responsibility for their training and development;and where staff could see no opportunity for career progression, they saw littlepoint in training: “There isn’t anywhere to go so you would have to say thatyou were going to do some training to do another job at the end of the day.There’s no point training for our job because this is where it stops. Even withan NVQ this is where it still stops.”

Problems may not merely related to barriers to access to formal trainingprogrammes, but also access to on-the-job-learning. While this may relate towhole groups of staff, in the fieldwork there were a number of cases whereindividuals felt that they were being excluded from learning because of theirage or their sex. One young woman who was working as a trainee informa-tion technology technician described how learning for this role is based onworking with a qualified technician. She believed that she was being excludedfrom this process because she was young and female. She was continually leftwith little to do except the filing.

For some staff, there may be multiple reasons for their lack of access tolearning opportunities including the threat that their increased competencemay present to their managers and supervisors. Another example of an indi-vidual who felt excluded was a fifty year old man who was employed as aclerical support officer, having worked for twenty five years in local gov-ernment as a chief administrative officer. While he was formally over quali-fied for this post, he had been made redundant and had no computing skills,which limited the range of jobs he could apply for. He felt that ageism per-meated all aspects of training and the labour market. He had asked his super-visor if he could use the computers at work in his own time to develop hiscomputer skills, but was refused. He perceived the problem to be one of middlemanagement feeling threatened, asking “is there a fear that I would be betterqualified than her?”.

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Concluding comments

Unskilled work is undergoing enormous change in the public sector, drivenby a number of different factors. In some areas legislation is creating a demandfor different mix between qualified and non-qualified nurses, while a shiftingbalance between social services and the health services is changing the natureof client need. New jobs are appearing as local collective bargaining in thehealth service has opened the way for a wide range of new forms of employ-ment contract which break down traditional demarcation lines and introduceflexible working practices, while there is a continued push to improve effi-ciency and improve the quality of service. Equally some jobs are disappearingas new technology removes the need for certain work or as areas of work arecontracted out to the private sector. In this context training takes on a par-ticular significance. Training may be regarded as a reward, giving status werethere was previously little, as recognition for effort and a signal of value tothe organisation and possibly opening up opportunities in the labour market.Equally, it may be perceived as a threat, an indicator of poor performance orthe forerunner of work intensification.

With initiatives such as Investors in People, the general work climate isone in which greater emphasis is placed on training and development.Although there were different management styles and approaches in the casestudy organisations, in all of them the expectation that staff from every gradeshould be involved in development activities was set at corporate level.Whether or not this ethos permeates through to the level of the workgroup ordepartment depends on a range of issues. How learning is perceived dependsto a large extent of the interplay of the nature of the environment created bythe organisation with changes in job organisation and other aspects of theemployment relationship. Central to this are line managers and supervisorswho make many of the decisions about individuals’ access to learning oppor-tunities, be they formal or informal, on or off-the-job. Their perception ofstaff ’s willingness to learn and need to learn may be influenced by factorssuch as age, gender or the likelihood of career development. It is these linemanagers who control the immediate work environment and who control theflow of information about learning opportunities. They hold the key to releasefrom work, but also their encouragement or failure to encourage can contributeto staff ’s motivation to learn.

Some extremely innovative developments were identified in the case studyorganisations in which there were opportunities for career progression and jobenrichment. This was particularly the case for staff working as healthcareassistants or in similar roles. However, in many of the jobs investigatedmanagement relied on prior experience, informal learning on-the-job and thewillingness of staff to attend training in their own time and often fund it them-selves. The reality for many unskilled manual and routine clerical staff appearsto remain one of limited opportunities for workplace learning.

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Acknowledgement

The full research team working on this project are Helen Rainbird, AnneMunro, Lesley Holly and Ruchira Leisten. We would like to thank the organ-isations which have taken part in the case studies. Particular thanks go to staffand managers who have generously given time for the interviews and providedan extremely warm and friendly welcome. Thanks also go to the ProjectAdvisory Group, Unison Education and Training Department for their supportand advice, and the ESRC “Future of Work” programme.

Notes

1. The project “The future of unskilled work: learning and workplace inequality”(ESRC ref. L212 25 2017) runs from October 1998 until September 1999. Itinvolves in-depth case studies of six public sector organisations and a pilot surveyof employees learning experiences.

2. Unison is the largest trade union in the UK recruiting members across the publicsector. It was formed in 1993 through an amalgamation of the National Union ofPublic Employees (NUPE), the National and Local Government Officers (NALGO)and the Confederation of Health Service Employees (COHSE). In 1997 the totalUK union membership was 7.1 million (Labour Market Trends July 1999). At thistime Unison had 1.3 million members (19 per cent of total union membership) ofwhom 78 per cent were women (Labour Research March 1998).

3. For a description of the Unison/employer partnerships on workplace learning seeMunro, Rainbird and Holly 1997; for a more detailed discussion of partnershipworking see Munro and Rainbird 2000.

4. The Return to Learn, first developed in conjunction with the Workers’ EducationalAssociation (WEA) in 1989, was aimed at union members who had been disad-vantaged in the formal education system and was designed around a combinationof distance learning and small study groups. By 1998, 6000 students had completedthe programme. It was successful in reaching non-traditional learners and achievinga dramatic impact on their lives (Kennedy 1995). From 1997 Unison began runningthe programme in partnership with employers, in which staff had time off fromwork to take part in the programme.

References

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Fearfull, Anne. September 1997. Training, Vocational Qualifications and EmployeePerformance in Care Work in the UK. International Journal of Training andDevelopment 1(3): 158–172.

Gallie, Duncan. 1996. Skill, Gender and the Quality of Employment. In: RosemaryCrompton, Duncan Gallie and Kate Purcell, eds., Changing Forms of Employment.London: Routledge.

Harrison. Rosemary. 1997. Employee Development. London: IPD.

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The authors

Anne Munro is a Senior Lecturer in Human Resource Management at NapierUniversity, Edinburgh which she joined in February 2000, having moved fromUniversity College Northampton. She has published in the fields of trade union andwork organisation (Women, Work and Trade Unions, 1999, Mansell) and workplacelearning (“The New Unionism and the New Bargaining Agenda: UNISON-EmployerPartnerships on Workplace Learning” 2000. British Journal of Industrial Relations,38:2. – with Helen Rainbird). Lesley Holly is a Senior Lecturer in Sociology at theUniversity College Northampton and formerly Senior Researcher at the TavistockInstitute of Human Relations. Helen Rainbird is Professor of Industrial Relations atUniversity College Northampton, previously at the University of Warwick. She haspublished widely in the field of workplace learning and the national policy contextof training. The authors formed the Centre for Research in Employment, Work andTraining in 1994 and continue to work together on externally funded research.

Contact addresses: Dr Anne Munro, Napier University Business School, CraighouseCampus, Craighouse Road, Edinburgh EH10 5LG, Scotland. Tel.: +44(0)131 455 6026.E-mail: am.munro@napier.ac.uk. Dr Lesley Holly, University College Northampton,Boughton Green Road, Northampton NN2 7AL, England. Tel.: +44(0)1604 735500.E-mail: lesley.holly@northampton.ac.uk. Professor Helen Rainbird, University CollegeNorthampton, Boughton Green Road, Northampton NN2 7AL, England. Tel.:+44(0)1604 735500. E-mail: helen.rainbird@northampton.ac.uk.

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