27 November 2023
Work-based learning on the job is crucial for countries' economic development
Despite the fact that work-based learning a prerequisite for innovativeness and productivity, which in turn is a prerequisite for the competitiveness of the individual company and the prosperity of entire countries, there is a lack of established measurement methods to measure it. A new dissertation in occupational science from Luleå University of Technology shows indicators that are relevant to learning at work and how they affect innovation and productivity.
- We need to get better at measuring what the driving forces behind economic development are in order to understand what drives economic growth. The more a country depends on work-based learning, the more we need to understand how work-based learning affects the country's economy. Learning at work is important from a socio-economic perspective, but to a large extent it is about development for the individual person. Parallel studies to the thesis show that learning on the job means that we can work longer into old age and that contributes to greater equality in the workplace, says the thesis's author, Annette Nylund.
One of the dissertation's goals has been to develop a functioning measurement method that is generalisable. Therefore, it has been important to find indicators of work-based learning that are robust, that is, they are not context dependent. The same indicators must be applicable over time and independent of organisation (private/public employer, size and so on).
Three indicators
Through literature studies, interviews and so-called factor analysis, which involves finding underlying factors for various phenomena, Annette Nylund has identified three different indicators: 1. Employees' individual learning 2. Work organisation (degree of decentralised work consisting of many contacts inside and outside the organization) 3. Other structural factors for learning in the organisation (for example on working methods, follow-ups and different incentive structures).
The dissertation's empirical material consists of two different questionnaire surveys. The first consists of answers from the top manager, or a representative of the top manager, in approximately 1,000 randomly selected Swedish companies. The second study also consists of responses from managers or representatives in Swedish organisations, but this study also included employers in the public sector and civil society, a total of approximately 1,300. The two surveys are Meadow from 2009 and the Nulägesundersökningen NU from 2015 (Current Situation Survey NU). Both surveys are based on Meadows employer survey.
Educational efforts are of great importance
The results show that all types of companies have both benefits and conditions to use different methods of learning at work because learning contributes to innovativeness and productivity. Annette Nylund states that learning that involves all, or the majority of all employees at a workplace, participating in various training initiatives is of great importance to the companies' ability to innovate.
- Work organisation and other structural factors for learning give the extra boost to the effect of individual learning. All three are important, but in different ways. Their importance gives an indication of how a business manager should allocate his investments.
Annette Nylund originally an economist. One thing that has surprised her during the course of her dissertation work is the great disagreement that prevails within learning research, compared to economics.
- I thought that knowledge in learning research was cumulative. It surprised me that there is no universally accepted statistic that provides a measure of work-based learning. In my thesis I show that Meadow's employer survey is an excellent starting point for designing a manual for producing statistics on learning at work. There is no reason for Sweden to wait for the OECD or the UN to produce such a manual.
Annette Nylund is a process leading analyst at the Swedish Agency for Work Environment Knowledge. She defended her thesis on November 9 at Luleå University of Technology.
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