Leadership enhancing sustainable learning in working life (JoKo)

Main funder

Funder's project number: 200324

Funds granted by main funder (€)

Funding program

Project timetable

Project start date: 01/01/2021

Project end date: 31/12/2022

Summary

Workplace learning (WPL) has become a significant requirement of working life, as technological and climate changes are forcing employees to learn at an ever-faster pace. In this research, WPL is viewed as strongly embedded in everyday work practices as a system of learning activities producing professional development. In recent years, the responsibility for workplace learning has increasingly shifted from organisations to employees. Consequently, one of the emerging risks for well-being is the requirement of continuous learning to maintain competence and expertise. Researchers have thus called for a critical approach to WPL, which sees it not only in a positive light but also as a conflicted and problematic activity in relation to individuals’, groups’, and organisations’ development and well-being. In this study, to highlight the multifaceted nature of WPL we utilise the concept of sustainability, and thereby construct a new concept of sustainable WPL. Sustainability in WPL will be assessed from three intertwined perspectives: well-being, widespread use of knowledge, and the rapid application of new knowledge. The new concept of sustainable WPL also helps to increase our understanding of the structural and practical issues that frame sustainable WPL in organisations. The study will be conducted among personnel in technology, health care and security organisations in three different countries. Within an ethnographic longitudinal framework, observations, interviews, and quantitative measures will serve as data collection devices, while a variety of qualitative and quantitative analytical tools will be used in the subsequent analyses. Ethnography can have a strong societal impact and therefore can promote deeper knowledge about the manifestations of the sustainable WPL. We will eliminate misunderstandings concerning WPL as a process that is always desirable and enabled by quick managerial solutions, and thus not sustainable. This is of paramount importance in society, where the issue of well-being at work generated by WPL has been raised. In addition, the research contributes to the ongoing debate on lifelong and continuous learning, specifically after or between formal education. It reinforces the understanding that learning occurs not only through education but also as a phenomenon that is strongly intertwined with people’s everyday life.

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