Ageless at Work - Skills for Care

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4. EMERGING GOOD PRACTICE IN SKILLS DEVELOPMENT OF OLDER WORKERS Is there an age-bias within current workforce development initiatives? “The principal feature of vocational learning in later life is depressingly familiar to anyone who has studied adult learning. Those who have had least previous education get least continuing education. Those whose skills and knowledge are least likely to equip them to stay employable are the least likely to receive any training. It seems that older people and many employers still share the two common prejudices: that ‘you can’t teach an old dog new tricks’ or that investing in older people is a waste of money because the payback period is too short. Neither of these widely held beliefs have any real foundation.” Stephen McNair quoted in ‘Demographic and Older Learners’ (2005) The simple – and perhaps not very helpful – answer to this question is that it depends on the programme, and what is meant by age-bias. Many studies have observed that participation in jobrelated training or indeed any kind of learning declines with age (Aldridge and Tucket, 2009). For example, one recent national survey of employees found that 18 to 24 year olds were more than twice as likely as those aged between 50 and state pension age to have taken part in job-related training in the last four weeks (Figure 1). The same survey has also revealed very little progression in terms of the highest qualifications of older people suggesting that current workforce development initiatives have done little to raise the qualifications of adults within the existing labour force. Figure 1 Employees receiving job related training¹: by age and sex, 2008², United Kingdom 30 26.4 Men Women 25 Percentages 20 15 10 15.6 19 19.8 14.6 17.2 11.9 16.6 9.2 12.9 5 0 16-17 18-24 25-34 35-49 50-59/64 ¹ Employees (those in employment excluding the self-employed, unpaid family workers and those on government programmes) who received job-related training in the four weeks prior to interview. ²Data are at Q2 (April June) and are not seasonally adjusted. Source: Labour Force Survey, Office for National Statistics Ageless at Work: Change workplace cultures, development skills. Good practice report 31
There is also evidence that older people are slightly under-represented in the distribution of carerelated NVQs. For example, while almost half (47%) of Level 2 Care NVQs were awarded to people aged 41 and over during 2004/5, people aged within this age group account for over half (53%) of (selected) care related occupations (Eborall and Griffiths, 2008). The same is also true at the opposite end of the skills spectrum: while three-quarters of Registered Managers are aged 40 and over, ‘only’ two thirds (66%) of Registered Managers NVQs were awarded to people aged 41 and over. The same bias towards participation of younger age groups is also apparent in most forms of LSC funded learning for adults (aged 19 and over), the only exception being for Safeguarded Adult Learning. Over half (54%) of adults taking part in this form of learning – comprising largely unaccredited, community and family learning – were aged 45 and over. This compares to 30% of learners on Train to Gain and 28% of learners accessing LSC funded Further Education courses 10 . These participation rates are well below older peoples’ share of the population eligible for these courses (38%). These findings suggest that while there is a degree of age bias towards younger workers in participation on most types of workforce development programmes, it does not necessary follow that the programmes themselves are inherently age biased in terms of design, since older people give a variety of reasons for not taking part in training. Notwithstanding this, a number of research projects exploring older peoples’ motivation to train and the barriers they face to taking part suggest that the form, format, location or content of skills development initiatives can influence older peoples’ decision about training, and that some characteristics of ‘mainstream’ provision are unattractive to some prospective older learners. Studies, for example, have acknowledged that while preferred learning styles inevitably vary between individuals, older workers often learn in different ways to younger workers, with many preferring ‘hands on’ or learning on the job (Jenkinson et al., 2008), informal learning environments and approaches and those that allow learners to study at their own pace (Ford, 2005) and one-to-one tuition rather than exams or qualifications (National Skills Forum, undated). Since traditionally many skills development opportunities are delivered by, and often in, further education colleges or formal classroom settings, older peoples attitudes to this environment will be an important factor in their decisions about training. Nervousness about returning to the classroom was a barrier to learning for around one-fifth (22 percent) of learners and one-quarter (24 percent) of nonlearners who wanted to train (Eurostat Adult Education Survey) with negative attitudes to formal learning settings more prevalent among those with low qualifications and/or those who had a negative experience of learning whilst at school (Stuart and Perret, 2006). Many older workers are, however, comfortable, or indeed prefer, to train away from the workplace, including attending college, although this is often preferred in combination with ‘hands-on’ study. Despite older workers’ preference to learn through practice and with workplace representing potentially effective learning environments, employer support for this learning might not always be forthcoming: 10 Through the Adult Responsiveness Fund. 32 Ageless at Work: Change workplace cultures, development skills. Good practice report
Page 1 and 2: we help create a trained and qualif
Page 3 and 4: CONTENTS 1. Introduction ..........
Page 5 and 6: Index of Tables Table 1 Six things
Page 7 and 8: While organisational change had bee
Page 9 and 10: 2. POLICY CONTEXT Why and how is ad
Page 11 and 12: Ensuring the right steps are taken
Page 13 and 14: Table 3 Workforce remodelling: prio
Page 15 and 16: What is already happening to suppor
Page 17 and 18: Personalisation agenda as set out i
Page 19 and 20: Responses to an open question about
Page 21 and 22: What works in enhancing leadership
Page 23 and 24: Skills for Care London also trailed
Page 25 and 26: Table 7 Engage the workforc
Page 27 and 28: Table 8 What needs to be done to in
Page 29 and 30: • Support and enable people to us
Page 31: People who use services as drivers
Page 35 and 36: - Training conflicted with the work
Page 37 and 38: articulate the experience, knowledg
Page 39 and 40: ‘unlikely’ learners 12 aged 55
Page 41 and 42: personalisation’. The results of
Page 43 and 44: Mentoring is cited as a “fundamen
Page 45 and 46: • Yearly (or more frequent) suppo
Page 47 and 48: Secondly, the project could test ne
Page 49 and 50: Figure 2 Vacancies notified to Jobc
Page 51 and 52: A recent survey by the ADASS/LGA (2
Page 53 and 54: Figure 5 Projected working age popu
Page 55 and 56: Table 15 Trends and drivers affecti
Page 57 and 58: Table 16 Health status of the popul
Page 59 and 60: Table 16 Main features of the ‘in
Page 61 and 62: 6. RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PROJECT ACTI
Page 63 and 64: Activities that challenge older wor
Page 65 and 66: ECOTEC (Undated) European Social Fu
Page 67: Tick Tock (2007) Tick Tock: An EQUA

Ageless at Work - Skills for Care

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