Stasz, C., & Brewer, D. J. (1999). Academic Skills at Work: Two Perspectives (MDS-1193). Berkeley: National Center for Research in Vocational Education, University of California.

Study Objectives and Approach

The study sample included sites in four firms in the Los Angeles area that represent diverse business areas: (1) a transportation agency (TA), (2) a traffic management agency (TM), (3) a microprocessor manufacturer (MPM), and (4) a health care agency (HA). The sizes of the firms, in terms of personnel, range from 26 people to tens of thousands. Two firms, TM and TA, are public agencies, while the other two are private. Three have service functions, while one--MPM--is a product manufacturer. They also serve markets of varying scale, from local (TM), to regional (TA), national (HA), and international (MPM). At the time of the study (1993-1996), most of these sites were feeling the pinch of austerity. Almost all of the workers we observed were facing rapid changes in technology and in the way their work was done. In addition, three firms had begun using new management practices such as total quality management (TQM), continuous quality improvement (CQI), or organizational learning to guide restructuring of many aspects of their operations.

At these four work sites, we studied seven service and manufacturing jobs:

• Construction inspectors and survey inspectors at the transportation agency
• Traffic signal technicians working in the traffic management agency
• Test cell associates and equipment technicians in the microprocessor manufacturing firm
• Home health aides and licensed vocational nurses (LVNs) in the health care agency

We chose technical jobs in the sub-baccalaureate labor force--the labor market for those with less than a baccalaureate degree but at least a high school diploma--for several reasons. The sub-baccalaureate labor force constitutes about three-fifths of the labor market, it has been growing steadily in the last decade, and it is poorly understood with respect to the relationship between formal schooling and subsequent employment (Grubb, Dickinson, Giordano, & Kaplan, 1992). The focus is on technical jobs, rather than entry-level jobs associated with a service economy, because technical jobs are growing and because they are more likely to be affected by the links of workforce changes that help create new skill demands (Barley, 1995).

Over several days, we observed workers' everyday activities and interviewed them to obtain information about their backgrounds (e.g., previous education and training experiences) and current job and work experiences. We also conducted interviews with senior managers, staff, line managers, and human resource personnel in order to obtain information regarding each firm and its hiring and training policies and on their views of the skills needed in these jobs.

The original study focused on three skill areas--(1) problem solving, (2) communication, and (3) teamwork--as well as work-related dispositions. These have generally been perceived to be required in the workforce (cf. Berryman & Bailey, 1992; SCANS, 1991, 1992) and are of particular interest to employers (cf. NCEQW, 1995). The study asked several questions concerning generic skills:

• Are generic skills and work-related dispositions evident in performing these jobs?
• How do workers conceive of them?
• How do these skills and dispositions vary across jobs and work contexts?
• How do firms view skill requirements?
• How do these views affect human resource policies such as recruitment, hiring, and training?

The new analysis reported here follows procedures employed for the initial study. Interviews and fieldnotes were entered into an online database for handling text data. Fieldworkers coded these data with index categories that corresponded to the questions of interest to the study such as the skills used on the job, work tasks, and social relations. The coding scheme was developed iteratively, building on the initial domains by adding categories that emerged at different sites. Once our preliminary analysis was completed, we returned to each work site to debrief study participants on our interpretations of the results and study findings. The debriefing provided a validity check on our findings and gave study participants the opportunity to discuss implications for their own work site.

Several questions were explored in this analysis:

• What academic skills are evident in these jobs? How do they fit into the broader work context?
• Are these academic skills central to the job or only required for certain work tasks or technology applications?
• How does the community of practice regard academic skills? How does academic knowledge and skill relate to work practice in a broader sense? Have skill requirements changed within a profession in which changes in technology or other factors have taken place?

Our analysis confirms that work context matters in the consideration of skills. We found that academic skills are essential to the performance of work in these jobs and settings, although they vary according to job, community of practice, and work setting. They also vary by level, with some jobs requiring high-level mathematics, for example. To fully appreciate the contextual richness of these jobs, interested readers may want to read the scenarios provided in Appendix I, which are based on data gathered from observations, interviews, and documents collected at the study sites.

Stasz, C., & Brewer, D. J. (1999). Academic Skills at Work: Two Perspectives (MDS-1193). Berkeley: National Center for Research in Vocational Education, University of California.