Learning to cooperate with change

The likelihood that people will respond negatively to change is even greater if it follows, or is part of, a reduction in headcount - and invariably this is the case, although, if change is supported by the trade unions, there is a greater chance of employers gaining the cooperation of the whole workforce. In addition, people returning to study after a long period often have little confidence in their ability to learn and may see it as threatening, especially if it is compulsory.

The employee development and assistance programmes (EDAPs) that have been widely implemented in the UK motor industry and replicated elsewhere are one example of a learning strategy that attempts to encourage staff to return to learning and foster a new collaborative employee relations climate. A study of EDAPs found that, among other benefits, they helped to create a learning culture, increased the skill levels of the workforce and improved industrial relations and the morale of employees^.3

Modelled on similar schemes in the US, which are generally joint union-management programmes, the domestic versions are less inclined to involve such a partnership, but, nonetheless, are seen as an excellent vehicle through which to encourage people to pursue non-vocational learning opportunities outside their normal paid work at minimal cost.⁴ Where EDAPs have been introduced as a joint union-management administered initiative - as at Ford Motor Company UK (hereafter referred to as Ford UK) - this is considered a valuable feature of the programme (see below).⁵

Other examples of union-employer agreements that seek to facilitate learning among staff who have previously had little opportunity to engage in development activities include the Return to Learn (R2L) initiative of the public services union Unison. R2L programmes include those agreed between managers and Unison at Mid-Anglia Community Health NHS Trust, the University of Brighton, the University of Leeds and Oxford Brookes University.⁶

Broader union-management partnerships to aid change have also invariably included an employer commitment to employment development. For example, under an agreement with its unions (GMB, Apex and Unison) to support a cultural change programme, Transco, the gas transportation and storage company, is committed to ensuring that:

"training and development needs are regularly reviewed for all employees and teams. Skill gaps relevant to personal aspirations and business needs are identified."⁷

There is a similar agreement - the Way Ahead plan - between the UK's largest cement producer, Blue Circle Cement, and its manual unions, the AEEU, GMB and TGWU. The company is committed to job security, and the Way Ahead agreement specifies that:

"succession planning, multiskilling and training - in order to: prevent the voluntary redundancy programme from destabilising the business by reducing the available skills base, existing employees would need to be trained and ready to take over from skilled employees wishing to take voluntary redundancy before the skilled volunteers could be released, and this would require a greater degree of commitment to long-term personal development and training from the workforce, along with extra resources from the company."⁸

Elsewhere, unions and management at the Heysham 1 Nuclear Electric plant have jointly designed a skills broadening programme for employees to increase their flexibility and job satisfaction.⁹

DEVELOPING A COOPERATIVE SPIRIT

Employee relations in the UK have undergone a sea change over the past 15 years or so. The previous adversarial relationship has given way to greater employee participation and involvement and joint partnerships between unions and employers. In part, the refashioning of employee relations is a necessary outcome of corporate responses to intensified competition and economic insecurity. The old "them and us" (workers v managers) model of employee relations was found to be incompatible with the corporate need to forge a united approach to the challenges posed by a changing environment.¹⁰ As a result, the old formula has been recast as "us (the organisation) v them (the competition)".

Jointism, as it has been referred to, is the outcome of a recognition by both employers and trade unions that collaboration has a better chance than conflict of producing a successful response to the challenge of international competition.¹¹ Specifically, employers realise that, particularly in organisations or industries with a history of adversarial employee relations, unions can threaten their ability to change in line with shifting business conditions. It is no coincidence that the enterprises that have adopted the partnership approach are, by and large, also those that are subject to the strongest competitive pressures, such as manufacturers. They also include public sector organisations that are increasingly having to adapt to the realities of competition. The aim of Blue Circle Cement's partnership deal was to reduce the cost base and improve productivity to meet the competitive challenge of the new millennium.¹²

To compete effectively, businesses require stability - something that an adversarial employee relations climate may endanger. Partnerships might help to alleviate the possibility of disruption, particularly as people often react negatively to change. The increasing popularity of long-term pay deals in the motor industry and elsewhere can be seen as a further way in which employers are seeking to prevent disruption to production. One study shows that the number of two and three-year pay agreements is slowly increasing.¹³ Equally, the single-union agreements that the electrical section of the AEEU, among others, signed with inward investors in the 1980s and onwards also reflect the pressing need to ensure stability. The so-called "no-strike" clauses contained in many of these deals are designed to rule out industrial action by resolving disputes through pendulum arbitration or binding conciliation.¹⁴

Learning has become one of the tools used to develop the new non-adversarial approach to employee relations. Ford UK's pioneering EDAP scheme, launched in 1989 following an agreement between the company and its manual and salaried unions, had the "implicit" aim of establishing a non-adversarial employee relations climate. As Mortimer points out, it intended to:

Ford's scheme was, in part, inspired by a similar agreement reached by its parent company and the Union of Auto Workers (UAW) in the US. This programme, and others, such those at AT&T, Boeing, Chrysler, General Motors (GM) and in the US steel industry, have become "part of a move towards more widely-based management-union cooperation".¹⁶ In a foreword to the booklet produced in 1995 to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the UAW-Chrysler joint activities board, created to oversee training programmes and funding, it was stated that:

"The UAW and the Chrysler Corporation in the 1985 negotiations recognised - and in the 1988, 1990 and 1993 negotiations maintained - the fundamental importance of joint cooperative effort in dealing with major changes in technology and the nature of an increasingly competitive world market. It was agreed that these changes could best be met by mobilising and integrating the full potential of our human resources in an environment that fosters cooperation."¹⁷

For employees and their representatives, the benefit of joint management-union cooperation is primarily the protection of working people's interests. The TUC has recognised that this can best be achieved if unions work with employers to make industries and services more efficient and competitive.¹⁸ A commitment to job security is often at the heart of such agreements. One study has argued that "businesses which want a motivated workforce with total flexibility are realising that people work best if they have some sense of being secure in their job."¹⁹

Learning has a central role to play in any such scenario. In the US, GM's 1982 National Agreement specified the common goals of the UAW and the company as "job security for employees and the advancement of the corporation's competitive edge in the marketplace". It was also stated that "as a means of achieving these goals together, the Joint Skill Development Training program was introduced and a Joint Skill Development and Training committee was established."²⁰

Although few employers are willing to commit themselves unconditionally to job security, many are promising a better deal if it can involve flexible working and redeployment in line with business requirements, besides providing staff with learning opportunities to enhance their employability.²¹ ScottishPower's wholesale and electricity generating division signed a partnership agreement with its manual and white-collar unions in 1995 that emphasises training and development to boost an individual's employability:

"Investment in training and development must be driven by the needs of the individual, aiming to maintain his/her employability, and not depend solely on the needs of the business."²²

BREAKING DOWN BARRIERS

A TUC report, Skills 2000, highlighted the fact that 80% of the UK's workforce, as estimated for the year 2000, is already in employment.²³ As a result, most employers acknowledge that they will have to maximise the potential of the existing workforce if they are going to have people with the requisite skills in the future. Until fairly recently, though, as was noted earlier, development has generally been targeted at managers and professionals, with many employees receiving little training throughout their careers. As one report found, staff who had access to "extended initial education" (typically, managers and professionals) were far more likely to enjoy continuing learning opportunities.²⁴

The necessity for employee flexibility, coupled with the need for people to adapt rapidly to change, means that in future all staff will be required to develop a habit of learning. Therefore, employers have broadened their development opportunities to include the whole workforce.

However, a number of barriers to learning need to be broken down if people who have had little formal education and/or have been absent from study for many years - often referred to as "traditional non-learners" - are to derive the maximum benefit from their learning.

It has been argued that employees have to be "willing, able and allowed" to learn.²⁵ Given that current perceptions of job insecurity might provide them with sufficient will, and that the learning cultures being pursued by some organisations will allow people to learn, this leaves the question of ability. Poor image and low confidence are potential individual barriers to learning. Often, employees have lost touch with basic educational skills and require support to re-engage with the learning process. Others might be reticent for fear of failing and the implications this might have for their employment prospects. In addition, some people may have had a negative experience of earlier learning activities.

The problems that some people experience when returning to learning were summed up by a production manager at Sheffield-based engineering business Richardsons after the company's decision to adopt the EDAP approach:

"We've given everybody every encouragement to join the scheme. But there's been a difficulty with a lot of our employees in making the first step . . . A lot of them could have taken better advantage of education at school but chose not to. And a lot of them are now having problems with that."²⁶

Employee development programmes and return-to-learn initiatives attempt to overcome these hurdles by offering people a choice of learning opportunities that usually include the option of support, designed to help the individual to become reacquainted with the learning process before embarking on his or her course. For example, Peugeot's EDAP, the Assisted Development Programme (ADP), which was set up in 1991, offers participants the following help with basic learning skills:

Likewise, Unison's R2L strategy is specifically designed to develop confidence in their learning ability among people who have few formal qualifications or have been away from the learning process for a long time.²⁸ It gives participants the opportunity to develop core skills in writing, investigation, analysis and applied numeracy.

EMPLOYEE DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMMES

Employee development and assistance programmes are essentially schemes that provide staff with financial and other assistance to return to learning, often in areas that are not directly linked to their normal work roles. While there is no common definition of an EDAP, the various schemes operating in the UK have a number of core features, including voluntary participation, a wide choice of courses on offer and work-based, rather than provider-based, learning provision.²⁹

Estimates of the use of EDAPs in the UK vary. The Department for Education and Employment (DfEE) suggests that there were 450 such programmes operating at the end of 1995 - barely six years after Ford established the first UK scheme - although as many as 300 of these were likely to be sponsored, and partially subsidised, by a TEC.³⁰ A study by the National Commission for Education (NCE) reported that some 175 organisations in the UK are, or have been, involved in EDAPs.³¹ The original research conducted for this issue of Management Review found that 33% of respondents had an EDAP. Surveyed organisations with EDAPs include: Bonas Machine Company, Konica Business Machines, MAFF legal department, spring manufacturer Peterson Spring UK, Royal Hospitals NHS Trust, Tarmac Quarry Products, Southern Electric, Van den Bergh Foods and the Ulster Bank.

Examples of EDAPs in operation include:

What type of learning?

EDAPs are usually an additional learning opportunity and not an extension of current job-related training activities. This is made clear by some of the schemes: Peugeot's ADP provides employees with a range of educational opportunities that are not necessarily vocational;³⁴ Ford UK's EDAP is open to all employees and specifically stipulates that "job-related courses are not likely to be approved",³⁵ and Oxfordshire County Council's Commercial Services' Open Door programme is described to staff as "an opportunity to take part in a learning activity not related to your job. It should be something you really want to do for yourself."³⁶

In contrast, Vauxhall only funds learning that focuses on "relevant and transferable vocational skills, [that are] valuable to both the employee and the company."³⁷ Indeed, the three most popular areas of study have been welding, vehicle maintenance and computer literacy. However, Vauxhall has funded a varied range of subjects, including German and Spanish language, electronics and mathematics.³⁸

The non-vocational nature of most EDAPs is surprising, given some reports that such employee development is "anathema" to many organisations. Organisations surveyed for this Management Review report were asked if they supported employees in development opportunities that were not job-related. This was intended to include EDAPs as well as less formalised arrangements. Nearly 32% of organisations said that they offered this form of support. Figure 6.1 summarises the kind of help given, which typically includes covering some or all of the costs or providing some or all of the necessary time off work.

Figure 6.1: Support for non job-related learning

Who's using EDAPs

EDAPs are often targeted at groups of employees who traditionally receive little or no training and development or whose training opportunities have been limited to technical aspects of their jobs. Typically, these groups include manual workers and lower grade white-collar employees. EDAPs have been broadly successful in encouraging these traditional non-learners back into learning. One study found that 70% of EDAP participants (from four surveyed enterprises) in the Heart of England TEC scheme had left school at 16.³⁹ Research conducted into Ford UK's EDAP after its first year of operation reported that:

EDAP take-up levels appear to vary considerably, however. For example, in the first year of furniture manufacturer Parker Knoll's EDAP, around 20% of the company's 440 employees joined the scheme, while at the Commercial Services arm of Oxfordshire County Council just 10% of the organisation's 2,400 staff took advantage of its EDAP^.41 Elsewhere, in 1993, Peugeot reported that around 25% of its employees had received study grants since the company's ADP was launched in 1991.⁴² In May 1995, Vauxhall said that a similar proportion of its 4,000 Luton-based workforce had participated in various aspects of Guidelines, the company's employee development centre.⁴³

Advantages and disadvantages

EDAPs offer employers a number of significant benefits at minimal cost. The NCE study has shown that EDAPs can help to create a learning culture; increase the skill levels of the workforce; increase the take up of job-related training; help identify job-related skills gaps in the workforce; increase employee commitment to the organisation; improve teamworking; improve recruitment and resourcing; make the business less reliant on the external labour market; lower labour turnover and reduce absenteeism; improve industrial relations and the morale of the workforce, and generate a better understanding of the business among employees.⁴⁴

At the individual level, EDAPs can be an avenue to further career progression. At Peugeot, for instance, four shopfloor employees who had been studying IT have taken up clerical positions.⁴⁵ Many staff returning to learning after a long period of absence from study have developed greater self-esteem as a result of taking part in the company's ADP. The NCE study reported that employee benefits derived from EDAPs included: increased excitement about learning; a breaking down of individuals' barriers to learning; enhanced self-esteem, and greater interest in the acquisition of work-related skills.⁴⁶

Nonetheless, getting people to join an EDAP remains a difficulty. While participation rates in the UK are generally higher than in the US, the majority of the targeted audience of most schemes fail to become involved.⁴⁷ Moreover, many schemes will have finite resources, suggesting that successful EDAPs can quickly become over-subscribed. People prevented from participating through lack of funds are likely to question the organisation's commitment to broader learning.

Applications to Oxford Brookes University's scheme, for instance, have, at times, exceeded the cash available, so a queuing system has been used.⁴⁸ In addition, research has found that few EDAP participants would embark on any form of learning if they were required to fund it themselves.⁴⁹

The advantages and disadvantages of employee development and assistance programmes are summarised in figure 6.2.

Figure 6.2: Pros and cons associated with EDAPs

CASE STUDY 5
JAGUAR
Jaguar uses a flexible approach to put learning in the fast lane

The Jaguar approach to employee learning has focused on the individual, beyond immediate job requirements, for nearly 15 years. The Jaguar learning culture dates back to the early 1980s when the company was still publicly owned. It was one of the first to establish computer-assisted open learning and the Jaguar model has been a benchmark for other employee development and assistance programmes (EDAPs).

In 1984, the then chairman of Jaguar Cars, John Egan, put forward the view that the workforce needed a higher level of educational attainment if the company was to succeed and take advantage of the opportunities arising from new technology in the post-privatisation era. His assessment, based on visits to competitor companies in the UK and internationally, applied from the shopfloor staff up to the most senior levels of management.

In response to Egan's analysis, the company developed a flexible approach to learning that consists of two key elements:

Jaguar's flexible approach to learning has been a big success. Les Ratcliffe, Jaguar's senior training officer, estimates that prior to the company's open learning centres (OLCs) began about 60 people a year would attend a "basic computing for managers" course. In the first 18 months of operation, 260 people had attended this course at an OLC. Across the workforce, 1,800 employees (out of a total workforce, at the time, of 10,500) used the OLCs over the same period, and 60% of these came from the shopfloor or first-line supervision. In 1988, the company received a National Training Award for its network of open learning centres.

THE GROWTH OF OPEN LEARNING

Open learning centres were launched at each of the company's sites. Most of the funding came from Jaguar itself, but financial assistance was also provided by the Engineering Industry Training Board and what was then the Manpower Services Commission. Resources at the OLCs were mainly devoted to work-related learning via computers and linked technology, such as interactive videos. Computer-assisted open learning was specifically designed to increase computer literacy at all levels in the organisation.

Jaguar's OLCs were also designed to encourage employees to develop their full potential. As a result, the company's other training facilities were opened in the evenings to provide broader educational opportunities. These included a variety of O-levels (now GCSEs), and certificates in supervisory management. The company used external tutors from outside educational institutions to provide the tuition. In the 1980s, around 40 evening lectures would take place in any one week across Jaguar's plants. According to Ratcliffe, there were "a number of examples" of people who did O-levels, and certificates and subsequently went on to take part-time degree courses funded by the company.

Ratcliffe believes that a long tradition of employee development based on the open learning approach established Jaguar as a learning organisation considerably before the concept gained its current popularity. There is a "culture of learning" in the company, which means that ongoing development is accepted as the norm at all levels. An example of the workforce attitude to training occurred in the 1980s. One of the plants had a dispute which kept most of the workforce out of work. However, at the end of the working day a large number of employees who had been on strike returned to work to continue the course they were taking. The view of the pickets was that "it's training isn't it. That's different."

JAGUAR EMPLOYEE DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMME

Alan Hepburn, Jaguar's employee relations director, confirms that the Jaguar open learning programme provided the benchmark for establishing a learning culture across the whole group. The work which the luxury car manufacturer had already done in this area meant that when the Jaguar equivalent of the Ford EDAP - know as the Jaguar Employee Development Programme (JEDP) - was established it could afford to adopt a narrower, more vocational, focus. This is because the company's workforce was already comfortable with the idea of learning, says Hepburn.

The aim of the scheme, as set out in the guidance to employees, is:

"to encourage all Jaguar employees to maximise their individual potential by developing wider skills and/or acquiring greater knowledge and/or obtaining formal qualifications which will improve their contribution to Jaguar".

JEDP pays for the funding of individual development activities which are carried out in the employees' own time. The level of funding is reviewed every two years and in 1997/98 a total of £220,000 was made available. The total cost of the scheme, including staffing, was £325,000 in the same financial year. This expenditure is over and above the costs of normal training activities within the company.

A wide range of courses receive funding out of the JEDP pot. They include supervisory training programmes, craft skills training, and first and second degrees. In the case of supervisory and craft training, courses are often run in-house by outside tutors. According to Ratcliffe, this has the advantage of being more cost-effective. It also allows the courses to be tailored to the needs of the company. Degrees are organised on a partnership basis with educational institutions such as Coventry University. Typically, two-thirds of the budget set aside for JEDP each year is actually used. At any one time, there are likely to be between 50 and 60 employees undertaking part-time degree courses and around 25 employees taking the NEBS supervisory diploma.

The JEDP scheme has been used to promote trade union involvement in training and development. A joint committee comprising representatives of management and the main trade unions - TGWU, AEEU and MSF - oversees the JEDP scheme and approves employee applications for training, education or development.

The key criterion for determining whether an employee will receive assistance under JEDP is whether the proposed development will be of benefit to the individual and to the company. However, this criterion is fairly flexible. Ratcliffe says that as long as the course develops skills which are in some way useful to the company then it will usually be accepted by the JEDP committee. For example, a skilled facia maker asked for funding to attend a course, the end product of which was the production of a violin. The application was accepted because the committee decided that the training would lead to the further development of his wood-working skills. To further illustrate the point, Ratcliffe suggests that although the company would not fund a course in scuba-diving, it might support a scuba-diver who wished to receive training in diving instruction. This is because the coaching skills involved would be transferable to the workplace.

SEPARATING OLCs AND EDAPs

The setting up of the JEDP scheme in 1990 led to a separation between computer-assisted open learning and other employee development that was conducted in the individual's own time. The main driving force for the Jaguar OLCs as they now operate is in keeping up with developments in new technology. In addition, the centres have packages to support, for example, the development of management skills. They also provide training for the company's sales force. For instance, to coincide with the launch of the new XK8 Jaguar model a multi-media training package was provided for staff to access at a time appropriate to them.

The OLCs are used to enhance more traditional lecture-based forms of training and to make such teaching methods more cost-effective. In a number of cases, trainees are required to undertake preparatory modules in advance of courses based on face-to-face teaching.

Ratcliffe considers that in the future an individual's desk may effectively become his or her own open learning centre with training packages available on their computers. Whether or not this approach is successful will partly depend on the extent to which experience shows that people are able to devote sufficient time and attention to learning given their normal day-to-day work distractions.

THE JAGUAR CHALLENGE

The Jaguar Challenge has operated for 12 years. It is an annual exercise, conducted over a weekend, which is seen as contributing to the process of employee development and teambuilding. In 1997, 26 teams were taken to a "secret location" in Wales. Teams can be work-based or cross-functional. The onus is on employees themselves to form a team and then to train as a group to undertake the tasks which they will face on the Challenge. These range from outdoor physical activities to more intellectual problem-solving. Ratcliffe says that the Challenge is popular with employees and that more teams apply to take part than can be accommodated.

DETERMINING TRAINING NEEDS

The company has an extensive training programme determined largely by the needs of individual functions within the company, such as manufacturing, design and marketing. Training is essentially demand-led, Hepburn says. He does not "consider it appropriate to talk about the precise training costs of the company as this would give the wrong message in a learning organisation which is constantly updating itself . . . if training is needed, then it will take place."

There is a Jaguar-wide training budget. Departments include a training element in their annual business plan. Each function also has its own personnel development committee (PDC) and there is a separate panel for each group of employees - white-collar staff and managers. These PDCs are coordinated by a corporate development committee which determines career development needs across the company.

Further input into the ongoing assessment of training needs is provided by the annual appraisals for non-manual employees and by annual assessments of training needs conducted by each functional department which then form the individual business unit's training plan.

The company has multiskilling agreements with its trade unions and operates a number of adult apprenticeships for employees seeking to broaden their skills. A major part of the training requirement of the manufacturing function is "versatility training" to allow workers to become more flexible in a range of tasks which they can perform at their workstations.

THE IMPACT OF A LEARNING CULTURE

In recent years, training has become line management rather than personnel-led. Ratcliffe says that line managers determine what they want and are as likely to organise their own training as to call on human resources for help.

Jaguar's learning culture has brought with it other welcome changes, including greater individual responsibility and pride in the product, which is demonstrated by high quality standards throughout the company. The quality and efficiency levels are "amongst the best in the Ford group", says Hepburn. This includes the HR function itself, which was the first personnel department in the group to achieve the Ford's own quality award, the Ford Q1 standard, for service activities. Jaguar is now used as a benchmark by other Ford plants internationally and regularly receives visits from these companies. Presentations to visitors are generally carried out by group leaders and operators in the relevant areas.

In addition, the company has seen a steady improvement in its employee relations, which have been "very good" for the past seven years. No days have been lost to industrial action in any of the past three years. The development opportunities available to staff are seen as having played a critical role in the more "cooperative spirit" that this industrial relations record reflects.

Hepburn says that the success of Jaguar's learning strategy lies in its consistency. "Since the early 80s we have said that employee development is vitally important for us and we have proved this by continuing the funding of schemes such as JEDP and open learning even at the most difficult times in the company's past".

²     Jackson T (1993), Organisational behaviour in international management (Butterworth-Heinemann, Oxford), p.293.

³     National Commission on Education (1995), "Employee development programmes: current practice and new directions", NCE Briefing Series 2, January.

⁴     IRS (1995), "Joint training and development - the US experience: 1", Employee Development Bulletin 68, August, pp.8-12.

⁵     Mortimer K (1990), "EDAP at Ford: a research note", Industrial Relations Journal, vol 21 (4), pp.309—314.

⁶     IRS (1997), "Training in Unison - forging partnerships with employers", Employee Development Bulletin 92, August, pp.7-10.

⁷     IRS (1997), "Partnership drives business improvement process at Transco ", IRS Employment Review 641, October, p.8.

⁸     IRS (1997), "Cementing a new partnership at Blue Circle ", IRS Employment Review 638, August, p.13.

⁹     IRS, "Skill broadening at Nuclear Electric", Employee Development Bulletin, forthcoming.

¹⁰    Kochan T A, Katz H C and McKersie R B (1986), The transformation of American industrial relations (Basic Books, New York).

¹¹    Hougham J, Thomas J and Sisson K (1991), "Ford's EDAP scheme: a roundtable discussion", Human Resource Management Journal, vol 1 (3), Spring, pp.80-81.

¹²    IRS, see note 8, above, p.11.

¹³    IRS (1996), "No take-off in pay in 1995/96", Pay and Benefits Bulletin 411, November, p.26.

¹⁴    Bassett P (1987), Strike free: new industrial relations in Britain (Papermac, London), pp.86-87.

¹⁵    Mortimer, see note 5, above, p.309.

¹⁶    IRS, see note 4, above, p.8.

¹⁷    Making History (1995), UAW-Chrysler Corporation, p.i.

¹⁸    Partners for progress; next steps for the new unionism, TUC (1997) (London).

¹⁹    Towards industrial partnership: new ways of working in British companies, Involvement and Participation Association (1997) (London).

²⁰    General Motors' Service Directory.

²¹    IRS (1997), "From here to security? ", IRS Employment Review 631, May, pp.6-12.

²²    Ibid., p.7.

²³    Skills 2000, TUC (1992).

²⁴    Rainbird H and Maguire M (1993), "When corporate need supersedes employee development", Personnel Management, February, pp.34-37.

²⁵    Dalziel S (1995), "Learning and development", in Walters M (ed), The performance management handbook (Institute of Personnel and Development, London), p.111.

²⁶    IRS (1995), "Kindling the spark of learning at work: TEC-sponsored employee development", Employee Development Bulletin 64, April, p.9.

²⁷    IRS (1994), "Assisted development at Peugeot Talbot", Employee Development Bulletin 53, pp.2-3.

²⁸    IRS, see 6, above, p.7.

²⁹    National Commission on Education, see note 3, above.

³⁰    Employee development schemes: what impact do they have?, Department of Education and Employment (1996); "Employee development schemes", Employment Gazette, October 1995, pp.385-390.

³¹    National Commission on Education, see note 3, above.

³²    IRS (1993), "Employee development programmes: towards a learning culture", Employee Development Bulletin 37, January, pp.2-6.

³³    IRS (1996), "Encouraging a learning at habit at Oxford Brookes", Employee Development Bulletin 76, April, pp.13-15.

³⁴    IRS, see note 27, above, p.2.

³⁵    IRS (1990), "Developing a hunger to learn - the first year of Ford's EDAP", Employee Development Bulletin 10, October, p.7.

³⁶    IRS, see note 26, above, p.11.

³⁷    IRS (1997), "Vauxhall's employee development scheme reaches a new milestone", Employee Development Bulletin 88, April, p.3.

³⁸    IRS (1995), "EDAP blossoms at Vauxhall plant", Employee Development Bulletin 67, July, p.3.

³⁹    Employee development schemes: what impact do they have?, Department for Education and Employment fact sheet (1996).

⁴⁰    The employee development and assistance programme questionnaire survey 1989: final report on hourly-paid and salaried employees, Trade Union Research Unit (Ruskin College, Oxford).

⁴¹    IRS, see note 26, above, p.11.

⁴²    IRS, see note 27, above, p.3.

⁴³    IRS, see note 37, above.

⁴⁴    National Commission on Education, see note 3, above.

⁴⁵    IRS, see note 27, above, p.4.

⁴⁶    National Commission on Education, see note 3, above.

⁴⁷    Mortimer, see note 5, above.

⁴⁸    IRS, see note 33, above, p.15.

⁴⁹    Moore R, Dixon L and Crayk D (1995), Main evaluation report on four HoETEC Employee Development schemes, Trade Union Research Unit (Ruskin College, Oxford).