Purpose: This paper aims to demonstrate how the Nordic model, featuring highly regulated trade union-employer collaboration, has enabled the building of learning organizations through a co-generative learning model involving both practitioners and action researchers. Design/methodology/approach: A literature search on the Nordic sociotechnical…

In a previous ethnographic study (Sebrant, 2000) a social constructionist view of how social identity is produced among professional groups in Swedish healthcare was developed. Looking at the workplace as an important environment for identity construction suggested that these processes were conditions for learning. The purpose of this paper is to…

People function within situational contexts, and these contexts define and limit behavior. An organization is a very important context and, accordingly, produces potent forces which circumscribe and channel the activities, attitudes, and motivations of personnel. For this reason, both individual and group behavior within an organization is simply…

The outlook for improving work life quality in unionized, mature organizations is examined in the context of the Jamestown, New York, community-based labor/management committee. Ten lessons from the experience of the Jamestown Committee are offered. (Author/JMD)

This five-section symposium report includes 22 papers assessing the state-of-the-art in occupational research. Section 1, Occupational Analysis, Structure, and Methods, contains four papers that discuss: the Air Force Occupational Research project, methodologies in job analysis, evaluation, structures and requirements, career development,…

Roles and functions of senior and front line managers in VET organizations and their approaches to developing management and leadership expertise were examined in order to identify best practices. Based upon mail surveys sent to managers in 1551 registered training organizations (365 responded, for a response rate of 23.5%), 147 telephone…

The book is primarily concerned with understanding the causes of and prescribing cures for the obsolescence of knowledge and skills among professionals. The focus is on the role of the organization in creating, as well as overcoming, obsolescence. Since management bears much of the onus for allowing obsolescence to occur, it is only just that it…

The world economic situation is beset by growing worker dissatisfaction, slowing economic growth, and rising energy and resource costs. A partial solution to these problems may be worker participation in management and ownership. As production has become more dehumanized and workers have become increasingly dissatisfied and alienated, the quality…