Chair: Nicholas Boreham, University of Stirling

Discussant: David Guile, University of London

Overview

This symposium integrates research carried out in three European countries. It explores new working conditions that are evolving in Europe, analyses the nature of occupational competence in these contexts and critiques EU VET policies as being insufficiently tuned to their requirements.

All three papers illustrate the increasing complexification of organisational forms, knowledge creation and working lives in Europe. In many sectors, large, bureaucratic, segmented and isolated organisations are being supplanted by small, amorphous, distributed and networked working arrangements, in which hierarchies and demarcations are blurred and deeper forms of personal judgement and participation are needed.

The symposium argues that these developments are not sufficiently acknowledged by current European VET policies, many of which assume that production and labour processes are based on linear structures and static work tasks and professional profiles. "Transparency", "recognition of non-formal learning" "credit transfer systems" and several other issues recently included in the European Qualification Framework are the main axes of policies aimed at increasing the objectification of competencies. However, although these policies promote the principle of equity, they entail significant risks in terms of quality of VET practices, and could further encourage standardised and context-insensitive approaches. VET practices aimed at fostering the relational and creative skills and practices needed by many of the innovative work arrangements in Europe could be undermined. An additional risk is that bureaucratic-technocratic models of VET could be reinforced in a European knowledge economy which calls for more flexible and client-oriented forms of provision.

This theme is examined from different perspectives by the three papers. Paper 1 "Competence development and reflexivity: clues for new programmes for European VET practitioners" includes a theoretical review aimed at identifying guidelines for the development of new programmes for VET practitioners in a flexible and client-oriented perspective. Based on the provisional results of a Leonardo project, it argues that a reflexive approach to competence can inform and update VET practices, supporting better ways of developing competencies and fostering the reflexivity of learners. It can also promote VET practitioners' self-development by converging on a model of the reflexive VET practitioner.

Paper 2 "The desire to learn: an analysis of knowledge seeking practices among professionals" examines the work of professionals in the knowledge society from the perspective of Knorr Cetina's theory of knowledge. What she terms "knowledge-objects" are distinguished by an "unfolding ontology". They are characteristically open, question- generating and defined by their lack of completeness and non-identity with themselves. The openness characteristic of knowledge-objects creates what she calls a "wanting structure" - a desire to fill out the blanks and make the picture whole. The striving for completeness that interaction with knowledge-objects generates accommodates a "looping back and forth" between objects and persons which is transformative. This analysis of the professional competence requirements of the European knowledge economy is explored in an empirical study of four professional groups.

Paper 3 "The co-construction of individual and organizational competence in learning organizations" studies the nature of the competence required for learning and working in learning organizations in the manufacturing sector. Drawing data from an EU Framework project, it argues that competence development in a learning organization depends on developing a relational sense of self. This selfhood is constructed continuously through dialogue and relationship-building with co-workers. However, current EU VET policies frequently assume that the competent employee has an individually-contained self, marginalizing the reflexive and relational dimensions of competence.

References:

• Argyris, C., & Schoen, D. (1996). Organizational learning II. Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley. Knorr-Cetina, K. D. (1981) The manufacture of knowledge: an essay on the constructivist and contextual nature of science. New York: Pergamon.
• Schoen, D.J. (1983) The Reflective Practitioner: How Professionals Think in Action. New York: Basic Books

Competence Development and Reflexivity: Clues for New Programmes for European VET Practitioners

Massimo Tomassini, ISFOL, ITALY

The Desire to Learn: an Analysis of Knowledge Seeking Practices Among Professionals

Karen Jensen, University of Oslo, NORWAY

The Co-construction of Individual and Organizational Competence in Learning Organizations

Nicholas Boreham, University of Stirling, SCOTLAND