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Collaboration between Leicester and Singapore's Workforce Development Agency has led to impacts underpinned by a 25-year history of research into skills, training and workforce development. The relationship has enabled the establishment of Singapore's first policy research centre designed to inform the government's workforce policy revaluation. Before the establishment of the Centre for Skills, Performance and Productivity Research (CSPPR), independent research in these areas was virtually non-existent in Singapore. Impacts include creating a new field of study in Singapore; contribution to government policy and direction in Singapore, and a resulting contribution to the well-being of the country's economy and society.
SKOPE has been an ESRC research centre since 1998. Successive pieces of research on linked themes have cumulatively influenced thinking, and practice, in policy circles and amongst practitioners more generally. SKOPE is recognised by these constituents as providing important oversight and challenging roles in the policy process, through its research on how skills are acquired, and where and how they are best used in the labour market. As indicated in a Frontier Economics report, its research findings, built up over the years, have provided an influential British critique of approaches to the making of skills policy.
This work has resulted in changes and amendments to specific policies and processes not only in the UK (Train to Gain) but also in Australia (high skill eco-systems), New Zealand (tertiary education) and within the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) (skills and competitiveness).
Research conducted between 1997 and 2013 at the University of Edinburgh has examined qualifications reforms designed to make education and training systems more coherent, unified and flexible. This research has influenced policy developments in Scotland and internationally, and especially the development of National Qualifications Frameworks (NQFs). It has achieved three types of impact: i) analytical tools and conceptual frameworks developed in the research have informed and guided policy development; ii) it has encouraged greater realism in the aims and objectives of qualifications-led reforms; and iii) it has encouraged policy designs and implementation strategies based on a better understanding of the processes of qualifications-led change. The reach of the impact has extended to policy-makers, education providers, learners and other stakeholders in Scotland, the UK and elsewhere, especially in countries introducing or considering NQFs.
Our research has impacted on policy and practice in the area of welfare to work, employment and skills, especially at regional and national levels. The most important impact has been through Professor Campbell's move to the UK Commission for Employment and Skills as Director of Research and Policy and subsequent applied research work by the PRI for the UK Commission on Employment and Skills (UKCES), which has contributed to the development of their policies on skills and employment. These policies in turn have informed government policy on skills, training and workforce development, and the work of the Sector Skills Councils to influence employers' practices, for example in the area of career development of staff. At the regional level, the main impact has been on skills policy through work for the Regional Development Agency.
The UK lags behind many countries with respect to training and skills development, especially among smaller firms. Challenging conventional wisdom, research at Durham University Business School (DUBS) helped to shape a major new government policy designed to address this problem — the £50m per year Growth & Innovation Fund (GIF) pilot. Introduced in 2011, this is a competitive funding mechanism to encourage firms, especially small firms, to work together to facilitate skills development. The initial impact is upon the form of GIF as a policy mechanism, where firms are invited to bid collectively for matched funding to support activities to deliver training to networks. The subsequent impact is that of GIF in operation — where it has both reach in the substantial number of UK businesses affected, and significance as a new approach to solving a longstanding problem in skills deficiency among smaller firms. More specifically, it shaped government policy, including the form of delivery of training to the public and to businesses.
Increasing the number of apprentices has been the goal of successive UK governments. The University of Southampton's sustained research on apprenticeship has critiqued policy-makers' preoccupation with quantity and generated a conceptual framework for evaluating quality. Fuller and Unwin's concept, the `expansive-restrictive (E/R) continuum', has informed vocational and education training policy at the highest level. The researchers have served as Special Advisers to a Select Committee assessment of the Apprenticeship Bill and their oral and written evidence has been cited in parliamentary inquiries and government commissioned reviews. Their practical guide to creating expansive apprenticeships is published and promoted to providers and employers by the National Apprenticeship Service and Learning and Skills Improvement Service, and the application of the E/R framework has been extended to Continuing Professional Development (CPD) and the third sector.
Sport and exercise research at Southampton Solent University commenced in 2007 and comprises a young research team focussed on strength and conditioning within sport. The overarching methodological approach is defined in the work of Fisher et al (2011) as momentary muscular fatigue (MMF) whereby training is undertaken to maximal exertion. Using MMF the research team have published findings and their conclusions for public benefit, thus improving performance with a range of client groups in sport. The impact of this methodological approach is far reaching, improving performance in elite performers, whether they are able or disabled. The beneficiary groups include; two Paralympic squads in the build up to, and including, the London 2012 Paralympic Games and a premiership football team.
Research on the post-apartheid South African labour market showed high levels of economic inactivity among black people concentrated in certain areas and high employee turnover among these groups. An integrated development programme was developed in and around Port Elizabeth tailored to address specific failings in labour market supply and demand identified by the research findings. This brought greatly improved employment rates for over 3,000 participating job seekers, with more than 80% achieving a positive outcome in terms of employment or further training. Furthermore, the programme reduced turnover rates for those employers involved in the project, and built the capacity of Union workforce representatives. The development programme comprising integrated training workshops and employer support is now being rolled out across South Africa.