Skip to content Skip to navigation
University of Warwick
  • Study
  • |
  • Research
  • |
  • Business
  • |
  • Alumni
  • |
  • News
  • |
  • About

University of Warwick
Publications service & WRAP

Highlight your research

  • WRAP
    • Home
    • Search WRAP
    • Browse by Warwick Author
    • Browse WRAP by Year
    • Browse WRAP by Subject
    • Browse WRAP by Department
    • Browse WRAP by Funder
    • Browse Theses by Department
  • Publications Service
    • Home
    • Search Publications Service
    • Browse by Warwick Author
    • Browse Publications service by Year
    • Browse Publications service by Subject
    • Browse Publications service by Department
    • Browse Publications service by Funder
  • Help & Advice
University of Warwick

The Library

  • Login
  • Admin

Skills utilisation : definition, theories, approaches and measures

Tools
- Tools
+ Tools

Warhurst, Christopher and Luchinskaya, Daria (2018) Skills utilisation : definition, theories, approaches and measures. Working Paper. Dublin: Eurofound .

[img]
Preview
PDF
WRAP-skills-utilisation-definition-theories-approaches-Warhurst-2018.pdf - Published Version - Requires a PDF viewer.

Download (1278Kb) | Preview
Official URL: https://www.eurofound.europa.eu/sites/default/file...

Request Changes to record.

Abstract

Skills have become a major competitive factor for many countries and have been emphasised in national economic and social policies (OECD, 2011). It is therefore not surprising that governments at all levels in the EU – supra - national, national and sub - national – have skills strategies. These strategies have typically centred on boosting the supply and stock of skills in the labour market. The European Commission’s Agenda for New Skills and Jobs (2012) is one such example, arguing for a higher - skilled workforce across the EU through investment in training and education. However, for most companies, skills, in the form of workforce development is a third - order consideration after business development and organisational development (Warhurst and Findlay, 2012). As a consequence, whilst many companies have business strategies that include skills, few have skill s strategies per se. Boosting the supply of skills on the labour market is therefore important but not sufficient: these skills need to be put to use within companies. Without considering how skills are used, the potential exists for creating a mismatch between skills supply and demand (Keep and Mayhew, 1999; Warhurst and Thompson, 1999). Indeed, this problem seems evident in the context of ongoing ‘over - qualification’ amongst the workforces of the advanced economies (Felstead et al, 2017; Livingstone, 2017) resulting in ‘untapped talent’ at best (Skills Australia, 2012b) or, at worst, a waste of human resources (OECD, 2011) within companies. As governments refresh their skill s strategies, there is an increasingly pressing need for a framework to assist the design and implementation of new policies that encompass both skill s supply and demand (OECD, 2011; EC, 2012). Understanding skill s utilisation has become important in this context. Skill s utilisation refers to the way that employers use the skills of their employees (Ashton and Sung, 2011). Employees’ use of skills is shaped not only by their own abilities but also by the human resource practices adopted by companies, which in turn are shaped by the choices that managers, as employers in loco, make about how to manage and organise their workplaces (Ashton et al, 2017). These choices can lever or impede skill s utilisation and can have negative and positive outcomes for companies. Skill s under - utilisation can lead to a loss of human capital and reduced productivity and job satisfaction (OECD, 2011). Unused skills can also degrade or be lost over time (Clark, 1995). By contrast, better use of skills can improve companies’ innovation, profitability and productivity as well as employee s’ job satisfaction, engagement and retention (Skills Australia, 2012b). Significantly, skill use is not predetermined; choices exist and there is policy scope for government s to help support better skill s utilisation within companies (Warhurst and Findlay, 2012; OECD, 2017). Good information about skill s utilisation is therefore needed. Generating this information requires addressing two key tasks: defining and measuring skill s utilisation. This background paper focuses on these tasks. Its aim is to inform how the European Company Survey (ECS) 2019 can capture skill s utilisation at the company level in the EU. The paper has four main sections. The first focuses on the definition of skills utilisation. The second section identifies the theoretical drivers of skill use within companies. The third section reviews existing survey measures of skill s in companies, including in the ECS 2013. The fourth section offers recommendations for including measures of skills utilisation in the ECS 2019. Annex A lists the surveys analysed for this paper; Annex B lists possible questions about skill s utilisation for inclusion in the ECS 2019.

Item Type: Working or Discussion Paper (Working Paper)
Subjects: H Social Sciences > HD Industries. Land use. Labor
Divisions: Faculty of Social Sciences > Institute for Employment Research
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): Labor market -- European Union countries, An agenda for new skills and jobs -- a European contribution towards full employment, European Commission
Publisher: Eurofound
Place of Publication: Dublin
Official Date: 8 June 2018
Dates:
DateEvent
8 June 2018Accepted
Number: WPEF18048
Number of Pages: 45
Institution: University of Warwick
Status: Peer Reviewed
Publication Status: Published
Reuse Statement (publisher, data, author rights): © European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions (Eurofound), 2018. Reproduction is authorised provided the source is acknowledged. For any use or reproduction of photos or other material that is not under the Eurofound copyright, permission must be sought directly from the copyright holders.
Description:

Background paper for European Company Survey 2019
https://www.eurofound.europa.eu/surveys/european-company-surveys/ecs2019

Date of first compliant deposit: 8 January 2019
Date of first compliant Open Access: 14 January 2019
RIOXX Funder/Project Grant:
Project/Grant IDRIOXX Funder NameFunder ID
UNSPECIFIEDEuropean Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditionshttp://viaf.org/viaf/123965092
Related URLs:
  • Publisher

Request changes or add full text files to a record

Repository staff actions (login required)

View Item View Item

Downloads

Downloads per month over past year

View more statistics

twitter

Email us: wrap@warwick.ac.uk
Contact Details
About Us