Relating rationality to context: interinstitutional complexity and embedded individual agency within industrial training in the UK tableware sector

ABSTRACT

The central contribution of this paper lies in showing a need to consider the complexity of interinstitutional systems, thereby more effectively relate rationality to context. Drawing on an institutional logics perspective, it presents a study of workplace training in a particular industrial sector in the UK: ceramic production. While identifying a vicious circle in the form of, what can be termed, a ‘high-quality/low-(formal-)skill’ system state, rather than simply privileging structure over action, findings show embedded individual agency. Besides being directed by goals, interests and self-seeking behaviour, a dominant logic for senior management personnel towards technology and home-based production was guided by issues of social identity and identification. ‘Nested’ in different opportunities and constraints presented at the levels of organizations and institutions, this individual-level logic was translated into not one, but two alternative corporate logics towards existing state-led intermediate-level workforce training arrangements. Both perpetuated a low-(formal-)skill situation in the sector.

KEYWORDS:

• VET
• UK
• institutional logics
• case study
• qualitative study

Acknowledgments

As well as the two anonymous reviewers and the editor for their detailed feedback and guidance during the review process, I would like to thank Johann Fortwengel, Thomas Roulet and Matt Vidal for their valuable feedback and insights regarding earlier versions of this paper, with special thanks going to Howard Gospel for his input throughout its development.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. A sector once synonymous with prestigious producers including Minton, Royal Doulton, Spode and Wedgwood, and one traditionally clustered within the city of Stoke-on-Trent, North Staffordshire.

2. It has been reported that (a) only a quarter of all the employers surveyed had been aware of the new standards, (b) only 12 per cent had any knowledge of what they involved and, strikingly, (c) only 8 per cent of the employers surveyed indicated an intention to utilise the new standards in the five-year period that followed (NAO, 2016, 29).

3. This relates to a typology of ideal-typical skill types based on a distinction between the relative transferability of their utility across (and thus their value for) different employers. This distinction is from most transferable, ‘general’ skills, that can be utilised by many employers, irrespective of industry; to ‘occupational’ skills, which are utilised by employers operating within a particular industry, sector or value chain position; down to the least transferrable, ‘firm-specific’ skills, which are only utilised, or indeed have value to, a single employer.

4. For 2007/08, 140 learners were registered nationally for the NVQ (Level 2) in Manufacturing Ceramic and Associated Products and 470 for the Pottery/Ceramics City Literary Institute. This was compared with 110 and 380 leaners, respectively, for 2006/7 (Skills Funding Agency, 2013). In this report, values were rounded to the nearest 10 and learners were counted for each qualification they were studying and so could be counted more than once.

5. For instance, in a survey of tableware producers, Staffordshire LSC (2003) identified that while just 38 per cent of surveyed firms provided on-the-job training and 31 per cent provided both on and off-the-job training to their workforces, 70 per cent indicated that main reason for the provision of this training was the recruitment of new staff. This was compared with just 36 per cent indicating the need to remain competitive in the market and 33 per cent for the introduction of new products and services. Indeed, when training had been provided by surveyed firms over the preceding twelve-month period, it was found that the principle areas had been health and safety (75 per cent), induction (71 per cent) and new products and services (57 per cent), with production skills only attributed to 38 per cent of cases (Staffordshire Learning and Skills Council (LSC), 2003).

6. This is significant given that, in the ceramics industry, employees in plant and machine operations represented 69.5 per cent of the workforce in the UK in 2000, and with craft and related operatives representing a further 16 per cent (Association for Ceramic Training and Development (ACTD), 2000).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Neil J. Lambert

Neil J. Lambert is a lecturer in the Strategy, International Management and Entrepreneurship (SIME) group at King’s Business School, King’s College London. He holds a PhD in Management Studies from the University of London.