Creating original knowledge in and for the workplace: evidence from a practitioner doctorate

Abstract

The workplace is becoming acknowledged, if not without some contention, as a site of knowledge production that can have equal validity with academic and other research-oriented contexts. One way of investigating practice-based knowledge generation is through doctoral work that is based on research and development in the workplace. Examination of a selection of outputs from a doctorate geared specifically to work-based candidates confirms the workplace as a site of valid knowledge production, and also indicates that real-life projects concerned with development and change rather than explicitly with research can, if pursued with intellectual rigour and critical reflection, be a powerful source of new knowledge.

Keywords:

• workplace knowledge
• knowledge production
• work-based learning
• doctorate

Notes

1. ‘Thesis’ is used here to refer to the written output, ‘project’ to the undertaking(s) giving rise to the written work.