Identity changes in the role of a Learning and

Development Advisor

by

Damian Robinson

Researching the Lifelong Learning Sector

The Dissertation

MA 210

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Abstract

This research paper presents the findings from a project that explored the identity

changes of Learning and Development Advisor's (LDA) since the UK economic

recession in 2008.

The aim of the project was to increase contemporary understanding of the LDA role

and to investigate the LDA's self-perception of their identity.

In particular, the project examined the relationship between the changing UK

economical and social environments, and the identities of LDA’s.

The dissertation answers whether the identity of the LDA has changed since 2008,

and if so, what has caused it to change. Further, it investigates what the consequences

of any changes might be.

Qualitatively, I conducted semi-structured interviews with a small sample group (12

LDA’s and 4 Senior LDA’s); whilst quantitatively, I collected work-based metrics

including the;

- Average number of delivery days by LDA's,

- Sizes of each L&D department,

- Training budgets,

- Total average training spend per head, and

- Average number of employee training days.

These metrics give an overview of the changing expectations of an LDA by

comparing data sets prior to 2008 with data sets from 2011.

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An analysis of the research data is presented where an attempt is made to identify

commonalities and divergences from 2008 to 2011.

The paper claims that core roles and responsibilities of LDA’s have changed

dramatically over a four year period, and consequently, LDA’s are lacking a clear,

common, identity. Prior to 2008 it would appear LDA roles were more clearly

defined through a training-delivery perspective. In recent years the emphasis has

shifted to a more advisory and consultative role.

It concludes by calling for more empirical research to explore the relationships

between changing identities and the 2008 economic recession. Further research is also

called for to investigate if the changes were driven by external variables, or if they

were part of a natural, organic, identity change.

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Contents

1.0 Introduction p6

1.1Rationale p8

2.0 Considerations p10

2.1 Literature review p11

3.0 Contextual setting p18

4.0 Research methodology p20

4.1 Research design and methods p20

4.2 Reporting lines p21

4.3 Quantitative research p22

4.4 Qualitative research p23

4.40 Sampling strategy p27

4.41 Senior LDA interviews p27

4.42 LDA interviews p28

4.5 Ethical considerations p29

4.6 Triangulation p30

4.7 Research companies p31

5.0 Data analysis p35

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6.0 Findings p36

6.1 Themes from the quantitative analysis p36

6.2 Themes from the qualitative analysis p38

7.0 Key findings p42

7.1 Finding One: Implications of reductions to L&D budgets p42

7.2 Finding Two: Implications of emerging Employee status p53

7.3 Finding Three- Lack of genuine L&D measurements p56

8.0 Final conclusions and discussion p63

9.0 Critical analysis p67

10.0 Bibliography p78

11.0 Appendix p89

11.1 LDA semi structured interviews p89

11.2 Senior LDA semi structured interviews p93

11.3 Interview consent form p98

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1.0 Introduction

Whereas the relationship between economic recessions and its impact onto work-based

Learning and Development (L&D) is not new to academia (e.g. Kingston (2009);

Charlton (2008); Brunello (2009)), the drastic changes in socio-economic conditions

stemming from the 2008-09 recession appear to have given us a fresh perspective on

(work-based) learning and professional development.

Felstead (2011) proposes that “In the 2008-2009 recession, there is a risk that the

negative effects on training may be more severe than in the shallower and shorter

recessions of the past” (p6) suggesting that traditional academic theories are in danger

of becoming obsolete, and new ideologies are required.

The relationship between recessions and work-based learning has been extensively

explored; however, empirical studies involving the identities of Learning

Development Advisor’s (LDA’s) are limited to indirect references in papers which

consider the future of work-based learning, and examine recent changes in the L&D

landscape (e.g. Felstead (2011); Avis (2010); etc).

This paper presents the findings from research which specifically investigated LDA

identities which have emerged from the impact.

The research focused on examining the LDA’s knowledge of their professional role;

investigating 'why' and 'how' they undertake their role.

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It uses Kolb’s (1984) “Experiential learning”, Bernstein’s (2000) “Professional

identities” and Fullers (2003) “Identity theory” as tools to analyse traditional LDA

identities and help detect emerging/ changing identities.

Additionally, it employs recent Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development'

(CIPD) reports on the changing social and economic practice of the Learning and

Development (L&D) community; and also Biesta's (2003) guidance on the emerging

corporate expectations of LDA’s.

Recent academic research into the L&D landscape has focused on the extent to which

the recession and changes in social methods of communication have led to

modifications in the practices of L&D, and the primary aims and objectives of the

L&D community (e.g. Fuller (2005), Felstead (2012), and Florian (2011)).

From a research perspective therefore, understanding the impacts of the 2008

recession, and the changing social perceptions towards development at work, were

seen as essential to understanding changing LDA identities.

This existing knowledge was located in wider publications; however, whilst the

literature (connecting past economic recessions to LDA identities) is growing, it is

overly focused on changes at higher-level, strategic positions, rather than specifically

on LDA identities. Likewise, the relevance of historical publications needed to be

questioned in light of Felstead’s theory.

While the impact of recessions on unemployment levels, training volumes, L&D

practices, and training spend have been the subject of frequent analyses (e.g. Fuller

(2003) and Livingstone (1997)) its effect on identities of LDA’s has received little

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attention; though traditional LDA roles have historically been examined, as has the

(generalised) concept of professional identities.

Regardless of an individual’s occupation, professional identity is viewed as dynamic

and constantly evolving (Stonach et al (2002)). Further, identity relates to the culture

of an organisation, social/professional interactions and an individual’s self-perception

(Bejaard et al (2000); Sachs (2002)).

The paper commences with Section One, the literature review, which summarises the

main changes to the L&D community since the 2008 recession. It gives a synopsis of

current academic thought on the evolution of corporate L&D and explores the future

of work-based development.

Section Two introduces the research project methodology, examines its multi-layered

structure, and justifies its choice. It also introduces the ethical considerations made

within the methodology and the three “Deductive” (Gill et al (2010)) hypotheses

which were created following my literary review.

Section Three presents the findings from the analysis of the research data. Here I

discuss what the evidence empirically reveals about LDA identities. Conclusions are

then presented.

1.1 Rationale

I was primarily interested in this academic subject as it relates directly to my

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professional practice. Specifically, I have experienced dramatic changes in my role

as an LDA since 2008, with each of the four companies I have worked for since

2008 having had different interpretations of the key aims and responsibilities of the

role.

Specifically, I wanted to examine

if these changes were common across the LDA role, and

if the LDA identity was still emerging (after the recession) or if the role had

stabilised and a new (permanent) identity had emerged.

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2.0 Considerations

I am keen to avoid discussing themes of maturisation during this paper. In particular,

I would like to avoid examination of 'Expansive learning environments' (Unwin

(2003)), and whether the recent growth in use of this culture has been created as a

result of the UK recession (or not).

Unwin (2003), for example, predicted the growth of expansive communities as early

as 2003; way before the 2008 recession.

Similarly, maturisation themes appear when examining the impact of the recession

onto the L&D community. For example, the 2010 “Quarterly Labour Force Survey”

demonstrate that the UK recession had no real-term effect on the delivery of instances

of off the job training; there having been a consistent reduction since 2000.

Such hypothesis suggest that many of the causalities which are believed to have

impacted on LDA identities were created, not as a result of the recession, but rather

were part of naturally emerging changes in the work-based development landscape.

Examination of specific cultural changes would have broadened the parameters of the

research too wide, therefore an early consideration was to establish boundaries onto

what would, and what would not, be investigated. For example, the impact of social

media onto L&D would have made for interesting research, but would have removed

me too far away from the principal relationship under investigation; that between

LDA’s and their own identities.

This paper also does not try to predict future LDA trends; instead it focuses on current

and emerging professional identities.

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Another consideration was to remove the development tool of 'coaching' from this

research. Although coaching has been identified as a key element to successful

corporate L&D strategies (Howe (2008)), the CIPD (2009) identified that only 50% of

companies see “coaching as a learning and development intervention” (p2). In

keeping with this unclear accountability, it was decided that coaching should not be

included as an L&D intervention.

A final consideration was to concentrate the research purely on the private sector.

CIPD (2010) statistics suggested that cuts in public sector L&D spending were

considerably greater than those in the private sector. Research into a sample group

containing LDA's from both the private and public sectors would therefore not have

allowed fair comparisons.

2.1 Literature Review

Recent reading of topical publications on L&D trends (Hutchinson (2008), Taylor

(2007), Felstead (2011), Florian (2011) etc.) suggests that the L&D community is in a

state of flux as it finds its renewed purpose within an economy affected by a deep

recession.

While the impact of recessions on the work-based L&D environment (including

training volumes, training climate and training spend) have been the subject of

frequent academic writings and analyses (e.g. Felstead et al (1994), Caballero (1994),

etc.) it’s effect on the identities of LDA’s has received little attention.

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The limited availability of literary work on LDA identities proved both positive and

negative during the development of my research project.

Positively, there were minimal concerns about my work duplicating existing materials

or hypotheses. Specifically, the lack of current hypotheses gave me licence to

decipher where I wanted to focus the research.

The lack of existing materials also proved problematic. In particular, I struggled to

devise deductive hypotheses as there was limited material examining LDA identities.

As a result, my hypotheses relied on literary content which focused on related L&D

topics and therefore required interpretation. This required considerable textual

analysis to identify keywords/ concepts, and in making links between texts which at

first appeared unrelated.

In the absence of primary literature, I was required to decipher correlations between

LDA identities and recent L&D activities. These activities included;

the impacts from the 2008 economic recession,

changes in the tools used within L&D,

changes in employee learning requirements,

changes in L&D approaches to talent, talent retention and engagement of

talent, and

changes in the responsibility expected from employees.

In essence, my literary review required the location, understanding, recording and

categorising of information from multiples sources of references. This helped to

produce a body of knowledge that interpreted contemporary issues within the L&D

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community and attempted to make them specific to LDA's and their identities.

As per Felstead (2011) I was aware that the 2008-09 recession was deeper than past

recessions, thus suggesting that literature pre-dating 2008 (e.g. Livingstone (1997)

and Saachs (2000)) was (potentially) irrelevant. Accordingly, material written before

2008 helped ascertain the LDA identity prior to the recession in order to establish if

and how this might have changed.

In order to establish the context of the research, and to identify a suitable research

methodology, some literature was particularly beneficial at the start of the project.

For example, 'Preparing businesses for recovery' (Bosch (2010)), 'Examining

diversification into new markets and competitive strategy' (Caballero and Hammour

(1994)), the CIPD (2011) report on the L&D community, and Felstead's (2008)

'Summary of changing LDA responsibilities' all helped to contextualise the L&D

landscape and give an understanding of some of the recent changes to work-based

development.

Academic writings concerning professional identities were also insightful. In

particular, Bernstein's (2000) work on the impacts which emerging roles and

responsibilities have on individuals helped give a context to the emotional struggles

some individuals have when their role goes through periods of change. Whilst not

specific to LDA's, the work was helpful in heightening my awareness of the

importance of employee identity, particularly when related to motivation.

Similar concepts were found in 'Square peg-round hole’ (Turner (2011)) which

examined emerging professional identities in an educational setting. It was interesting

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to study changing identities in non L&D settings. Turner's work was helpful when

observing how he selected (and validated) his research and research analysis,

methodologies.

Felstead et al's 2012 piece on Training floors, helped conceptualise how legal

accreditation requirements can impact onto LDA's roles and responsibilities.

Specifically, this prompted me to identify which members of my sample group were

legally required to deliver training, and if this impacted onto their identities.

Schugurensky (2006) and Avis (2010) were helpful when considering the emergence

of 'employer-led' approaches to development.

The increased ability for employees to define their own development paths was

interesting and led me to consider the emergence of new pedagogical approaches to

work-based learning and how/ if this had effected L&D identities. Similarly, Fuller’s

(2004) work introduced Expansive learning environments and altered my perception

of how employees chose to learn, what motivates them to learn and how a company

decides what learning environment to use in the workplace.

Accordingly, my semi structured interviews were tailored to include questions about

employee identities, and company learning environments; and their impact (if any)

onto LDA’s.

Keeping with employee identity themes, it was interesting to read academic works on

employee status and the importance of accreditation. Berthelemy (2010) suggested

that development responsibility lies with employees, “unless they keep up with their

colleagues and competitors, they will get left behind” (p3). This aligned with

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academic writing and the increased motivation of employees to validate themselves

for doing something they have done, informally, for years (e.g. Livingstone (1997)).

Academic perceptions include;

- Haskel et al (2003) (a greater percentage of high performing companies hire

workers with formally recognised skills),

- O'Mahoney et al (1999) (productivity growth is greatest in industries with the

highest proportion of accredited workers), and

- Reid (2000) (a highly accredited skilled workforce is connected with strong

commercial orientation, strategic awareness and a propensity to innovate).

All writings suggested that both employees and employers were acutely aware of the

benefits of formal accreditation. As a result, research was required to investigate how

and where accreditation occurred within the companies investigated, and how this

affected LDA's identities.

Interesting contradictions to the employer-led environments were also located. The

CIPD (2010) suggested “employees/ learners are expected to show “some”

involvement (54%) but few (17%) organisations expect them to be mainly responsible

for their own learning” (p5). Again, the dominance of employees in their

development needed researching and analysing when taken into an LDA identity

setting.

The CIPD (2010) and Aberdeen report (2007) were helpful in clarifying some of the

challenges faced by the current L&D community. In particular, they placed emphasis

on the lack of measurements in place to record the success of the L&D interventions.

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Similarly Felstead's (2011) conclusion of the core challenges faced by L&D

communities, in particular the requirement to “train smarter” (p20), and the CIPD

(2007) work on insufficient measurements of L&D interventions proved beneficial.

Similar to the work on employee-led development, this work helped in the creation of

my hypotheses, and also in the production of the semi structured interviews. In

particular, this was influential to the Senior LDA interviews where there was a need

to investigate the measures in place within each company to record development and

measure its success.

Reading into certain approaches and case studies of research objectivity and

pluralistic research (e.g. Mydral (1969), Creswell (2007) and Gorard (2007)) were

also helpful when selecting, and thereafter validating, my approach to research. I

found these works incredibly beneficial when considering the research approach I felt

would most benefit my work. In particular, the themes of objectivity and researcher

bias impacted my methodology greatly.

I was aware that my deductive hypotheses were created predominantly through past

personal experiences, and accordingly I became more and more aware of my desire to

counter-balance this by reducing the opportunities for (research and analysis) bias at

all opportunities during my work. On reflection, I would not have used a triangular

approach to research had I not read, and been influenced, by these works.

However, even though I read a lot of material, I was not surprised to find any

controversies within the work, and on initial reflection, most of the writings and

theories were apparent in my own workings as an LDA and what I had experienced

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myself over time.

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3.0 Contextual setting

According to Bernstein (2000), factors which influence professional identities can be

wide ranging; they include

current social and economic contexts,

trends within the professional community, and

individual organisational features (such as size, ownership, the economic

model, history and culture).

Taking Bernstein into a specific L&D context, there are several community factors

which should be identified prior to the start of the project. This will provide some

guidance on current academic thought on L&D structures.

A recent trend within the UK L&D community has been the increase in on the job

development; moving it to the preferred method for work based learning. Certain

academics (e.g. Unwin (2003), Felstead (2011) and Avis (2010)) cite this trend

originating from companies wishing to engage in cheaper, less luxurious, methods of

employee development. This has become necessary due to reduced L&D funding.

The CIPD (2011) suggest that an impact of the 2008 UK recession has been a

reduction in “funds available for learning and development” (p5) (by two-fifths).

This is supported through the 'median development spend per employee' falling from

a 2008 peak of £300 to £250 in 2010 (CIPD 2010).

Other reasons supporting the increase in on the job development arise through

changing employee preferences with the CIPD (2005) agreeing that on the job

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development is now the preferred method of development (only 19% of employees

consider on the job training the most effective method (p7)).

Additionally (and over the same time period) there has also been changes in the

quantity of development people receive. CIPD (2008) statistics show the average

number of (UK) training days increasing from 6 to 8 a year between 2009 to 2010

(p6). This has been due to either “increased ‘slack’ releasing normally busy staff for

training” (The South West Observatory (2008) p2) or an intention for businesses to

multi-skill workforces (Felstead (2011) p2).

As guidance, the IMC (2008) recommend L&D departments focus on “short-term

(training) solutions” (p2) to promote cost cutting, sharing of best practices and

learning as a community. This is supported by the CIPD (2010) “overall, it would

appear that organisations have switched to more cost-effective learning and

development practices, brought about by cuts in external costs” (p3).

Contextually, LDA identities remain, for the most part, unexplained. However,

Sloman (2008) predicted radical changes in the LDA role some years ago “it is

evident that the role has changed significantly” (p9).

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4.0 Research Methodology

A research methodology is a belief about the way that data should be collected and

analysed (Levin (1988) p2).

The principle challenge of this project was identifying ways to capture the perceptions

of LDA's whilst eliciting research on an identity which is embedded within day to day

working activities.

Responsively, I adopted a multi-layered research approach where data was collected

in a variety of ways and through a variety of channels, including interviews, sample

groups, surveys and business documentation.

4.1 Research design and methods

The research process was conducted by myself over a three month period from

August to October 2012.

The research methodology focused on collecting data to:

Examine how LDA’s perceived their identity,

Investigate any changes in the core roles and responsibilities of LDA’s since

2008,

Understand and contextualise the different L&D strategies used in the research

companies,

Investigate any changes in the social and economic landscapes of each

company since 2008.

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Data was collected through use of multiple quantitative and qualitative research

methods. This included conducting 16 interviews with LDA's from four FTSE top

100 companies. In the original research plan, five companies were selected, however

the fifth company chose not to be part of the project.

The Interviewees will be referenced through use of the following coded data;

  Interviewees

Company LDA's Senior LDA's

1 1, 2, 3 13

2 4, 5, 6 14

3 7, 8, 9 15

4 10, 11, 12 16

4.2 Reporting lines

Within the four companies, each LDA is managed by a Senior LDA.

Senior LDA reporting lines differ; Interviewees 14 and 15 report into a Department

head, whilst 13 and 16 report into a Senior Human Resources (HR) director.

Common responsibilities of the Senior LDA’s included;

- Managing the L&D department,

- Setting and reviewing performance targets,

- Monitoring staffing levels and sickness,

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- Managing the department budget, and

- Liaising with other departments across the business.

All four Senior LDA’s were detached from the day to day LDA duties, though the

Senior LDA’s in companies 3 and 4 were required to deliver development to their

respective executive board when required.

4.3 Quantitative research

The data collection process began with an “enlightenment” approach (“using one’s

own understanding with guidance from another” (Kant (1974))). Correspondingly, I

commenced my research by collecting hard evidence about each company’s approach

to L&D. This included;

- Average number of training delivery days by LDA’s,

- Training budgets,

- L&D department sizes,

- Average number of employee training days,

- Average training spend per head.

Through collection of such commercial information, I felt that I could;

Collate an understanding of each company's changing L&D strategy

(particularly the L&D size and budgets) and, subsequently,

Use the data to design relevant qualitative research.

Agreeing with Holton (1997), the use of quantitative approaches allowed “smaller

groups to make inferences about larger groups that would be prohibitively expensive

to study” (p.71).

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Similarly, a quantitative approach was chosen as it should have helped the paper

match the research focus's of transcending interview observations and not relying on

soft data, agreeing with Olsen’s (2003) theory that any research methodology should

avoid sole use of a qualitative approach as “the respondents and the interviewers

interpret the question to mean certain things, which are not necessarily identical” (p8).

As part of the quantitative research, where employee satisfaction statistics were

available (Companies 1 and 3) these were used. It was hoped that these could provide

large, company-wide, measures of the impact L&D interventions were having in each

company.

4.4 Qualitative research

The second phase of the research process focused on collecting qualitative data. This

was achieved by conducting semi structured interviews (Appendix 1.0) with each of

the 12 LDA’s. The intention of these interviews was to collect data regarding;

the current perceived roles and responsibilities of LDA's,

LDA’s perceptions of their identity (and in particular if the role had changed

since 2008), and

the L&D environment in which they operated (i.e. had it changed since 2008

and if so how).

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In addition, a second semi structured interview was conducted with the 4 Senior

LDA’s (Appendix 2.0). This focused on the Senior LDA’s perception of the LDA

role, and was designed to offer an alternative opinion to the LDA’s.

When developing the interview frameworks, I employed the work of Biesta (2003)

and the CIPD (2011) who both predicted the future working practices of LDA’s. I

was keen to use these predictions as they matched my own forecasts about the future

of the LDA role. These practices included;

- Creating multiple communities of practice,

- Providing a blend of e-learning, external conferences, off the job learning, and

interactive learning,

- Enhancing/ enabling the use of social media and interactive materials (e.g. e-

learning, blogs, multi media videos, etc),

- Increasing the use of in-house training provisions,

- Incorporating trainer functions within the role of regular staff,

- Renegotiating relationships with external providers, and

- Increasing train the trainer events.

I hoped that these practices would act as a guidance upon which to base my

interviews and to offer suggestions of where possible changes to the LDA role had

occurred.

In creating the interviews, I also drew on both my practical understanding of the LDA

role, and the results from the quantitative research stage.

In agreement with Kuhn’s (1962) suggestion that a researcher possess an internal

subjectivity (on account of pre-existing social beliefs and values), I set out to use the

Foundationalist belief that bias can sometimes have a positive influence on research

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(Pickard et al (2004) and Annis (1977)). Accordingly, I used my existing LDA

experiences in the creation of the interviews, particularly when forecasting where

changes to the LDA identity might have occurred and where struggles with identity

might be occurring.

Although all interviews followed a similar format, each one was prepared individually

based on the company who the Interviewee worked for (and thus the results from the

quantitative research).

The interview also recognised the complexity of the LDA’s work, and its structure

was designed to encourage LDA’s to articulate how they made, humanistic, meaning

of their role. This was done by asking open questions.

Silverman (2001) supports a qualitative approach to research by arguing that “human

beliefs and values cannot always be proven by cold quantitative statistics” (p32).

In endorsement, Olsen (2007) argues that to only use a quantitative research

methodology is to disregard the nature of subjective human thoughts and beliefs; and

to rely too heavily on the “empiricist belief that the world consists of ‘facts’ (p14).

As a result, the principle focus of the qualitative research was on acquiring deep,

rich, data that examined the perceptions of participants.

The interview structure was designed through interpretation of the CBI Industrial

Trends Survey (1989). I considered this as a proficient model interview as it was

produced in a semi structured format, and followed a logical progression.

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Numerically, I conducted the interviews with a small sample group. It would have

been impractical to interview a larger sample size, suggesting that a cross sample of

LDA’s was the most effective approach to my research.

The approach to each interview was similar for both LDA’s and Senior LDA’s. Not

every prepared question was asked during each interview, and the responses to

previous questions determined which questions followed.

The LDA interviews were divided into nine key topics. Each topic formed a key part

of my research. It was compulsory to ask each interviewee a question from each

topic.

Key differences between the LDA and Senior LDA interviews were;

- The introduction of “Business context” questions into the Senior LDA

interviews (these sought responses to the business statistics referenced in

Section 4.3),

- The removal of “Economic conditions” questions from the Senior LDA

interviews (I felt they had been positioned during the “Business context”

questions),

- The removal of “Personal considerations” questions from the Senior LDA

interviews (this project was to focus on the LDA rather than the Senior LDA

role),

- The modification of all Senior LDA questions so that they focused on LDA

identities (rather than Senior LDA identities).

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Prior to each interview, an agreement form was collected from each Interviewee to

record their voluntary informed consent in the research process (Appendix 3.0).

In accordance with the ethical and legal issues set by BERA (2011) the form ensured

that all Interviewees understood their key rights (including how the report would be

used and how and to whom it will be reported, the right to withdraw and their

entitlement to privacy).

To summarise the key elements of the interviews;

1. Interviewee selection was based on existing contacts,

2. Interviews lasted between 30- 60 minutes and were recorded,

3. Participation was voluntary,

4. Interviewees were invited to respond to a range of questions designed to elicit

their attitudes to their role and identity.

4.40 Sampling strategy

The sampling group of 16 interviewees was selected from a cross section of ages,

L&D experiences and development backgrounds. This attempted to ensure that no

particular demographic provided an over-riding influence on the data (and thus

impacted on it’s reliability).

Selection occurred due to my existing relationships, which offered access to LDA’s.

4.41 Senior LDA interviews

Senior LDA’s were asked to contribute to the data collection stage in two ways;

- To present quantifiable (“Business context”) responses; and

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- To be interviewed during the qualitative stage.

Each Senior LDA was interviewed using a semi structured approach. They were

invited to discuss the roles and responsibilities of the LDA's, the day to day operation

of the L&D function, and how the department worked within the company.

The interviews took place in September 2012.

Similar to the quantitative research stage, it was considered best practice to implement

an order to the research. In this instance, the Senior LDA interviews were conducted

prior to the LDA interviews. This allowed modification of the questions asked during

each LDA interview to ensure that each question was relevant (based on their

company's circumstances).

4.42 LDA interviews

To explore the emerging/ changing professional identities of LDA’s, a series of semi

structured interviews were conducted with 12 LDA’s (three from each of the four

companies).

The interviews provided an opportunity for respondents to discuss their working

experiences, including their perceptions of the LDA identity, their roles and

responsibilities, how their L&D department operated within their company and

whether they had experienced any changes in their role since 2008.

The interviews took place between September and October 2012.

As a group, the LDA Interviewees were diverse in terms of educational backgrounds

and professional experiences;

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- 5 of the 12 LDA’s had been with their current company for 5 years or more,

- 9 held professional qualifications in L&D (mostly the 'Certificate in Training

Practice' accreditation),

- 3 held no formally recognised professional L&D qualification,

- 2 were currently studying degree level qualifications.

This diversity allowed no particular demographic provided an over-riding influence

on the data.

4.5 Ethical Considerations

In addition to the ethical practice suggested in section 4.4, other ethical considerations

were made during the research. For example, in order to protect identities, all

Interviewees and companies were allocated unique identity numbers, to which only I

had access. In referencing the interviews, individual identities have been safeguarded

by referring to the Interviewees only by their identity number.

Further, to permit data protection laws, all interviews were recorded (the recorded

data is held in a secure holding accessible only by myself).

In designing the methodology, attempts were also made to remain loyal to the Bera

(2011) guidance of not bringing research into disrepute by not;

1. Falsifying research evidence or findings,

2. ‘Sensationalizing’ findings,

3. Distorting findings by selectively publishing some aspects and not others,

4. Criticizing other researchers,

5. Exploiting the conditions of work and roles of contract research staff,

29

6. Undertaking work which might compromise the objectivity of the research,

7. Undertaking work for which I was not competent, or

8. Using research for fraudulent or illegal purposes.

4.6 Triangulation

In keeping with Bera (2011) guidelines on ethical research, an attempt was made to

employ research methods that were fit for purpose. This resulted in the selection of a

methodology which combined quantitative and qualitative field work, whilst also

utilising a range of methods and overlapping phases.

Having considered academic reflections on objectivity (e.g. Mydral (1969), Hanson

(1965), and Philips (1993)), I believe that (in order to offer any useful addition to

existing knowledge) research must ensure that its methodology encourages maximum

objectivity.

As I had selected both the research topic and sample groups, I was conscious that I

required a methodology that would mitigate against any internal bias I might have and

not distort the results of the research study. Resultantly, I opted for a pluralistic

approach to research collection in the belief that combined qualitative and quantitative

methods are both complementary and encourage neutrality. My approach synthesised

with Bryman’s (2004) research into the increased use of pluralistic methodologies,

and his conclusion that the highest motive comes from a researcher's desire to

maximise objectivity.

30

Creswell (2007), Gorard (2007) and Olsen (2004) promote a Triangulation approach

to research, commenting that it allows a multifaceted approach to data collection (the

use of different sources, viewpoints, research tools, data, researchers, methods, etc.).

Similarly, the adoption of qualitative and quantitative approaches were chosen in the

hope that it would allow me to draw out important similarities/ contrasts within the

sample group and hopefully reduce any internal bias.

4.7 Research Companies

Supplementing the methodological quest for objectivity, the interviews were

conducted within four companies from different industry sectors (Banking,

Accountancy & Payroll, Construction, and Software development).

Companies were chosen from a cross-section of disciplines to ensure that industry

specific variables did not exert an over-riding influence on the research findings.

Specific companies were selected because of the existing contacts I had (and thus the

subsequent availability of data).

A short summary of each company follows;

Company 1

Company 1 is a small shared-service centre within a large construction company. It

currently employs 236 people. The workforce is divided broadly into two groups;

those working in finance and accountancy (170 people) and those who operate in

specialist roles (i.e. HR, Contracts management and IT). There is a top heavy training

programme designed for those within finance and accounting, including job

31

shadowing and enrolment onto an externally provided, but internally funded,

accountancy training programme with a nationally accredited body.

The operation has been active for two years and due to its current (loss-making) status

it has stopped providing all training which is not deemed 'business critical'.

A company L&D strategy was created in July 2010 where principle aims were to

provide both “Expansive” and “Coaching” learning environments.

The strategy rationale was to;

Minimise development costs,

Reduce off the job training,

Provide individual development (large-scale, off the job, training was deemed

largely irrelevant).

Company 1 currently has an L&D team of 4 people (3 LDA’s and 1 Senior LDA).

Company 2

Company 2 is a leading UK bank employing approximately 2000 people. Although

it’s head office is in the North East of England, there is a strong branch network and

regional offices across the UK. Company 2 has been in existence for over 40 years.

The company has experienced a number of different owners since 2008 and has

recently gone through a major brand change. Historically, it had a strong learning

culture in which employees at all levels of the organisation were encouraged to

participate. This tended to result in a promotional opportunity. Due to economic

conditions and changes in business funding, this was halted in 2010.

Mandatory regulations mean Company 2 must ensure their staff meet the Financial

Services Authority's (FSA) legal requirements to sell certain financial products.

32

The L&D budget has been reduced considerably since 2008 meaning that there has

been a reduction in

- the size of the L&D team (from 35 to 15),

- the opportunities for external qualifications, and

- the opportunities for off the job development.

In 2008 the company decided to disband its 25 person strong internal sales coaching

academy as part of it’s cost reduction programme.

There is no corporate L&D strategy at present in Company 2.

Company 3

Company 3 is an Accountancy and Payroll software provider. It employs 2,300

people across the UK and Ireland, with offices in several locations. It has been active

for over 30 years.

There is a strong focus on (internally-provided) management and leadership

development within the company, and also on (externally provided) development to

the research and development departments.

In recent years there has been a reduction in the L&D budget. Several L&D teams

operate separately to each other and no L&D strategy exists within either. 19 people

work in all L&D teams (a reduction from 52 in 2008).

A core recent activity of the L&D team has been the design, development and roll-out

of a new employee appraisal process. This has been the first time that the L&D

department have been formally involved in the training and embedding of an HR

initiative.

Company 4

33

Company 4 is a large utilities company. It currently employs around about 4,100

people across the UK and Ireland. The operation has been active for over 70 years

though it was only privatised in 1997. Company 4 operates a central L&D

department which is based from the Midlands. It employs 18 LDA's who each care

for a region of the company. Their role is to develop employees in both sales and

product skills.

Traditionally the role is home-based, though travel to different sites is a key

requirement of the LDA's.

Similar to the other three companies, it has suffered from reducing department sizes

and budgets since 2008.

5.0 Data analysis

34

I approached the analysis of the data through a 'Deductive' approach (Gill et al 2010).

Here, I proposed hypothesis and attempted to prove these with evidence. The

hypothesis were created after the literary review and prior to the research stage. They

were based on academic beliefs identified during my literary review, and also my

previous LDA experience. In particular, they were strongly influenced by the work of

Biesta (2006), CIPD (2011) and Florian (2011)

There were three final hypothesis about LDA's; namely (since 2008) there had been

Increases in, and a broader variety of, LDA core role activities,

Increased corporate emphasis on on the job training (resulting in less

LDA delivered off the job training) and,

Changes in LDA identities resulted directly from the economic

recession (i.e. reductions in L&D budgets and staff sizes).

6.0 Findings

6.1 Themes from the quantitative analysis

35

As illustrated in the data set below, my principle findings from the quantitative

research suggests strong similarities with recent academia on L&D trends (e.g. CIPD

(2011) and Fuller (2005)).

Com

pany

Average

number of

training

delivery days

by LDA’s

(Days)

Trainin

g budgets

(£000)

L&D

department

sizes

(People)

Average

number of

employee

training days

(Days)

Average

training spend

per head (£)

  2008 2011 2008 2011 2008 2011 2008 2011 2008 2011

1 n/a 32 n/a 100 n/a 4(2010)

123 n/a 260

2 40 36 400 150 35 15 42 48 450 415

3 52 42 350 200 32 19 24 27 500 390

4 71 65 300 260 30 18 22 24 490 450

The data shows that all three relevant companies (Company 1 is excluded as it was

not operational in 2008) have seen reductions (since 2008) in their;

36

Training budget,

Average training spend per head,

L&D department sizes and

Average number of LDA delivery dates.

Though the scale of these reductions differs across companies (Company 2 for

example has seen a larger reduction in spend and department size than Companies 3

and 4) there can be seen broad consistencies and trends within the sample group; all

of which suggest L&D departments are being asked to work in ways which are more

economical and efficient.

The results are consistent with recent publications, with the CIPD (2011) commenting

that the “main changes in organisations’ learning and development departments over

the last year included the department becoming more business focused (38%), a

reduction in external suppliers and a move to in-house provision (31%) and

redundancies in staff (20%)” (p3); all of which focus around core concepts of;

Increasing L&D budgetary efficiencies,

Reducing L&D costs, and

Reducing surplus physical resources.

Similarly, the Quarterly Labour Force Survey (2010) identified a steady decline in the

proportion of off the job training which decreased from 73% in 1995 to 61.5% in

2009.

37

Of particular interest is that, although L&D spend has reduced, three of the four

companies have seen increases in their average number of employee training days.

Again, this trend is supported in recent publications (“while the impact of recession

has been less acute on provision of learning and development than feared, this is due

to a re-shaping of training” (Felstead et al 2011) (p2)).

By contrast, Company 1’s average decreased (though this was over a one year, rather

than a four year, period).

Where employee satisfaction surveys were available, both Companies 1 and 3 were

rated against their opportunities for development. 78% of employees within

Company 1 and 54% in Company 2 agreed that they were “very happy with the level

of learning and development which they receive from the business”.

This is particularly interesting in Company 1 when we note that the average number

of training days reduced dramatically (from 12 to 3) between 2010 to 2011.

6.2 Themes from the qualitative analysis

The interview data identified contrasting identity perspectives, and provided some

rationale behind this.

Interview findings suggest that LDA identities remain strongly rooted to historical

responsibilities and are currently in a state of flux. Principally, this has resulted from

changing work assignments and shifting employer demands, both of which appear to

result from reductions in both departmental budgets and people resources.

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The interviews revealed strong similarities amongst LDA's in their perceptions of

their roles. Analysis revealed five main themes;

1. LDA Roles and responsibilities have changed

A group consensus suggested that (due to changing economic environments) the role

of the LDA has been reconfigured to be more cost- efficient. Principle changes seeing

more time being taken to produce an effective e-learning system and a reduction in

training delivery.

2. Managers are now required to initiate developmental operations

Re-occurring interview themes suggested that some traditional LDA roles were being

“taken away” and “given” to managers (Interviewee 7).

The principle result was a migration towards on the job development (provided by

managers) within each of the four companies.

Complementary, the reduction in off the job training was promoted within all

companies as a method of reducing training costs whilst maintaining productivity;

evidently the contemporary 'Learning territories' (Hodkinson et al (2004) p21) of each

company having changed to a strong focus on (manager-led) on the job development.

This finding contradicts both McCall’s (2010) theory that the UK corporate world has

“been slow to embrace the idea that on-the-job experience should be the driving force

in development” (p1) and also Bruner's (1949) reflection that management-led

development is sporadic and lacks “scaffolding” (p8).

3. Employee status as learners have changed

39

The introduction of tighter L&D budgetary controls has shifted development away

from allowing “nice to have” opportunities to a focus on “essential” development.

Development choices appear to be a less led through employee decisions and more

bureaucratic, issued via a top-down approach, and focused on producing clear

competitive advantages. Here, the focus seems to be on driving down business costs

and validating the skills of employees.

Again this concurs with current L&D trends, with Opie (2008) concluding that 90%

of companies wish to increase the formal accreditation of their employees (p3).

Similarly, Hodkinson et al (2007) propose that the focus is no longer on the process of

learning, but instead the outcomes of learning. Recent articles by the South West

Observatory (2008) and CIPD (2011) concluded that there had been “a decline in

training spend by business and an emphasis on the importance of maintaining training

levels through the recession” (p3).

Analysis of the interviews suggests consistent pedagogical dimensions in the four

companies. Critically, the two key consistencies appear to be,

- The purpose of development is linked directly to role performance.

- The reduction in funding has seen a shift from learning through discourse to a

“tell” approach.

This suggests changes to Fuller et al's (2005) pre-2008 belief that “learning as

participation” (p3) was the dominant approach to workplace learning.

4. Insufficient methods of L&D evaluation

40

The interviews with both Senior and non Senior LDA’s suggested there was an

insufficient level of evaluation occurring in order to properly assess both the amount,

and the success, of development interventions.

Interviews revealed that no company evaluated interventions using traditional deep

level approaches.

5. Unclear L&D strategies

Only one company (Company 2) had an official L&D strategy. The other three

companies, by contrast, had 12-month rolling L&D plans that were linked to a

protracted 12-month budget and corporate strategy.

This appears consistent with industry trends; the Aberdeen report (2007) found that

only “41% of all organisations surveyed have a learning and development strategy”

(p4).

41

7.0 Key findings

Overall, the qualitative and quantitative data were largely consistent with each other;

particularly with reference to reductions in L&D budgets and decreases in on the job

training deliveries.

Throughout the data analysis stage, I identified three clear findings from both the

collective qualitative and quantitative data;

There is strong evidence to denote a correlation between the recession (in

particular reductions to L&D spend and department size) and changing LDA

identities,

There is insufficient evaluation of LDA interventions, and

There is wide scale confusion concerning the identity of an LDA; in particular,

what is expected and what the core tasks are.

7.1 Finding One: Implications of reducing L&D budgets

There were several consequences that reducing L&D budgets appeared to have on

LDA identities, though the predominant change had seen LDA’s developing wider

remits since 2008. The root causes for this appeared numerous;

On the job reduction

As evidenced in the quantitative analysis, all four companies have seen reductions in

the volume of LDA-delivered training.

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The impact of decreasing deliveries has meant changing LDA roles and

responsibilities. In practical terms, changes discussed during the interviews closely

aligned to changes proposed by Biesta (2003) and the CIPD (2011). These changes

included;

- Internally marketing and promoting L&D,

- Participating in tasks traditionally associated to HR departments (e.g. co-

ordinating internal meetings; involvement in HR steering groups, etc.)

(Companies 1 and 3 launched new HR processes in 2011, both of which

required considerable L&D interventions).

- Attempting to create communities of L&D practice,

- Building and providing content for e-learning systems, and

- Renegotiating relationships with external providers.

The results imply that all four companies are moving towards learning environments

where the emphasis is on learners to learn socially (e.g. Vygotsky (1962) and Bruner

(1949)).

Daniels's (1984) work on social learning seems relevant to the emerging learning

cultures in the four companies when he considers how learning develops through

'participation and collaboration' (p3). Practical examples of this were seen through

some of the working objectives of the LDA's in particular the provision of cross

department training, and the promotion of interactive social groups.

Interestingly, where LDA delivery did occur, there were noticeable changes to

traditional approaches. For example, during Company 3’s HR programme (see

43

Proximity to the business section) there was no attempt to identify the needs of

learners (e.g. Gibbs (1992) Grenham et al (1999)). This has resulted in some LDA’s

feeling that only some of their skills are being used;

“The reality is that I’m no longer allowed, or even asked, to tailor my training to

particular groups of people. I’m asked to deliver the same message, in the same way,

to all people. This leads me to wonder if you really need a skilled trainer to do this

role. Anyone can read off a script. In fact, the way I see it is in years to come you

won’t even do these sessions face to face, they will be recorded once and put out as an

on line video” (Interviewee 8)

One identity implication created as a result of LDA's delivering less relates to time.

“Last year I was doing literally twice as much training as I have been asked to do this

year. I don’t always know what to do with this extra time” (Interviewee 2).

In addition, other stimulus for changing identities emerged. Bernstein (2000), for

example, acknowledges the importance physical location has on professional identity,

a suggestion which correlates with some LDA comments;

“I spend more time at my desk answering emails than I do delivering training”

(Interviewee 5).

44

“As a trainer, I have always stood in a room and trained. The less I do that, the more

anxious I get about what I meant to be doing. And yet I seem to be busier all the

time”. (Interviewee 6)

When analysing the data, it was interesting to cross refer some results to traditional

academia regarding emerging professional identities (e.g. Bernstein (2000)). For

example, whilst there was a strong correlation amongst LDA's in the wider remits of

the role they were experiencing, there was a clear disparity when it came to the

acceptance of such changes. Some LDA’s were more resistant to change than others:

“The reality is that I’m asked to promote the success of L&D. I’m happy to do that. I

understand the reason behind that. But the truth is I don’t see why I am being asked

to do it. We have an internal communications team who possess the skills and

abilities to do this task in half the time it takes me; and with twice the quality. My

skills are linked to development. But instead you have the managers delivering

training”. (Interviewee 8)

“In the past I would have just been involved in training new skills and refreshing

existing ones; now I am asked to be actively involved in rolling out a new HR

appraisal system. My involvement was not only about designing and delivering the

training but also about company-wide communications, promotion and blogging. I

have also been asked to evaluate its impact across the business. I am not used to

doing the majority of this and now I’m asked to do this for a new business critical

project” (Interviewee 3).

45

“I’m more than happy to take on new roles, it keeps my job interesting and to be

honest I was getting bored of constant deliveries” (Interviewee 1)

Changes in team dynamics

Correspondingly, the interviews made reference to all four companies having lost all/

some of their L&D administration teams. Resultantly, it appears common that LDA’s

now carry out administration work (e.g. record keeping, scheduling and room

booking) as part of their role.

In most cases, this was perceived as a backwards career move.

“It seems stupid to pay me my salary but decrease the level of work that I am required

to do.” (Interviewee 4)

“I’m frustrated that a lot of my time is taken up doing administrative tasks at the

detriment to working on innovative projects.” (Interviewee 5)

Interestingly, all four Senior LDA’s commented that administration had always been

considered a part of an LDA’s role.

Mandatory Training floors

In Companies 1 and 2 mandatory training requirements impacted onto LDA’s heavier

than companies 3 and 4. Interestingly, LDA’s operating in Companies 1 and 2

appeared to hold stronger identity perceptions than their counterparts. This appeared

to result through a consistency in topic, timing and the quantity of, training.

46

“I enjoy the repetition of refreshing our sales staff and making sure we provide the

required FSA benchmarks.” (Interviewee 5)

Conversely, the removal of (regular) mandatory training requirements appears to have

had a detrimental effect to the way some LDA’s perceive their role;

“It used to be that I would provide sales training to all sellers for 6 weeks a year.

Now I don’t have to do this. It has been decided that managers will do this. The

result is that I have now been given back 6 weeks of the year. No one has told me

what I am supposed to do with this time”. (Interviewee 8)

Academically, these findings correlate with Felstead et al’s (1994) Training floors

work, which examined the impact of legal regulations onto the roles of LDA’s and

identified that training floors can have a positive effect on LDA's.

Management development programmes

All four companies currently operate management development programmes; only

one company (Company 2) ran such a programme prior to 2008.

These figures correlate to CIPD (2010) figures of internal programme growth (62% of

organisations now use such programmes (58% in 2008)). The IRS (2010) quantified

that 8 in 10 corporations believe training for people managers should be compulsory.

Implications of these programmes on LDA identities appear twofold;

1) Short-term:

47

Similar to the findings on mandatory training, management development training

appears to offer stability to some LDA's. Regular training, with a consistent message,

offers stability in a dynamic role.

Not all LDA’s have welcomed the management development programme however;

“I find our management programme stressful. There has been such emphasis placed

on the success of the programme that I feel like I can’t allow it to fail. It is promoted

as our flagship training. What worries me is that underperforming managers are sent

on the course, meaning we have now become the punishers. In other cases managers

who have been here for ten years have been forced to attend. They are already aware

of the content. Yes it’s nice to be refreshed with company policies, but is it really a

good use of their time? We aren’t really considering manager's individual training

needs, and that’s part of my job” (Interviewee 3)

2) Long-term:

By developing managers in the necessary skills to lead, coach, develop and manage

employees, this suggests a sustained attempt in making them responsible for their

staff’s development. Consequently, this has started to remove traditional roles and

responsibilities from LDA's (which subsequently has identity implications (see

Section 7.3)).

The majority of the interviews concluded that a key reason for developing managers

was their ability to develop others, thus justifying the cost of management

development. By creating in-house programmes, companies would benefit through

reducing spend on external training, talent retention and increased productivity.

48

According to the LDA’s the strategy behind management development suggested it

was a key L&D initiative in helping build development capability rather than create

dependency.

A consistent finding during the LDA interviews was the belief that employers

invested fewer resources into non management training than they did into

management training. It’s interesting to observe the prediction of this trend within the

CIPD (2010) guidance on changing LDA roles, and the decade old academia that

supports this opinion (Beinart et al (1998) La Valle et al (2001)).

Identity wise, this appeared to permit some LDA’s to perceive that they were no

longer trainers of everyone, but exclusively for managers.

“Most of the time I spend training is focused on training managers to be able to train

others.” (Interviewee 7)

Changing responsibilities of managers

Resulting from reducing L&D budgets, and increasing employee preferences for on

the job development, there appears to have been strategic changes to the role of

managers across all four companies. Principally, this has seen larger responsibilities

in identifying and providing development to direct reports.

The CIPD (2009) supports this industry trend with 70% of interviewees suggesting it

is now a manager’s role to provide on the job development (p3) (52% in 2005).

49

Quantitatively, this increase in manager-led development provides a clear solution to

the questionable correlation between the reduction in LDA-led delivery, and the

increase in development opportunities per employee.

It is interesting to read CIPD (2011) proposals that a common L&D trend is the re-

christening of traditional management tasks into 'development'. This insinuates that

there have been no real increases in the amount of development opportunities per

individual, just an alteration of what is recorded. It would be interesting to conduct

further investigations to identify where the increases in development have come from,

and if they merely result from a change in what is measured.

Sloman (2008) identifies a related consideration, suggesting that by shifting

responsibilities for people development (from LDA’s to team managers) there are

evaluation difficulties (“off the job development is difficult to manage and monitor”)

(p10). Findings about the problems of measuring LDA interventions are examined

later.

Enabling

Relative to the above findings of developing employees through developing

managers, Sloman (2008) suggests that the role of an LDA is now focused on

“Working through others and achieving change by influence rather than immediate

personal intervention.” (p9)

He suggests that changing LDA identities result from development initiatives which

focus on “a range of activities, not all of which are under the control of the trainer or

L&D manager” (p9).

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This theory is supported by the Aberdeen report (2007) and the CIPD (2011) which

proclaim that L&D “is shifting from delivering to developing and enabling” (p2) and

that there was a 13% increase (between 2009 to 2010) in the belief that LDA’s have

primary responsibility for determining (but not delivering) L&D needs (the amount of

time spent by LDA’s organising development increasing from 22% (2009) to 36%

(2011)).

Sloman (2008) believes that the focus on enabling has resulted in a loss of LDA

identity, a theme which was strongly observed during the LDA interviews.

In numerous examples, interviewees explained that they had been asked to reduce

their amount of deliveries, whilst increasing the delivery of initiatives which would

“reach the maximum amount of people” (Interviewee 3) or “have the biggest impact”

(Interviewee 4).

“I have spent increasing amounts of my time working on an e-learning project which

will hopefully reach a lot more people than I could if I spent the same amount of time

in a training classroom” (Interviewee 3).

There were contradictory opinions on the positive effect of these enabling changes;

“I tend to do less delivery but spend a greater amount of time consulting with the

business, and designing more localised interventions. I am seeing a real success in

this field.” (Interviewee 7)

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“I am involved in more company meetings than ever before. There’s not always a

focus during the meeting on L&D so it’s not always in my interest to take time out to

go”. (Interviewee 6)

Proximity to the business

Berthelemy (2010) predicted the future of L&D involves moving from instant

feedback (“how many people attended a course”, “how many viewed an online

tutorial”, etc.) to measuring the longer-term impacts of L&D interventions.

Berthelemy recommends L&D achieve this by becoming “performance improvement

consultants, not just providers of off-the-shelf chunks of learning” (p3).

Data analysis showed a connection between recent LDA activities and Berthelemy’s

prediction. Several Interviewees agreed that they had been asked to get closer to the

business, with specific reasons including having a “greater visible presence (across

the business)” (Interviewee 2) and “supporting the business to achieve specific

development targets” (Interviewee 11).

Initiatives to increase the L&D business proximity included;

- Company 3 asking each LDA to align themselves to an HR representative

from a particular business area.

- Company 2 operating a drop-in facility where business employees could visit

and seek guidance on L&D interventions (e.g. training programmes,

qualification funding, etc.).

Both initiatives were implemented within the last two years.

52

The impact of Company 3’s intervention has received mixed responses from LDA’s.

“I enjoy doing it because it gives me the chance to meet the business, understand their

needs and provide my expertise and experience.” (Interviewee 8).

“I feel like I’m doing this to justify my existence. It’s almost like a large majority of

my time is spent being visible and providing evidence of the job I do. Why not just let

me do the job I’m paid to do without making me spend half my time proving what a

good job I am doing”. (Interviewee 7).

The impact of these new LDA tasks seem complimentary to the outcomes identified

during the “Enabling” stage, i.e. LDA's are becoming the “enablers” (rather than

“deliverers”) of development. This seems critical in the creation of the new LDA

identity.

7.2 Finding Two: Implications of emerging Employee status

The emerging learning status of employees (section 6.2.3) has, itself, impacted onto

LDA identities. Analysis of the qualitative research suggested a variance in the

perceived status of employees. For example Company 1 appeared to view employees

as the unfortunate recipients of challenging economic times;

“Our people cannot be full learners at the moment as we cannot reduce the amount of

hours they need to be operational for. Also, we cannot fund any external training.”

(Interviewee 2)

53

Contradictory, Companies 2, 3 and 4 employed policies that increasingly allowed

employees to choose their own development paths (based on the skills required to

either perform in their current role, or for career progression).

Academically, the emergence of increasing employee choice has received

considerable thought. The challenge of building/ maintaining an (employee-led)

development environment, whilst being subjected to budgetary cuts, has historically

shifted L&D practices towards Expansive communities (Schugurensky (2006); Avis

(2010); etc.).

Fuller et al (2004) have written considerably about Expansive environments and

define it as occurring when employers treat employees as individual ‘learners’ (p4)

and allow them to become responsible for their own development. Subsequently,

Fuller et al describe some of the conditions of an Expansive environment as allowing

“employees to: engage with multiple communities of practice; gain broad experience

across the organisation; pursue knowledge-based as well as competence-based

qualifications; learn off-the-job as well as on-the-job” (p4).

The freedom of employees to be responsible for their development, differed between

each of the three companies that chose to implement expansive environments and

during the Senior LDA interviews, it was recognised that the initiatives had not been

as beneficial as originally planned. All short-comings were blamed on reducing L&D

budgets.

54

Company 3 was forced to reduce the number of (externally provided) courses

that it offered employees.

Company 2 was required to move its “Development Path” initiative (a skills

matrix detailing the development required within each company position)

from 2012 to 2013.

Employee-led initiatives appear to be a current industry phenomenon. Berthelemy

(2010) labels the trend the “Individual Responsibility” approach (p8), and Sloman

(2008) suggests that in order to fully engage employees they should be encouraged to

“construct their own learning agenda”(p3). This employee-led approach to

development was mostly seen as a positive step forward in development, though

concerns were raised;

“I now can’t plan my workload too far ahead as I might receive a lot of training

requests for a topic which I had not planned for”. (Interviewee 4)

“I feel sorry for those who choose a training module but need to wait for 6 months

until there are enough people to run a course. In the past we would have probably

just sent them on an external course as soon as we could; now there is no budget so

we can’t.” (Interviewee 7)

The common LDA critique of an Expansive environment concerned the reduced

ability to plan future workloads; LDA’s suggesting that they have become more

reactive to the needs of the business than ever before.

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7.3 Finding Three: Lack of genuine L&D measurements

A continual trend across all 16 interviews concerned the lack of evaluative work

collected following L&D interventions, and the detrimental impact this had on LDA

identities.

There were three key themes;

Measures to record training occurrences and training successes

The ability to measure on the job development is something that has challenged L&D

institutions for years. Pre-recession, the Aberdeen report (2007) for example

commented that “learning and development has been a victim of corporate cuts and

scrutiny due in large part to the subjective interpretation of its business impact” (p4).

After analysis, it appears that all four companies lack appropriate methods of

evaluation. This has strongly influenced LDA identities and made them question how

they were perceived within the business. .

“I find it funny that on the job development is promoted as the new and improved way

of training. But does anyone actually record this? The only evidence I see is when

managers document instances of formal coaching or 1-2-1’s; but what about when a

person asks a member of their team for help or guidance? This is never recorded.

The value of development isn't recorded either.” (Interviewee 4)

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Three of the four companies operated a central training system where managers were

expected to record all training occurrences (the fourth company had no system to

record training).

During interviews, the general LDA consensus was that the recording of training

appeared sparse and irregular; and its success depended on each manager following

the correct processes.

Resultantly, LDA’s appear cautious about company statistics demonstrating increased

levels in employee training days.

Common research themes suggested LDA’s were uncertain;

that all development is recorded,

that managers fully understand what development is, and

why tasks previously defined as being a manager's operations are now

classified as 'development'.

The implications on LDA identities appear significant;

“We are being told that training is happening, and as a result our roles are changing.

How, if we are not delivering the training ourselves, do we know if it is happening? If

I’m relying on others to record development then I’m also relying on them to know

what development is.”(Interviewee 11)

Similar observations were seen not just in the recording of interventions, but also in

how their success was measured;

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“As far as I can see, our methods of recording training, and recording any successes,

are practically non-existent” (Interviewee 7)

“I have no way of finding out how beneficial my involvement has been”. (Interviewee

9)

A common trend from the LDA interviews suggested they were lacking a way of

validating their work. Analysis of Senior LDA interviews showed that each company

used Level One Kirkpatrick (1975) ‘happy sheets’ to monitor the effectiveness of the

intervention. This was only used during off the job interventions; nothing was used

for on the job interventions. Sloman (2008) suggests the difficulty in measuring

informal development; “it is much easier to report on top-down training than informal

learning activities; this raises real dilemmas for today’s training and development

professional when it comes to demonstrating value (p10)”

No company surpassed Level One and reviewed interventions at a deeper

understanding (i.e. examining intervention impact after timescales (e.g. Bramley

(2003) or calculating economic returns on investment (e.g. Kearns (2005)).

Without detailed appraisals of their work, LDA’s appeared uncertain about why they

were asked to perform certain interventions, and what impact(s) they were having.

“Sometime I have no real sense of what impact I’m making onto the business. It’s not

like I work in sales where I have measures for revenue or data conversion. I literally

have no measures other than the success reported on a tick-sheet after a training

session. Even then, I feel like I can’t trust the results because people are being nice”.

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(Interviewee 5)

“I am being asked to make fundamental changes to my role, and yet no one can offer

me reasons for the changes based on the work I have done and our old approaches.”

(Interviewee 4)

Training budgets

Consistently, the only quantifiable L&D measure used in all four companies is the

“Training budgets” calculation. This suggests where the current focus of L&D lies

(i.e. managing the overall costs of development).

In some interviews there appeared some concerns about what benefits this particular

measure provided;

“Reducing costs does not help me to evaluate my own performance. Who cares if

costs have reduced? It makes no clear link to job performance or education and skill

levels. Those stats are ones for the shareholders.” (Interviewee 11)

Future trends

When questioned further about the evaluation of development, LDA’s appeared non-

perturbed, indicating that having no measures, or suggestions of value add, was

common in their experience of L&D.

However, during several interviews, it was clear that steps were being taken to

implement stronger evaluations of L&D interventions. In most cases, LDA's saw this

as positive.

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“People often ask me what exactly I do. If I’m sitting at my desk, and I’m not

delivering training, people seem to have no idea what I do”. (Interviewee 12)

The general positive response from LDA’s is in keeping with CIPD (2006) findings,

which reported that 80% of L&D professionals believe that development delivers

more value to their organisation than they are able to demonstrate.

Practical steps have been taken in some companies to measure the effectiveness of

L&D interventions.

Company 4, for example, have set FY2013 objectives to design and

implement some Kirkpatrick Level Three style evaluations;

“The idea has come about because of a future audit. We realised that our approach

to L&D was not adequate to be accredited by the company’s internal audit.

Realistically this will mean evaluation forms are sent round 3 months after a course

has run to see if the course has affected people in their day to day roles”.

(Interviewee 15)

Similarly, as part of Company 3’s HR initiative, deep-rooted measures and

feedback were identified as a pre-requisite to the project.

“I knew before we started the design of the initiative that I would be required to give

ongoing, quantitative, feedback on it’s impact”. (Interviewee 9)

These company examples correlate with industry trends; the CIPD (2009) illustrated

that 30% of the L&D community expected more factual measures of training

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effectiveness within the next 5 years; and Impact International (2011) commented that

“72% of people development professionals had experienced increased pressure to

prove ROI of their programs” (p2).

Felstead (2011) concludes that “The current emphasis (of L&D) is upon providing

high quality contents but in more cost effective and focused ways” (p20). ‘Training

smarter’ and ‘doing more for less’ being the key themes.

These themes suggested that a key focus of L&D was on measuring the impact of

interventions, principally;

1. To validate the effectiveness of its interventions, and

2. To promote its effective budgeting.

Whilst the increased approach to evidencing interventions was commonly seen as a

positive by the LDA’s, there was some concern raised about how the statistics will be

used.

Interviewee 4, for example, commented that the success of one of his objectives was

measured through the total number of people he delivered training to;

“This seems a bit backwards to me; all I need to do next year to improve my

perceived effectiveness is to train more people. But quantity is not always quality. I

could reduce the cost of training, or expand the maximum size of each training class.

This doesn’t mean people have actually learnt anything or that I’ve performed

better”. (Interviewee 4)

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Concerns were also raised about who was expected to take the time to measure L&D

effectiveness. Again, this correlates with current trends, with the CIPD (2007)

suggesting that “80% of HR and L&D professionals believe that training and

development evaluation is too time consuming”.

No interview mentioned any future initiatives to either record or measure off the job

development.

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8.0 Final conclusions and discussion

This study examined the complex relationship between LDA’s and their identities. In

particular, it set out to prove three hypotheses.

I feel that there has been significant value gained from understanding how LDA’s feel

about their current identities. In particular, the findings have helped evaluate core

themes of emergence; emerging identities of LDA’s in an emerging L&D

environment.

I conclude my research paper by surmising that the data collected in my project

proved my three hypotheses;

there is empirical evidence that LDA roles operate in a remit that is much

wider than 2008,

there have been reductions in the number of LDA classroom deliveries, and

most of the LDA identity changes have resulted from the 2008 recession.

Three key variables were identified from my research data as having a direct impact

onto how LDA’s perceive their own identity;

The amount of L&D budget available,

The level of appropriate L&D measurements, and

The status of employees.

The impact each variable has onto LDA identities seems consistent across all four

companies, despite the uneven effects of the recession. Consequently, new tasks have

developed within LDA’s roles. In particular, these have resulted from reducing L&D

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budgets and sizes, and therefore it can be suggested that the recession is the principle

reason for changing LDA identities.

The research has specifically shown (as predicted) that LDA’s have migrated away

from their traditional tasks (designing and delivering training) into new, more-wider-

reaching, practices (e.g. e-learning, community practices and the use of interactive

media) as a result of trying to balance falling L&D budgets, with an increased demand

to provide development opportunities for all.

In practical terms, the data suggests that all four companies have sought to make L&D

savings through;

- increased use of in-house training provisions,

- increased delegation of development responsibilities to managers,

- renegotiated/ cancelled relationships with external training providers,

- expanded on-site, internal expansive communities, and

- enhanced use of e-learning.

It has been the introduction (or increased use) of these wider remits which has

effected LDA’s identify.

Similarly, another impact of the recession has seen an increased attention placed onto

the contribution which L&D makes to each business. Ironically, there appears

insufficient measures in place to monitor the new LDA activities, though the research

did suggest that companies are making a concentrated effort to increase their

measurements.

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The impact that these measures have on LDA identities will be interesting to observe,

though it would be beneficial for LDA's if their measurements validated their new

working practices (at present there appears to be no plans to measure two of the new

LDA practices (‘business proximity' and 'changing management responsibilities').

The forecasted measures appear a timely and wise corporate trend, though similar

suggestions were made after a key CIPD (2007) recommendation to “analyse,

measure and evaluate how investment in people creates value” (p2) and no key

implementations were made. Observations of these promises appear necessary.

It is noteworthy that sufficient measures were not in place to measure traditional LDA

roles, and it is reasonable to agree with those LDA's who argue that changing their

roles and responsibilities was not based on any tangible evidence.

In conclusion, the identity of a modern day LDA seems in a state of genuine flux.

The basis of this derives through the emergence of a new identity in a role which

seems to have been long unchanged. Although LDA’s have been asked to undertake

new roles and responsibilities, these are not sufficiently measured and this prevails the

LDA struggle of finding meaning and direction in their role.

The roots of LDA identities still appear grounded in old, and in some cases, dated

responsibilities. Some LDA's appear to be clinging onto the declining instances of

classroom based deliveries for a sense of identity. Conversely, others are embracing

the ability to enable others, and to offer new approaches to development.

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Somewhat worrying, some LDA’s are even considering the long-term lifetime of the

LDA role; particularly in light of the apparent migration of traditional tasks, and the

decline in specialism’s.

Whether the identity will (or even can) stabilise as the impacts of the 2008 recession

persist is an interesting question and one which LDA’s should perhaps be aware of as

they (in some cases) struggle with an identity that remains dynamic and fast changing.

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9.0 Critical analysis

As the paper appears the first research solely focused on LDA identities, and therefore

has not been able to add to any existing work, I conclude that it is useful: if only in the

hope that it stimulates progressive academic discussions.

In particular, I believe several areas require extended attention;

I. The relationship between changing LDA identities and the 2008 recession

It would be interesting to evaluate if identity changes had been created through

maturisation or if they were exclusively a result from the recession.

Felstead (2011), for example, suggests that declining levels of off the job training is

part of a 15 year L&D trend, as well as implying “the total (employers spent on

training) fell only by 5% in real terms between 2007 and 2009” (p4).

Perhaps further empirical evidence is required to critique my assumption that

changing identities have resulted from the economic impacts of the recession.

II. LDA trends in other industries

By expanding the research methodology across other industries (and potentially the

public sector) it would be interesting to evaluate if the LDA changes were a national,

or industry specific, phenomena.

III. The emerging identity of employees

As implied within my research (some) LDA's feel that they are more reactive than

ever to the needs of the employees. This results from increasing use of ‘employee-

led’ and ‘expansive learning’ environments. Further research seems appropriate into

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this relationship between changes in the employee status and LDA identities, again

perhaps focusing around themes of identity maturisation.

IV. The relationship between social and economic conditions

Micro-level investigations into the impact which social and economic variables have

onto LDA identities would be interesting; has one impacted on LDA identities more

than another?

V. The lack of clearly defined L&D strategies

An investigation into why there is a lack of L&D strategies within the four companies

would be interesting. It might also be beneficial to correlate this trend with the Leitch

report (2004) and it’s suggestion that foreign companies are outperforming their UK

counterparts in employee skill-levels and accreditations. Why is the UK L&D

community being outperformed by overseas competition? Does this relate to a lack of

clearly defined L&D strategies?

VI. Informal learning

Billet’s (2002) work on influences to informal learning (workplace cliques,

affiliations, gender and race) would be interesting to investigate; particularly in

relation to how successful managers are at developing their staff and whether the

trend for manager- led (rather than employee-led) development is a valid one.

VII. Reasons for increased development

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There are theoretical reasons suggesting why development can increase during a

recession; for example to prepare a business for recovery (Bosch (2010)) or to

diversify into new markets (Caballero and Hammour (1994)).

Further investigation into the reasons why there has been increased development in

the four researched companies seems appropriate. In particular, I would be interested

to examine my assumption that the increases occurred because of changing

classifications of ‘development’.

VIII. Evaluations

In light of the revered focus on L&D evaluations it would be interesting to investigate

what came first, a need by Snr LDA’s to validate L&D interventions, or a move by

companies to effectively audit the value add of L&D. This might shine some light on

why the LDA roles are changing, and who wanted these changes.

In addition to other academics critiquing my work, the next step should be to produce

a body of longitudinal studies. By repeating the research methodology at regular

intervals I could identify if changing identities were ongoing, or if they ever

stabilised. Repeated research would also help examine the reliability of the results,

something particularly beneficial to me as this is my first large-scale piece of work.

Methodology

A principle aim of the project was to examine both the micro and macro scales of the

LDA identity.

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At a micro level, I used qualitative techniques to research patterns in human

personality and functioning. This approach proved beneficial as it allowed

research to progress beyond mere observational and hard data sources.

Consideration had been made to use focus groups or surveys during the research

process, though interviews were preferred on the grounds of feasibility. In retrospect,

a survey might have been beneficial in allowing some quantification of LDA internal

opinions.

When designing the questions, I found it difficult to not make them appear biased or

be influential on an answer. To help me I used the “dissertation-help” website which

advised that questions remain open rather than closed, and should be broken into key

topics. These both proved helpful in making the interviews successful, though, as

predicted the range of varied responses did make data analysis difficult. It was also

apparent that not every question related to the project’s hypotheses and provided

value. A narrower bank of questions would have helped and should I interview again

I would re-write some questions (in particular those focused around the lack of L&D

strategies).

Generally, the pre-interview conversations appeared to work well in providing a

context to the interview. Perhaps on a few occasions they overly influenced the

interviewee and pre-empted certain responses. It would have been interesting to

observe if responses were the same had the conversation not occurred.

The probability of the results was also potentially affected by the timing of the

interviews. It seems reasonable to suggest that topical L&D activities (e.g. the launch

of new initiatives, and the downsizing in department sizes) might have impacted on

the LDA’s identity perceptions.

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Overall the interviews appeared well prepared, well structured and answered honestly.

Perhaps the honesty resulted from my prior relationships with the interviewees and it

would be interesting to observe if the results were the same had an unknown

researcher conducted the interviews.

It would be reasonable to question the objectivity of the results based on the sampling

strategy, and perhaps I should have randomly selected the interviewees rather than use

existing contacts. In conclusion though, the chosen interviewees seemed appropriate,

and their different L&D backgrounds and experiences ensured that their responses

were knowledgeable, and not overly influenced by one variable.

I originally planned to translate the interviews and use a pilot interview. Though

offering several potential benefits, these proved unfeasible and reflected my

inexperience of the research process.

I found the collection of quantitative research before qualitative research beneficial in

that their results helped the interviews be more specific. I would imagine that if the

order was reversed, the interviews would not have been as successful.

At a macro scale, the quantitative statistics attempted to provide an

overarching summary of the L&D environments in which the LDA's operated.

I found this research approach was sufficient and resulted in the collection of varied

and valuable primary data.

However, some shortcomings were seen in the quantitative research, and in retrospect

some defined boundaries would have helped. For example, the research did not

examine if all companies shared a definition for ‘development’, thus permitting the

potential for unfair comparisons. Similarly, the figures for ‘budgets’ and ‘average

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spend per head’ were given as estimates by Snr LDA's, rather than calculated

responses.

Other business figures (e.g. the level of staff turnover, expenditure in other areas of

the business, etc.) might have helped broaden the scope of the research. In retrospect,

as the companies were listed on the stock exchange I could have found these in

published accounts. Not making use of this readily available data was a genuine loss.

It seems reasonable to question why Company 1 was used in the survey group as it

was not operational in 2008 and could not provide the same quantitative results as the

other three companies. Similarly, as employee satisfaction statistics were not

available in all four companies, it might be considered unfair to use those that did

exist.

A Triangulation methodology was used during the research process, and, in

retrospect, I believe it was appropriate as it helped ensure that;

- internal bias and subjectivity was minimised,

- my work was data rich (and balanced between hard and soft evidence), and

- the research matched the focus of the paper.

Not only did the Triangulation method assist the research, it also made me appreciate

the importance an efficient methodology plays in a research project.

Before starting the project, I was critical of using just either the quantitative or

qualitative approach to research. The success of the triangulation helped reinforce

this. Similarly, I remain convinced that Sarandakos (1993) and Silverman (1993) were

incorrect in concluding that quantitative and qualitative research approaches are

incompatible; I believe that the two research paradigms are complementary and do not

need to be kept apart.

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I continue to believe that research and analysis cannot be completely objective,

though I remain convinced that it is the researcher’s responsibility to select a

methodology which maximises the opportunity for it.

The pluralistic approach proved particularly helpful when providing details of what

was occurring within all parts of the research. For example,

- all LDA’s reported decreases in their delivery, however business figures showed

development increasing across all businesses, and

- Companies 1 and 3 showed on the job delivery decreases, yet satisfaction reports

showed employees were content with the amount of training provided.

Such contrasts would not have been possible without a combined research approach,

and it is probable that one-sided findings would have occurred.

The deductive approach worked well during the data analysis stage of the review.

Principally, it helped focus my attention on what to look for in the data rather than

simply endeavour to discover trends.

I did however have unrealistic timescales regarding analysing the data. In retrospect a

greater concentration of quantitative data and quantitative tools (e.g. Frequency

tables, the “Working as Learning” framework (Felstead et al (2009)) and/or the

“Expansive-restrictive continuum” (Fuller et al (2004))) might have helped speed up

the analysis process, though when reflecting on the lack of L&D measurements and

records, these probably did not exist. The L&D community will, I feel, be in a

perpetual state of irrelevance unless it makes decisive steps to quantify it's

interventions and their successes.

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Although I found the deductive approach helped match the analysis of the data to the

focus of the research, I collected sufficient data that a grounded or inductive approach

could have also been used to identify proposals after the collection of data (rather than

before).

It would be interesting (from a self-development perspective) for an independent

researcher to review my analysis, and decipher if they agreed with my findings.

In representing the data, I felt like I chose data which;

- gave a balanced perspective of the quantitative and qualitative research,

- helped reduce my tendency to indulge in inductive reasoning (instead focusing on

specific case studies),

- gave equal importance to each interviewee, and

- was not pre-selected to favour my hypothesis.

Literary review

The literary review was challenging as limited texts were available and I was required

to interpret related works. Later it was challenging to evaluate if I had contextualised

the texts correctly.

I found my final review to be sufficiently extensive. In particular, it helped;

- create a deductive set of hypotheses (through which the methodology was selected),

- give a formal grounding to my LDA experiences (which I had found difficult to

contextualise and ration) and,

- introduce new phenomena which proved valuable to the research (e.g. the

consequences of employee-led development).

The identification, examination, understanding and comparing of literature was not

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attached to my time plan. This proved a major failing and re-empathised my lack of

research experience. Similarly, the typology proved difficult and timely; particularly

when many themes overlapped. I’m still not content with the typology in the final

draft, though I do believe that by mentioning the factors affecting the methodology

(i.e. a reduced amount of time, problems accessing participants) and providing regular

supporting evidence, the reader is suitably informed of the process when considering

the final claims.

Conclusion

I believe the project is clear, realistic and appropriate to it’s original intent,

particularly being a first-time piece of work.

I think the work reflects well against the professional difficulties I have experienced

with my LDA identity.

In particular, I was happy that the 'what' and the 'why' of the research (which was

based on a personal curiosity of my role) gave clear suggestions on the future of the

role, and which skills I would need to continue my development. From a professional

viewpoint, it was also interesting to observe the different perceptions of LDA

colleagues and the work they were asked to undertake.

The 'how' and 'who' of the methodology could have been assisted by a larger sample

group, however the final sample size proved feasible and appropriate. Similarly, the

group did possess diverging interviewees and companies meaning the inferential

statistics were fairly universal. Subsequently, I am confident that the relationships

and trends observed within my group are likely to occur in a wider sample and thus

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the results are significant and did not occur through chance; a belief which continued

longitudinal research should validate.

I do hold though that the feasibility of using a small sample size to generate national

trends is open to, reasonable, debate. As is the fact that all of the companies involved

were from the North East of England and perhaps regional influences might have

occurred.

The 'when' of the project was not realistic, and as mentioned regularly, the project

particularly offered insights into research planning and what I should consider for

future projects (in particular the time it takes to produce literary reviews and analyse

data).

As a final point, it is worth considering Philips’s (2009) view that “certainty and

objectivity should not be linked” (p60). Although I am content that my work was

objective, there is no suggestion that it provided “true” results.

I leave my work in the belief that the research produced results which represent the

modern LDA and their struggle for identity, though I leave them open for critique.

Epilogue

Even in the short time following the paper there has been evidence supporting the

current dynamic nature of the L&D community. Company 4, for example, is now in

the process of reducing it's L&D department size to 4 and delegating total

development responsibilities to managers. It appears that the LDA's will continue to

exist in an environment which still appears to be stabilising itself after the recession.

Accordingly, this helps strengthen my prediction that the identity of LDA's will

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remain disjointed until long-term decisions are made about the future of corporate

L&D departments.

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11.0 Appendix

11.1 LDA semi structured interviews

Learning and Development Advisor semi structured interview

Introduction

The purpose of this discussion is to obtain your views on the Learning and Develop-ment Advisor role (LDA).  We are meeting with a wide range of LDA’s and Senior LDA’s to understanding the prevailing views on the role within a range of different sectors.  Your input will support the approach and design of a final dissertation.

Name of the Respondent: Interviewee ______________________________

Q1. Age

20-30                         31-40 41-50 50-60 60 and above

Q2. Length of LDA experience _____________________________________

Q3. Current company _____________________________________________

Q4. Length of service with current company __________________________

1. Personal ExperienceHave the key roles and responsibilities of your role changed since you joined the company, and if so, how?

(If applicable) Why do you think these changes have occurred? (i.e. changes to company budgets, changes to focus of L&D, etc)

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Did the recession effect your role, and if so, how and what could have been different?

What do you think are the main roles and responsibilities in your role?

Do you feel your role is more concentrated to delivering or is it enabling and developing?

Do you find you spend less time delivering classroom based training?

Have you noticed that you have been asked to do any of the following, and if so, are these new to you?

Promoting learning and development benefits/ or recent successes, Defining workforce core competencies required for each job and there after

career paths, Identifying all stakeholders that could benefit from development, Identifying and taking inventory of all existing learning resources, Creating multiple communities of practice inside and outside the workplace, Providing a blend of e-earning, external conferences, off the job learning, and

interactive drama/ based learning, Enhancing/ enabling the use of social media and interactive materials (e.g. e-

learning, blogs, multi media videos, etc), Increasing the use of in-house training provisions, Incorporating trainer functions within the role of regular staff, Renegotiating relationships with external providers, and Increasing train the trainer events.

Are there any new initiatives you have been asked to do which haven’t been mentioned?

2. Status of employeesAre employees regarded by your company as being learners or employees?

How do you know this/ how can you prove this?

Do you to allow individuals to be responsible for their own development (in relation to both their current performance and also their career development)?

Is there a focus on development for all in your organisation or is development ring fenced to certain groups (i.e. managers/ roles/ etc)

3. Reason for developmentWhy do employees receive training (e.g. is it a mandatory requirement? Has it been demanded (and if so by who)?

Do you have any mandatory training?

4. Business consultancy

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Have you been asked to be more present within the business? If yes, then please clarify how you have done this, or what plans are in place to make this happen?

5. EvaluationsA. Evaluation of training activities

Do you evaluate training within your company, and if yes, how?

If yes, do you think that your evaluation process is fit for purpose?

B. Evaluation of developmentDo you keep a record of the number (and activity) of development days each employee receives every year?

If yes, do you think your recording system is fit for purpose?

C. Evaluation in GeneralHas evaluation become a bigger part of your core job in recent times? And if yes, then how and have you been given more time to evaluate learning and development interventions?

If so why do you think this is?

Do you think it is worthwhile evaluating training? Or is it too time consuming?

6. Learning and Development strategy Do you see a long-term corporate strategy and how L&D fits into this?

Does the L&D department have a strategy- or are you aware of one? And if so, what is it?

Do you see how your role fits into the corporate objectives of L&D?

Do you see a move towards short-term training solutions? (I.e. rather than long term costly solutions)

Is the emphasises now on providing high quality contents but in a more effective and focused way?

If applicable, what do you think drives the choices of your L&D strategy?

7. Management trainingHas there been a change in focus towards the design and delivery of management and leadership training?

8. Academic standing

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Is there an expectation for you to be skilled/ continue with continual development?

Are you undergoing any personal development yourself at present?

9. Final considerationsWhat are your current personal feelings about work?

Do you feel engaged/ inspired in work?

What do you think have been, if any, the major changes to your role over the past four years?

Do you believe there are opportunities available for you for progression and development?

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11.2 Senior LDA semi structured interviews

Senior Learning and Development Advisor semi structured interview

Introduction

The purpose of this discussion is to obtain your views on the Learning and Develop-ment Advisor role (LDA).  We are meeting with a wide range of LDA’s and Senior LDA’s to understanding the prevailing views on the role within a range of different sectors.  Your input will support the approach and design of a final dissertation.

Name of the Respondent: Interviewee ______________________________

Q1. Age

20-30                         31-40 41-50 50-60 60 and above

Q2. Length of LDA experience _____________________________________

Q3. Current company _____________________________________________

Q4. Length of service with current company __________________________

Q5. Length of LDA management experience __________________________

Q6. Number of employees who report to you and their roles ______________

1. Personal ExperienceHave the key roles and responsibilities of the LDA role changed since you joined the company, and if so, how?

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(If applicable) Why do you think these changes have occurred? (i.e. changes to company budgets, changes to focus of L&D, etc)

What do you think are the main roles and responsibilities in the LDA role?

Do you feel the LDA role is more concentrated to delivering or is it enabling and developing?

Do you find your LDA’s spend less time delivering classroom based training?

Have you changed the roles and responsibilities of your LDA’s?- if yes, how?

Have you noticed that you have asked your LDA’s to do any of the following, and if so, are these new?

Promoting learning and development benefits/ or recent successes, Defining workforce core competencies required for each job and there after

career paths, Identifying all stakeholders that could benefit from development, Identifying and taking inventory of all existing learning resources, Creating multiple communities of practice inside and outside the workplace, Providing a blend of e-earning, external conferences, off the job learning, and

interactive drama/ based learning, Enhancing/ enabling the use of social media and interactive materials (e.g. e-

learning, blogs, multi media videos, etc), Increasing the use of in-house training provisions, Incorporating trainer functions within the role of regular staff, Renegotiating relationships with external providers, and Increasing train the trainer events.

2. Business contextWhat are the current number of average LDA training delivery days and has this changed since 2008?

If there has been a change, why has this happened? Do you have any mandatory training requirements within your company, and if so, what are they?

What is the current L&D budget in your company and has this changed since 2008? If so, why?

Do you expect the budget to change in the next two years? (if yes, how)

Have you had to make redundancies in your department or L&D?

What is the average cost per head of training? Has this changed since 2008? And if so why?

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What is the average number of development per employees per year? Has this changed since 2008? And if so why?

Have you reduced any spend on external development providers? If so, has this affected the tasks you expect your LDA’s to carry out?

Do you promote the success of L&D? and if so, how?

What formal and informal opportunities are there to present information about the contribution that learning is making?

What is the main commercial reason for development?

3. Status of employeesAre employees regarded by your company as being learners or employees?

How do you know this/ how can you prove this?

Do you to allow individuals to be responsible for their own development (in relation to both their current performance and also their career development)?

Is there a focus on development for all in your organisation or is development ring fenced to certain groups (i.e. managers/ roles/ etc)

4. Reason for developmentWhy do employees receive training (e.g. is it a mandatory requirement? Has it been demanded (and if so by who)?

5. Business consultancyDo you expect your LDA’s to be more present within the business? If yes, then please clarify how you have done this, or what plans are in place to make this happen?

To what extent are line managers encouraged to identify strategic learning priorities for your organisation?

To what extent are line managers encouraged to work with the learning function to determine appropriate investment in learning?

6. EvaluationsA. Evaluation of training activities

Do you evaluate training within your company, and if yes, how?

If yes, do you think that your evaluation process is fit for purpose?

What model is your evaluation based on? (if any)

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B. Evaluation of developmentDo you keep a record of the number (and activity) of development days each employee receives every year?

If yes, do you think your recording system is fit for purpose?

C. Evaluation in GeneralHas evaluation become a bigger part of your (or your LDA’s) core job in recent times? And if yes, then how and have you/ they been given more time to evaluate learning and development interventions?

If so why do you think this is?

Do you think it is worthwhile evaluating training? Or is it too time consuming?

7. Learning and Development strategy Do you see a long term corporate strategy and how L&D fits into this?

Does the L&D department have a strategy- or are you aware of one? And if so, what is it? If not, why not?

Do you see how the LDA role fits into the corporate objectives of L&D?

Do you see a move towards short term training solutions? (I.e. rather than long term costly solutions)

Is the emphasises now on providing high quality contents but in a more effective and focused way?

If applicable, what do you think drives the choices of your L&D strategy?

How do you ensure that your learning is aligned with the strategic priorities of the business?

How do you establish the most relevant value and evaluation of the learning process for your organisation?

Has there been a shift from use of external companies to one of internal compelling training events and programmers?

8. Management trainingHas there been a change in focus towards the design and delivery of management and leadership training?

Is development focused at present more towards management and leadership development or more towards development for all?

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9. Academic standing

Is there an expectation for your LDA’s to be at a certain skill level and to continue with continual development?

Are your team undergoing any personal development at present?

Do you need your LDA’s to hold formally recognised qualifications?

Do you have training/ development plans in place for each of your LDA’s?

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11.3 Consent form

Learning and Development Advisor semi structured interview

Name of the Respondent: Interviewee ______________________________

According to the guidelines set out in BERA (2011), please confirm that you have been instructed, and understood, the following criteria;

- the process in which you are about to be engaged, including why your participation is necessary, how it would be used and how and to whom it will be reported,

- the right to withdraw from the research for any or no reason, and at any time,

- any predictable detriment arising from the process or findings of the research,

- your entitlement to privacy and your rights to confidentiality and anonymity,

- compliance with the legal requirements in relation to the storage and use of personal data as set down by the Data Protection Act (1998),

- compliance that data is kept securely and that the form of any publication, including publication on the Internet, does not directly or indirectly lead to a breach of agreed confidentiality and anonymity,

- your debriefing at the conclusion of the research and provision of copies of any reports or other publications arising from your participation.

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