understanding of professional practice and learning in globalised work
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Understanding of professional practice and learning in globalised work. transitions. Tara Fenwick University of Stirling. transition … derived from. the Latin transitus (passage; crossing) the Late Latin transire (go over, cross) the Latin trans (beyond, across). - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
Understandingof professional practice and learningin globalised work
Tara FenwickUniversity of Stirling
transitions
transition … derived from• the Latin transitus
(passage; crossing)• the Late Latin transire
(go over, cross)• the Latin trans (beyond,
across)
Why understanding transitions matters
• Psychological – personal struggle, dissonance, challenges to self-concept. Counselling to provide personal coping strategies
• Organisation/management studies – planning & ‘managing’ workers’ change
• Policy/regulatory view – ensuring quality & reliability of professional decision-making
Why understanding transitions matters• Educational interest – understanding & supporting learning
processes in transition
Transitions in
New Public Managerialism
less knowledge authority & discretionary judgment
multiple competing stakeholdersand regulatory agencies
increased audit measuresand performativity
personal transitions in professional practice
• unfolding career• role/responsibility• knowledge• migration
• as problem needing management
• as perpetual, inevitable• as ‘becoming’• as institutionalized path• as turning point• as journey
discourses of transition
Educational assumptions about transition
• people can become ‘prepared’ through knowledge • what’s coming is known• we should develop strategies to ‘cope’
psychological approach
• Life tasks & self concept• Cognitive coping
strategies– Planning & reflection– Translate goals and self-
beliefs to action
• Emotional coping strategies– “defensive pessimism”– “optimism”
problems – psychological approach• Unpredictable effects of cultural norms, values• Mediated by others’ expectations, language,
positioning (power)• Hundred of cognitive dimensions influence choices• People perform and identify with diverse selves
‘life course’ sociology approach
• Life history enmeshed with environments
• Social/cultural capital• Discourses influencing self-
narratives• Triggers of transition, and
responses
• Learning/identity/agency
Role of learning in lifecourse approach
• what people learn from their lives, what they learn for their lives – and how
• Learning as blocker and as enabler
• What restricts mobility, new possibilities?
• What best supports ‘enabling’ learning that manages transitions?
Problems – lifecourse approach
• Focusing on the individual• Focusing on events• The ‘becoming’ discourse• Pathologising transitions• ‘Managing’ transitions
problems – career passages
• Normative patterns, homogenised, linear• Economism – individualist, adaptive• Work sites as static blocks? – only the individual moves• Deflects critical gaze from processes causing change
Issues - ‘transitions’ as learningConstruction of ‘risk’
(need help, soothing)Conception of passage
(space as static)
Conceptions of ‘journey’• (uni-directional)• (discourse of development)
Preoccupation with personal-psychological, or personal-social
• (ignores ecologies of practice& transition)• (accepts existing systems of production)
Questions for exploration?
• What is a ‘successful’ transition? (& is this a valid question?)• How can we conceptualise transitions in ways that disrupt
linearity , universality, ‘development’?• How do we examine the complex ecologies of transition? • Are distinctly different forms of transition experienced across
professional groups? Across activities? Regions? Moments?• How do different forms & practices of learning influence
professionals’ transitions?• Are some transitions more ‘empowering’ or
‘disempowering’?