UPSKILL: A Credible Test of Workplace Literacy and Essential Skills Training. Technical Report PDF Download

Author: Sophie Hebert
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 173

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Book Description
The report (173 pages), from the Social Research and Demonstration Corporation, summarises the findings of the UPSKILL demonstration project which aimed to provide a credible test of the effectiveness of workplace literacy and essential skills training by measuring its impacts on workers and firms and estimating the return on investment for all those engaged. The researchers found that UPSKILL provides a rigorous test for workplace Essential Skills training, UPSKILL firms earned a 23 per cent rate of return on training investment and there were positive returns on investment for employees and government. The effects of Literacy and Essential Skills training on workers included: increased literacy scores; improved job performance; increased job retention; and improved health and wellbeing. The effects were greater for employees with lower pre-training skills. The effects of Literacy and Essential Skills training on firms included: increased customer satisfaction; cost savings and productivity gains; increased revenues. The benefits were achieved with modest investment of workers' time. Larger impacts were seen in firms with greater breadth of business needs. The report goes on to describe the conditions for success for the provider - business partnership. These include: understanding worker and business needs is key to maximising return-on-investment; firms' commitment to learning and training matters; trust and workers' receptivity to learning also matters; and alignment with business needs through effective customisation. Table of contents: * Highlights (Effects of Literacy and Essential Skills training on workers. Effects of Literacy and Essential Skills training on firms. Conditions for success) * Chapter 1: Background (Encouraging employer investments in LES training. Establishing the business case for workplace LES training. Objectives and research questions. Target groups. Research design. Research framework) * Chapter 2: Recruitment and profile of firms and workers (Summary of findings. Recruitment of firms and employer data collection. Baseline business and performance needs of firms. Employee recruitment and data collection. Profile of participating workers. Baseline Essential Skills and performance levels. Comparability of program and control groups) * Chapter 3: Training take-up and duration (Summary of findings. Training take-up. Comparing trainees and non-trainees. Amount of training offered and received. Training delivery: self-directed activities and training modules. Implementing UPSKILL: program fidelity and lessons learned) * Chapter 4: Impacts on Essential Skills and job performance (Summary of findings. Data sources. Mean impacts on document use and numeracy scores. Distributional impacts on document use levels. Job performance and industry certification. Impacts on employee performance, by business objective) * Chapter 5: Impacts on psychosocial outcomes (Summary of findings. Psychological capital: Attitudinal indicators. Behavioural indicators of increased learning and literacy practice. Social capital: Networks and social resources) * Chapter 6: Impacts on employment and earnings (Summary of findings. Job retention and unemployment. Employment: weeks worked, hours, and wages. Primary versus secondary jobs: work vs. self-employment. Expectations: hours of work, wages, job loss, and EI/SA receipt) * Chapter 7: Impacts on health and well-being (Summary of findings. Health literacy practices. Physical health. Mental health and stress. Absenteeism and working while unwell. Life satisfaction) * Chapter 8: Impacts on business outcomes (Summary of findings. Guest satisfaction: service quality, complaints, and customer loyalty. Sources of revenue: occupancy, food and beverage sales, ancillary spending. Cost savings: staff efficiency, supervisory costs, and hiring expenses. Human Resources: job satisfaction, receptivity to learning, retention) * Chapter 9: Return on investment: a cost-benefit analysis (Summary of findings. Methodology, data sources, and accounting framework. Limitations. UPSKILL implementation: program design and delivery costs. Impacts of UPSKILL on participants and firms: benefits and costs. Net benefits and costs, by stakeholder. ROI under cost-sharing alternatives. Extended model: valuing impacts on intangibles) * Chapter 10: Conditions for success - an explanatory analysis (Summary of findings. Differences in the impacts, by demographic characteristics. Differences in impacts, by key mediating factors and workplace context. Customization and training process: importance of business alignment) * Chapter 11: Conclusions and policy implications (The decision to train. Engagement in learning activities. Effects of LES training on workers. Effects of LES training on firms. Return on investment. Conditions for LES training success. Policy implications) * Appendix A: Random assignment, non-response analysis, and regression adjustment * Appendix B: Analysis of the implementation.