EurOccupations Expert Conference
21-22 May 2008, Marseille
Summary of Main Findings of the Expert Session:
Clerks, Staff, Management
Conference Programme Note for the Expert Session
This session addressed the issue of heterogeneity in the occupational cluster. The discussion focussed on the 'Clerks, secretaries, post, telephone' area of the cluster. Topics for discussion were:
- A review of the variety of skill levels in this cluster – what problems does this pose for cross-national comparability; are different definitions used in different settings?
- How to recognise skill levels from the job title
- Treatment of these occupations in ISCO and national occupational classifications
- Variations in educational requirements and occupational tasks.
Presentations
Nominated experts were invited in advance of the Conference to prepare a short presentation addressingthe issues specified in the Programme note as shown above, relating these to their particular experience at national and/or international level.These formed the basis of wider discussion during the expert session.
Appended to this note are PowerPoint presentations by:
- Ben Hickman (Local Government Association, UK);
- Paul Dorsemagen (Ecabo, Netherlands);
- Bazyli Gowacki (BG – Consulting, Poland);
- Victoria Embid (FES-UGT, Spain).
Summary of Main Findings
(See also the PowerPoint presentation appended.)
· Occupations in this cluster are characterised by a high degree of heterogeneity, both within and between occupations: for example, a Cashier might simply operate a till to receive and pay out money, or the same title might be applied to someone carrying out relatively complex tasks within an organisation’s accounts department (similar to the work of an ‘accounts manager’); secretarial occupations range from those providing high level support to managerial staff across a broad spectrum of activities and involving a complex set of responsibilities (‘Executive Secretary’ or ‘Personal Assistant’), to a ‘General Secretary’ whose principal task is word-processing or typing.
· A key feature emerging from the presentations and subsequent discussion is the impact of organisational and technological change on the content of jobs in this cluster, particularly for clerical and related occupations, leading to extensive multi-tasking and the very widespread use of ICT. Some occupations have changed or are disappearing, e.g. ‘Filing clerks’ are doing database management and ‘Typists’ as such hardly exist any more. Change is also driven by the fact that employers are able to take advantage of the availability of more qualified people that in turn can affect job content.
· Whilst overskilling (highly qualified people taking jobs with lower level entry requirements) is evident in clerical occupations in particular, it continues to be the case that, despite widespread and increasing professionalisation, experience rather than qualification is a feature of managerial occupations.
· There is a trend of increasing outsourcing of clerical occupations. For example, the occupations ‘Post sorting/distributing clerk’, ‘Receptionist’ and ‘Security guard’ may be combined and the service outsourced.
· The concept of work outputs, rather than simply work inputs, in defining job tasks was considered. For example, the tasks involved in a secretarial occupation might be defined in terms of levels of pro-activity or autonomy required to be exercised by the jobholder, in addition to such tasks as filing and diary-keeping. In this context, combining skill level, tasks and training requirements to define occupations was seen as highly relevant.