By Professor Stephen Corbett, Head of School of Education, Languages and Linguistics, University of Portsmouth, UK
Recently, the Technology Code of Practice (TCOP) in the UK spotlighted the Department for Education’s (DfE) ‘Teach in Further Education’ recruitment campaign. However, recruitment into Further Education and Training is only half of the recruitment and retention challenge that the sector faces. In this article Dr Stephen Corbett – a Professor in Professional Development & Learning at the University of Portsmouth – considers immediate action that managers and leaders can take to support wellbeing, and workforce retention, in the sector.
Hear from Dr Stephen Corbett at VDC’s World Teachers’ Day, this Friday 27 October: Register here
The Further Education (FE) sector invests a lot of time and resource into recruiting, training, developing and retaining technical teachers. If we wish this investment to be successful it is important that some of the time and resource used by organisations in the sector is focused on supporting wellbeing.
Workforce wellbeing has become a more prominent topic in recent years; however, it is not necessarily a new concept. Early management theorists such as Elton Mayo proposed that taking an interest in those working in your organisation can increase their motivation. These early concepts have been built upon and more sophisticated studies have investigated various strands of wellbeing from different specialist perspectives: psychological, sociological, organisation and managerial.
The matter of wellbeing in the workplace is complex as we cannot always divorce the factors which occur in our personal lives from our work lives and vice versa. This can be referred to as work-family conflict. Difficulties at home can limit our workplace performance and, in contrast, stress at work can affect our behaviour at home. Our wellbeing is affected by both our work and personal affairs so it’s reasonable to ask: how can an organisation facilitate positive wellbeing in its workforce?
This is a complex question to answer, but there is extensive research that can help us to respond to it.
There is a long history of policy churn and fiscal pressures impacting the further education workforce. The global pandemic – which appears to be adding further to the detriment of workforce wellbeing – is an unwelcome addition and requires action.
The Education and Training Foundation (ETF) commissioned a report in 2019 to investigate FE workforce wellbeing (you can download it here). The report set out recommendations as to how to improve teacher wellbeing by providing teachers with support to:
• gain an enhanced work life balance
• review the workload expectations in terms of the number hours assigned to undertake certain tasks
• provide more flexibility to work from home.
These recommendations were disrupted, like so many things, when the pandemic struck. Two years after the onset of the pandemic myself, Professor Karen Johnston and Dr Adele Bezuidenhout at the University of Portsmouth sought to repeat the study commissioned by the ETF to see what impact the pandemic was having on FE workforce wellbeing.
This research suggests that workforce well-being in the FE sector remains an important area for action. The data indicates that areas where concerns were previously voiced (for example, not having energy to spare) have been exacerbated by the pandemic.
Unfortunately, it appears there has been a polarising effect during the pandemic which is likely to exacerbate issues experienced by the FE workforce.
It is likely that many, if not all, further education providers will be considering how to best support and enhance workforce wellbeing. Given the findings by academics at the University of Portsmouth the issues of workload and challenging working conditions, something previously recommended for review by the ETF, are still key elements.
Immediate action for workforce wellbeing
There is no quick fix to these issues but this does not mean nothing can be done. A sensible initial response for managers and leaders is to consider ways in which they could review and address issues of workload as an immediate response to enhancing workforce wellbeing.
This time of opportunity and investment in the Further Education and Training sector requires the FE workforce to be as strong, resilient and adaptive as it possibly can be, and needs providers to address not only recruitment, but also the retention and wellbeing of its existing workforce.
If you would like to read in more detail the research published by Professor Stephen Corbett on workforce wellbeing click here
