University of Tasmania, Australia

Ms Katrina Gonda

Graduate Research Candidate

Contact Details

Project title: Values, Expectations and Challenges for Contemporary and Intergenerational Workforce Development and Mangement

Abstract
Contemporary workforce development and management is currently facing a number of challenges in achieving an effective and efficient workplace. These challenges impact across the sector of human resource development and management activities including recruitment, selection, retention, workforce profiling and prediction models, skills identification and training and development requirements and frameworks, performance management frameworks and employment conditions. The change in human resource management to a more strategic framework incorporate future planning activities, measurement of activities or outputs/outcomes has occurred in more recent years but have not provided for a seamless transition to meet these new challenges whilst maintaining a full workforce with the necessary skills, knowledge and employment conditions. There are a number of factors that are converging at the present time which contribute to the current challenge, including:

• Changes in population demographics (global, national and state levels)
• • An increase in the number of older people in the population; and
  • A decrease in the number of younger people in the population (due to declining fertility rates).
    
• Changes in workforce profiles
• • An increase in the number of older people; and
  • A decrease in the number of younger people.
• Subsequent changes to labour market participation levels in terms of the number of young people entering the labour market and a delay in their entering the market (entering the full time labour market at a later age than in previous years).
• Generational differences in work expectations, values and perceptions for and from both employers and employees.
• The growth in the concept of work/life balance and the demand for organisations to provide a flexible and responsive workplace to meet work/life balance issues.
• Issues relating to the intensification of work and ongoing technological advances at the workplace.
• Evolving human resource development and management theories and frameworks.

These issues will be explored in order to describe and identify the impact of them on workforce development and management.

Hence the research aim concerns the context of how work is arranged, the value of work and related areas including remuneration and flexibility. For organisations the question is how to manage an ageing workforce and yet maintain a level of awareness and actions sufficient to apply to both older and younger employees. These aspects are also held within an individuals perceptions, values and expectations, and must be considered by organisations; therefore their viewpoints and expectations need to be further explored and analysed in order to assess both a current and future picture of what the face of public sector employment will look like and what organisations (and individuals) will need to have in their toolkits to meet future challenges across all employment and public sector areas.

This research aims to explore how employees perceive themselves and othersincluding their supervisors/managershow their work is structured, how their work is valued (recognition and reward) and whether the performance management and employment frameworks are suitable and adaptable to future changes/needs.

The research could be considered to be a different approach to workforce development, planning and management, in that it is considering the expectations and values of employees as a key component rather than taking an organisations missions and goals and then allotting such perceived principles and values into the process.

Keywords
Ageing workforces, older workers/employees, public sector human resource mangement, employment perceptions/expectation