Showing papers on "Deskilling published in 2023"

Are we deskilling or reskilling our hospital ward clinicians?

Abstract: Rapid reponse teams emerged 27 years ago to identify deteriorating patients and reduce preventable harm. There are concerns that such teams have deskilled hospital staff. However, over the past 20 years, there have been marked changes in hospital care and workplace requirements for hospital staff. In this article, we contend that hospital staff have been reskilled rather than deskilled.

Does Artificial Intelligence Promote or Inhibit On-the-Job Learning? Human Reactions to AI at Work

Abstract: This paper examines how AI at work impacts on-the-job learning, shedding light on workers’ reactions to the groundbreaking AI technology. Based on theoretical analysis, six hypotheses are proposed regarding three aspects of AI’s influence on on-the-job learning. Empirical results demonstrate that AI significantly inhibits people’s on-the-job learning and this conclusion holds true in a series of robustness and endogeneity checks. The impact mechanism is that AI makes workers more pessimistic about the future, leading to burnout and less motivation for on-the-job learning. In addition, AI’s replacement, mismatch, and deskilling effects decrease people’s income while extending working hours, reducing their available financial resources and disposable time for further learning. Moreover, it has been found that AI’s impact on on-the-job learning is more prominent for older, female and less-educated employees, as well as those without labor contracts and with less job autonomy and work experience. In regions with more intense human–AI competition, more labor-management conflicts, and poorer labor protection, the inhibitory effect of AI on further learning is more pronounced. In the context of the fourth technological revolution driving forward the intelligent transformation, findings of this paper have important implications for enterprises to better understand employee behaviors and to promote them to acquire new skills to achieve better human–AI teaming.

Different degrees of skill obsolescence across hard and soft skills and the role of lifelong learning for labor market outcomes

Abstract: This paper examines the role of lifelong learning in counteracting skill depreciation and obsolescence. We differentiate between occupations with more hard skills versus more soft skills and draw on representative job advertisement data that contain machine-learning categorized skill requirements and cover the Swiss job market in great detail across occupations (from 1950 to 2019). We examine lifelong learning effects for “harder” versus “softer” occupations, thereby analyzing the role of training in counteracting skill depreciation in occupations that are differently affected by skill depreciation. Our results reveal novel empirical patterns regarding the benefits of lifelong learning, which are consistent with theoretical explanations based on structurally different skill depreciation rates: In harder occupations, with large shares of fast-depreciating hard skills, the role of lifelong learning is primarily as a hedge against unemployment risks rather than a boost to wages. By contrast, in softer occupations, in which workers build on more value-stable soft-skill foundations, the role of lifelong learning instead lies mostly in acting as a boost for upward career mobility and leads to larger wage gains.

Confronting Racialised Power Asymmetries in the Interview Setting: Positioning Strategies of Highly Qualified Migrants

Abstract: Based on our longitudinal, in‐depth qualitative research focusing on the social construction of deskilling among highly educated migrants from Central and Eastern European (CEE) member states of the European Union, we will discuss in this article the positioning of the interview partners within the interview situation as interrelated to societal racialised power asymmetries. In this contribution, we exemplify that critical migration research can only be carried out when we reflect on our methods accordingly. To do so, we discuss actual evidence from this ongoing research project: While we see that many of our interview partners from new EU member states are reluctant to point to negative experiences in our conversations, we want to highlight that the potentiality of discrimination is part of the interview setting in our research and thus co‐constructs the empirical data. By analysing a variety of discursive positioning strategies employed by our interview partners that can be understood as strategies to avoid anticipated discrimination, we aim to fulfil the promise of methodological reflexivity and thus contribute to the quality of interview research in the context of migration studies. The aim of this contribution is thus twofold: We want to contribute to methodological discussions as well as refine current research focussing on the racist experiences of CEE migrants.

A meta-synthesis of the transitioning experiences and career progression of migrant African nurses

Abstract: Abstract Introduction With the rise in global migration, hospitals and health systems in developed countries are looking to supplement their workforces with migrant nurses who have been reported to feel devalued, underutilized with experience of deskilling and unmet expectations as they transitioned. Despite the plethora of literature reporting on the experiences of internationally trained nurses, only limited work has been done regarding understanding the experiences of Migrant African nurses. Thus, this study sought to synthesize existing qualitative studies to develop in-depth understanding of the transitioning experiences of migrant African nurses, their career progression and to highlight existing gaps to guide future studies as well as inform policies. Method A meta-synthesis was performed and reported according to the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses and the Enhancing transparency in reporting the synthesis of qualitative research statement. A pre-planned search strategy was developed guided by the SPIDER tool for qualitative synthesis searching EMBASE via OVID, CINAHL via EBSCO, PubMed, Web of Science, and PsychINFO databases. We included published studies that 1) focused on migrant African nurses, 2) employed a qualitative design and 3) reported in English. Results The search yielded 139 studies of which nine studies met the inclusion criteria and included in final synthesis. Three themes with corresponding subthemes emerged from data synthesis: 1) Navigating reality shock (a. Navigating a new culture, b. Survival strategies and support amidst the shock); 2) Discrimination and limited opportunities for promotion (a. Prejudices and preference for White over Black, b. Lack of recognition and limited opportunities for a workplace promotion); and 3) Finding one’s feet (a. Standing up for oneself and looking beyond discrimination, b. Experiencing growth). Conclusion Transitioning to a new setting can be a challenging experience for migrant African nurses warranting the availability of a tailor-made adaptation or orientation programme. Though African nurses may experience discrimination and prejudices as part of their transition, they consider their situation to be better off compared to back home. Therefore, clear transitioning policies which focus on career pathways are required by hiring institutions, and migrant nurses should be proactive in taking active roles in pushing their career ahead, instead of maintaining a culture of silence.

Good for tech: Disability expertise and labor in China's artificial intelligence sector

Abstract: People with disabilities are often perceived as being “given” the opportunity to work, rather than “providing” valuable labor. Centering on disabled data workers as experts involved in the quotidian construction of artificial intelligence (AI) systems in China, this article shows that disability expertise and labor can afford a technical edge to AI systems in a certain political economy. In the case examined, the work of consistently synchronizing interpretations of the ambiguous data and elusive rules of smart home systems prefers a stable annotation workforce with coordinated cognition and trained judgment. This technical demand has come to be met by a committed team of skilled disabled workers, who are pushed out from mainstream job market by systemic ableism, and pulled in by disability-informed expertise that reconfigures space, time, and political economy to meet non-normative bodyminds. Through this exceptional case run by a disabled people led organization, I draw attention to disabled people’s under-examined role as system-builders of information technologies as opposed to users, victims, or inspirations, and highlight the transformative potential of disability expertise.

‘Rethinking camaraderie as emotional practices: deindustrialisation and deskilling in South Yorkshire coalfields, 1980s-2000s’

Abstract: ABSTRACT Historical and sociological scholarship on the British coalfields has been driven by a sustained interest in community and class. Consequently, however, a focus on community can subsume camaraderie/comradeship as a category of historical analysis and its potential value as a framework for understanding change and continuity in practice, experience, and identity. Drawing on methodological tools from the history of emotions, and oral history interviews with ex-miners, this article employs the concept of ‘emotional practices’ to define camaraderie as a learnt, embodied, and affective workplace practice. Arising out of class processes, camaraderie constituted a workplace skill, important in communicating and mobilising ways of feeling and being, which oscillated between integration and alienation, alleviating and aggravating work experiences. It argues men’s lamentations over the loss of camaraderie should be understood as a profound emotional experience of deskilling, affecting how workers navigated and negotiated work and workplace transitions, and communicated with their co-workers and to themselves who they are. By integrating the history of work and the history of emotions into an analysis of camaraderie, it offers a contribution on the lasting effects of deindustrialisation on the body, experience, and identity, and towards a new way of conceptualising camaraderie as ‘emotional practices’.

Healthcare Professionals’ Expectations of Medical Artificial Intelligence and Strategies for its Clinical Implementation: A Qualitative Study

Abstract: Objectives Although medical artificial intelligence (AI) systems that assist healthcare professionals in critical care settings are expected to improve healthcare, skepticism exists regarding whether their potential has been fully actualized. Therefore, we aimed to conduct a qualitative study with physicians and nurses to understand their needs, expectations, and concerns regarding medical AI; explore their expected responses to recommendations by medical AI that contradicted their judgments; and derive strategies to implement medical AI in practice successfully. Methods Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 15 healthcare professionals working in the emergency room and intensive care unit in a tertiary teaching hospital in Seoul. The data were interpreted using summative content analysis. In total, 26 medical AI topics were extracted from the interviews. Eight were related to treatment recommendation, seven were related to diagnosis prediction, and seven were related to process improvement. Results While the participants expressed expectations that medical AI could enhance their patients’ outcomes, increase work efficiency, and reduce hospital operating costs, they also mentioned concerns regarding distortions in the workflow, deskilling, alert fatigue, and unsophisticated algorithms. If medical AI decisions contradicted their judgment, most participants would consult other medical staff and thereafter reconsider their initial judgment. Conclusions Healthcare professionals wanted to use medical AI in practice and emphasized that artificial intelligence systems should be trustworthy from the standpoint of healthcare professionals. They also highlighted the importance of alert fatigue management and the integration of AI systems into the workflow.

Tools of war and virtue–Institutional structures as a source of ethical deskilling

Abstract: Shannon Vallor has raised the possibility of ethical deskilling as a potential pitfall as AI technology is increasingly being developed for and implemented in military institutions. Bringing the sociological concept of deskilling into the field of virtue ethics, she has questioned if military operators will be able to possess the ethical wherewithal to act as responsible moral agents as they find themselves increasingly removed from the battlefield, their actions ever more mediated by artificial intelligence. The risk, as Vallor sees it, is that if combatants were removed, they would be deprived of the opportunity to develop moral skills crucial for acting as virtuous individuals. This article constitutes a critique of this conception of ethical deskilling and an attempt at a reappraisal of the concept. I argue first that her treatment of moral skills and virtue, as it pertains to professional military ethics, treating military virtue as a sui generis form of ethical cognition, is both normatively problematic as well as implausible from a moral psychological view. I subsequently present an alternative account of ethical deskilling, based on an analysis of military virtues, as a species of moral virtues essentially mediated by institutional and technological structures. According to this view, then, professional virtue is a form of extended cognition, and professional roles and institutional structures are parts of what makes these virtues the virtues that they are, i.e., constitutive parts of the virtues in question. Based on this analysis, I argue that the most likely source of ethical deskilling caused by technological change is not how technology, AI, or otherwise, makes individuals unable to develop appropriate moral–psychological traits but rather how it changes the institution's capacities to act.

Employment Relations Past, Present and Future: Denise or Resurrection in India?

Abstract: This critical reflective paper draws upon my reading, studying and teaching employment relations (ER) and human resource management (HRM) over the years, from a sociological perspective. I make a compelling case for ER as a research activity, an organisational habit and a way of reflexive thinking. There is a false perception that ER is outdated. Indifferent to fads, ER endeavours to see clearly and speak the truth fearlessly and excavate the challenges and possibilities of the socio-economic exchange within any employment relationship. ER’s real strength is its granular holistic, multi-layered understanding of the totality of the wage-effort bargain. It has always been interdisciplinary because it draws from a vast canvas of sociology, economics, political economy and even psychology. Tracing its trajectory, I map the context in which ER evolved from Fordism to Post-Fordism, how HRM tried to take its place, and why it cannot do what ER does. It is only with this critical sceptical inquisitive spirit of ER that an effective emotionally intelligent transparent HR-lifecycle with a well-thought-out employee voice mechanism can craft better workplaces. ER in India speak for gig workers and other casualised employment and intervenes urgently on their behalf by bringing their concerns to academic discussion and advocating change. In conjunction with critical management studies, the sociology of work and ER in India must go to the nub of inequality. It must reach out to broader constituencies to mitigate workplace inequalities in different situational and longitudinal work contexts.

Automatization as a Challenge for Employment of Skilled Manpower: An Empirical Investigation from HRM perspective

Abstract: The process of using technology and machines to carry out jobs that were previously completed by humans is known as automation, sometimes known as automatization. While automation offers many advantages, like higher production, efficiency, and precision, it has also made hiring qualified labor more difficult. The displacement of human workers by automation is one of its biggest problems. Machines are more capable of carrying out jobs that were formerly the responsibility of skilled employees as technology advances. For those who are unable to retrain or upgrade their skills in order to meet the needs of the evolving work market, this displacement may result in unemployment and underemployment. Deskilling might also result from automation. Workers may no longer have the opportunity to apply and develop their abilities when more duties are taken over by machines. As a result, the caliber of the job may suffer, and important abilities and knowledge may be lost. The requirement for humans to constantly adapt to new technologies and machines presents another difficulty brought on by automation. In order to be competitive in the employment market, workers must constantly learn new skills and methods of operation due to the quick rate of technological change. Automation does, however, offer opportunities as well as obstacles to the employment of skilled labor. Workers may learn to work alongside machines and take advantage of automation with the correct training and assistance. Additionally, automation may open up new career prospects in industries like data analysis, robotics, and artificial intelligence. Overall, even though the employment of skilled labor is hampered by automation, it is crucial for governments, companies, and workers to adapt to and accept these changes in order to ensure a smooth transition to the future of work.

Scottish Government Educational Research Policy: Co-opting School-based Research and Deskilling Teachers

Abstract: A common idea of research lies in association with virtues of open-mindedness, pursuit of truth and the liberation of humanity from burdens of prejudice. Aside from this blue skies picture of scientific research we have practitioner research designed by teachers to improve the quality of the education they provide in classrooms. And third, there is policy research by government, which is designed to monitor and implement political values into schools and classrooms under its aegis. This article explores the educational research policy which the Scottish Government has recently published. It argues that its approach to education policy research will weaken the professional standing and autonomy of teachers. That policy agenda will result in the proletarianisation of classroom educators. A dimension of this government's policy shifts research out of education into the hands of quasi-private companies. The outsourcing of research contracts to companies illustrates ideological values. Besides the government's general policy orientation to education research, its subcontracting model reinforces the assumption that valid and reliable research on education does not require the nuanced expertise of classroom practitioners. The government's politics also disfavour university education researchers. The outcome of marginalising these two elements of the education world ensures evidence-informed policymaking incorporates neoliberal values. Research companies operate in the capitalist free market and, to survive, must satisfy their customers. Management of schooling by means of abstract scientific data that monitors and judges teacher performance is an international norm. That destructive, ideologically driven trend undermines the local expertise of schools and reduces the autonomy of schoolteachers who are employed in schools. The policy culture so described, it is concluded, will re-model the profession, recast what counts as professionalism and in this process trash the accumulated wisdom of generations of committed and caring teachers.

A Multi-Dimensional Development and Deployment Framework for Hybrid Intelligence

Abstract: This paper introduces a novel multi-dimensional framework for developing and deploying AI-human systems, incorporating both technical and managerial design principles. The paper then applies the framework to four standard human-AI interaction patterns, including Human Out Of the Loop (HOOTL), Human On the Loop (HOTL), Human In the Loop (HITL), and Hybrid Intelligence (HI). The dimensions are used to succinctly describe the essential characteristics of each pattern, highlighting potential risks and benefits, such as end-user resistance, employee deskilling, value-misalignment and employee upskilling and business model reengineering. The framework provides a valuable tool for AI developers and managers to characterize their current solutions and optimize the integration of humans and machines in complex systems.

Storms, Early Education and Human Capital

Abstract: This paper explores how school-age exposure to storms impacts the education and primary activity status of young adults in India. Using a cross-sectional cohort study based on wind exposure histories, we find evidence of a significant deskilling of areas vulnerable to climate change-related risks. Specifically, our results show a 2.4 percentage point increase in the probability of accruing educational delays, a 2 percentage point decline in post-secondary education achievement, and a 1.6 percentage point reduction in obtaining regular salaried jobs. Additionally, our study provides evidence that degraded school infrastructure and declining household income contribute to these findings.

Skill and Deskilling in Two Automotive Assembly Plants in South Africa

Abstract: This article presents research on skills development and workplace change complexities within two automotive assembly plants in Pretoria, South Africa. Auto assembly companies are also termed Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs). Since 1995, South African OEMs have become fully integrated into the global networks of their foreign parent companies. As South Africa’s leading manufacturing sector, the automotive industry’s increasing importance is reflected in its exports, investments, and contribution to the country’s gross domestic product. The two companies are global multinationals situated in one of South Africa’s most globally integrated sectors that have undergone significant mechanization and automation since the 1990s. Therefore, these companies present a relevant site for studying changes in the labor process and the tendencies of deskilling in these workplace environments. The research is based on a qualitative research design that used semi-structured interviews with workers, supervisors, and managers across two plants that assemble motor vehicles in South Africa. The objective of the research was to understand the nature of changes to workplace production methods that influence the character of skills amongst the workforce. This paper studies workers’ experiences on how changes in work processes have impacted their work skills and contributed to the processes of deskilling. Present studies of skills in South Africa have prioritized large-scale labor market aggregate data analysis or reforms in education and training policies of the state. This paper brings a perspective on the labor process changes that are informed by concrete analysis of the production process and how technological changes shape the character of skills formation within automotive assembly plants. The value of such an approach is that it brings to the discussion of technology and workplace change a more specific set of experiences that transcends the often speculative and mythical discussion about the impact of technology on work. This article highlights the importance of understanding workers’ voices, shift supervisors, and managers on the contested nature of skills development within capitalist enterprises. The findings illustrate the contradictory nature of technological change and skills development. This is shown by discussing the following themes that emerged from the findings: 1) worker responses to the introduction of robots in the workplace environment, 2) the deskilling challenge on the two plants, and 3) grappling with the turnover times of capitalist production. I conclude the paper by revisiting the key findings of the research and showing the implications for future studies of deskilling in contemporary capitalist enterprises. The significance of these findings ultimately points to the importance of locating labor processes and deskilling in the context of the political economy of the capitalist mode of production and how it is reshaping the content of work in modern automotive assembly plants.