Early Career Learning at Work and its Implications for Universities

This paper first briefly summarizes the findings of a study of the mid-career learning of professionals, technicians and managers in the health, engineering and business sectors funded by ESRC's research programme on The Learning Society. This is followed by a discussion of the findings of a recently completed longitudinal study of the Early Career Learning at Work of newly qualified nurses, graduate engineers and trainee chartered accountants. Finally, it discusses the implications of these projects and other related research for learning in higher education.