Quality of working life in Britain

A £1m research project led by Cardiff University will provide a picture of the quality of working life in Britain.

Professor Alan Felstead of the School of Social Sciences, will head a research team collecting and analysing survey data on the skills and employment experiences of those working in Britain in 2017.

Funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), the Department for Education and Cardiff University, the survey will involve 2,500-3,000 workers who will be questioned about what they do at work in face-to-face interviews.

The resulting data will help chart and explain the changing pattern of job quality and job skills over time, and leave a lasting and valuable legacy resource for others to use.

Professor Felstead said: “We are living an era of constant and rapid change, politically and economically.  This project will provide robust and unique data on what this might mean for working people whose jobs may be put at risk or altered in some way because of changes in the economic climate, the introduction of technology or different ways of organising work. This survey will provide some of the answers, and allow us to assess and explain how work has changed over the last 30 years.”

Professor Felstead will lead a team of researchers, including long-time collaborators Professor Francis Green (UCL) and Professor Duncan Gallie (Oxford), and will be assisted by Dr Golo Henseke (UCL).  The project is being carried out in collaboration with the ESRC Centre for Learning and Life Chances in Knowledge Economies (LLAKES) and UCL’s Institute of Education, London.

This award is the 14^th ESRC grant held by Professor Felstead and the sixth secured in the last four years.  The project will start reporting results in the middle of 2018.