Reforming further education: the changing labour process for college lecturers

Purpose – The purpose of this article is to examine how the labour process of further education lecturers has changed as a result of legislative reforms introduced in the early 1990s.

The authors: Kim Mather, University of Wolverhampton Business School, Wolverhampton, UK
Les Worrall, University of Wolverhampton Business School, Wolverhampton, UK
Roger Seifert, Keele University, Keele, UK

Personnel Review, 36, 1, 2007

...The application of market-based reforms in the FE sector, as in other parts of the public sector, has resulted in the intensification and extensification of work effort for lecturers on the front line. There are fewer lecturers who are working harder, working for longer and teaching more students: we have shown that they are struggling to cope with these increased workload demands. Our view is that this is a direct consequence of the particular nature of and, particularly, the ideological underpinning to the reform process that has sought to stimulate a state proxy for the capital accumulation imperative, through the introduction of competitive and market pressures in FE provision. Applying Braverman's logic in a highly labour intensive sector such as FE, we might expect to see labour management strategies designed to secure more for less from lecturing staff. Evidence of work intensification is clearly apparent in the three colleges we have examined and this echoes the findings drawn from research undertaken elsewhere in the FE sector and the public sector more generally.

Workers' responses suggest that there is resistance both at individual and collective level to these downward pressures though resistance does not seem to have been sufficiently strong to prevent the reported changes from occurring. Braverman (1974) was clear that under capitalism, work intensification increases the rate of exploitation of workers. He was also explicit about the long-term tendential nature of deskilling and the degradation of labour suggesting that short-term acts of resistance will be ineffective over the longer term. Lecturers in these colleges have been dispossessed of key job controls, which, when allied to trends in work intensification reported here, points to a degree of transformation in aspects of their labour process that may be directly linked to broader developments in the political economy of the Further Education sector specifically and the public sector more generally.

The research has revealed a number of key points all of which are consistent with Braverman's thesis. There is clear evidence that the public sector in the UK has changed dramatically with managerialist and consumerist notions having assumed ascendancy over those of the professions. The rise of a new managerial class in the public sector with its own rhetoric of performance management, targets, indicators, value for money, quality, productivity and flexibility has also been shown to have a world-view that has little in common with workers at the chalk face. We have provided clear evidence of deskilling in the form of the replacement of less flexible and more expensive full-time staff with more flexible and less expensive “things” (as one senior manager called them) and the increasing casualisation of working conditions.

We have also provided clear evidence of the redesign of work practices that have moved the lecturing profession away from a craft system of production where lecturers, as subject specialists, had more autonomy over what was taught, towards a factory system of production where standardisation in the form of modularisation has taken place and subject specialists are expected to teach outside their specialism simply to fill up their timetables in order to keep costs down. This we see as evidence that cost reduction criteria assume ascendancy over quality criteria despite the rhetoric of quality that currently pervades academic institutions in the UK. We argue that labour process theory has provided a powerful framework for the analysis of recent changes in the public sector as characterised by the growth of managerialism and the rise of the “new public management”. Despite the rhetoric of much contemporary management practice (“our employees are our greatest asset”), Taylorism and Fordism would seem to be “alive and well” in the UK public sector. It is unfortunate that many of the workers in the sector are not in a similar state of “good physical and psychological health”.

The mistreated teacher: a national study

Purpose – This study seeks to identify 172 American elementary, middle, and high school teachers' perceptions of the major sources and intensity of the experience of mistreatment by a principal, the effects of such mistreatment, how these perceptions varied by demographic variables, teachers' coping skills, and teachers' perceptions of contributing factors.

The authors: Joseph Blase, University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia, USA
Jo Blase, University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia, USA
Fengning Du, Defense Language Institute, Monterey, California, USA

...With respect to teachers, several large-scale international studies of workplace mistreatment/abuse across occupations in Great Britain (Hoel and Cooper, 2000), Sweden (Leymann, 1992b), Norway (Matthiesen et al., 1989), Ireland (Irish Taskforce on the Prevention of Workplace Bullying, 2001), and Australia (Queensland Government Workplace Bullying Taskforce, 2002) indicate that public school teachers are among the high- risk occupations for mistreatment/abuse. In fact, one of the most prominent web sites in the world devoted to workplace mistreatment (www.bullybusters.org) has reported that teachers were among the largest group of abused workers, and another high-profile web site (www.bullyonline.org) reported that teachers were the largest group of enquirers and callers. Recently, the National Association for the Prevention of Teacher Abuse (NAPTA) launched a web site (www.endteacherabuse.org) devoted to addressing the specific problem of teacher abuse...

Effects of abuse

A great deal of research has emphasized the deleterious effects of abusive workplace conduct on a victim's psychological-emotional health, physical-physiological health, work performance and relationships with coworkers, and personal life. Examples of negative effects on psychological-emotional health that appear in the research literature include the following: reduced job satisfaction, negative feelings (e.g., desperation, incompetence, inadequacy, embarrassment, guilt, shame, self-doubt, loneliness, powerlessness), loss of concentration, obsessive thinking and intrusive thoughts, distrust, cynicism, anxiety, emotional exhaustion, compulsivity, burnout, disorientation, shock, chronic fear, sociophobia, panic attacks, hypervigilance, depression, generalized anxiety disorder, suicidal thoughts, and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Negative effects of mistreatment/abuse on physical-physiological health include hair loss, back and neck pain, headaches and migraines, skin disorders, racing heart rate, loss of strength, significant weight changes (loss or gain), ulcers, chest pain, chronic fatigue syndrome, high blood pressure, angina, irritable bowel syndrome, TMJ, heart arrhythmia, and heart attacks. Negative effects on work performance and relationships with coworkers revealed by research include work impairment (i.e. decreases in initiative, creativity, risk taking, commitment, concentration, effort, work time, ability to do job), distrust, tardiness, absenteeism, voluntary attrition, stress and strain, job mistakes, sabotage, social withdrawal, isolation from colleagues, deterioration of relationships, impaired individual and group decision making, thoughts of quitting, change of career goals, withdrawal from extra-role and social involvements, and deterioration of quality of relationships with clients. Effects on family and personal life include increases in family conflict and deterioration of relationships among family members, and loss of friendships...

Stress is considered an interactional phenomenon; it is a function of perceived situational demands and an individual's perceived ability to cope with such demands. Stress and strain result from a perceived imbalance between situational demands and perceived coping abilities. When individual coping proves to be ineffective and exposure to stressors prolonged, structural and functional damage to an individual can be expected (Cox, 1978). Keashly (1998, 2001) argued that because of relative power differences, mistreatment/abuse by a superior will tend to significantly undermine a victim's coping abilities. To wit, a limited number of studies have investigated victims' coping responses to abusive superiors. In general, such studies indicate that direct action by a victim (e.g., reporting an abuser to a superior or a union) resulted in no response, efforts to protect the abuser, or reprisals against the victim...

Effects of principal mistreatment

The ten most frequently reported effects on teachers participating in our survey were (in rank order) as follows: stress (90.7 percent of participants), resentment (80.8 percent), anger (75 percent), insecurity (70.3 percent), a sense of injustice and moral outrage (70.3 percent), self-doubt (68 percent), anxiety (65.7 percent), sense of powerlessness (64.5 percent), maintenance of silence (64 percent), and bitterness (64 percent) (see Table II). The least frequently reported effects of principal mistreatment were use of alcohol (14.5 percent of the participants), worsened allergies or asthma (14 percent), smoking (12.2 percent), ulcers (3.5 percent), use of illegal drugs (1.7 percent), and PTSD (0 percent).

With regard to teaching, participants were asked, “Overall, how much did your principal's mistreatment undermine your effectiveness as a teacher”: 4.1 percent of the teachers responded not at all, 18.6 percent responded minimally, and 27.3 percent, 28.5 percent, and 21.5 percent responded moderately, significantly, and severely, respectively. In short, 77.3 percent indicated that principal mistreatment markedly undermined teaching...

Losing one's career

Zapf and Gross (2001) found that victims of long-term bullying advised others to leave their place of employment more often (22 percent) than they advised any other coping strategy. The Irish Taskforce on the Prevention of Workplace Bullying (2001) reported that 11 percent of those who recently had been bullied quit their jobs, and 14 percent indicated that they had considered withdrawing from the labor force completely. Furthermore, The External Advisory Committee on the Defence Forces (2002) found that 51 percent of mistreated victims had applied for a transfer or thought about leaving their jobs. Similarly, in our current study of teachers, slightly over half of the participants indicated that principal mistreatment was so harmful that they were unable to cope, and over three-quarters (76.7 percent) reported that they would leave their teaching positions because of the harm caused by their principal's mistreatment. Even more alarming, we found that half (49.4 percent) of the teachers we studied “wanted to leave teaching altogether” because of their mistreatment. This astounding percentage of teachers willing to relinquish their chosen careers, clearly a “last resort” coping strategy, underscores the overwhelming deleterious effects of principal mistreatment on teachers and teaching; this is particularly ominous in light of current and predicted teacher shortages...

Workplace bullying is a problem that cannot simply be denied

The reactions by Bill McGregor of the Headteachers' Association, John Stodter of the Directors of Education and Cosla's spokesman to the suggestion that bullying is "endemic" within six local authorities make interesting reading (The Herald, May 16). They seem to deny it is a problem on their own patches. Just a small review of existing evidence might be helpful.

Two years ago, Amicus and the DTI funded a national project that addressed the serious issue of bullying in the workplace, in which it estimated the cost to UK employers as more than £2bn a year in sick pay, staff turnover and loss of production. One in 10 employees said they had been bullied. Stress-related illness and absence levels in education were substantially above the national average.

In a recent study by Glamorgan University, it was found that nearly 80% of teachers had been bullied in the past two years, with many telling researchers that the problem was continuing and they were regularly bullied. Many said members of their school's senior management team were either the bullies or allowed bullying by others to continue, causing some teachers to think about leaving their posts or abandoning their careers altogether.

Nearly one in 12 staff working in the NHS has experienced bullying or harassment by their manager, according to Westminster figures. An official survey of doctors, nurses and administrators showed the scale of the culture of bullying that had to be tackled by hospitals and primary care trusts.

November 7, 2007, was Ban Bullying at Work Day - a message that doesn't appear to have got through to all parts of further and higher education. Academics at Leeds Metropolitan University claimed that 42% felt intimidated at work, 37% felt their work was belittled and 24% felt they had been humiliated by bullying. The University and College Union survey (with a 41% response rate) suggested a management culture at odds with the university's goals of challenging received wisdom, encouraging students to think and promoting collaborative inquiry. Some 96% of respondents said they felt inhibited about positively criticising policies and 63% reported witnessing bullying.

Denying the nature and existence of the problem without having proper evidence is not only to demean, insult and possibly harm those who have suffered; it is to sustain the corporate, structural and institutionalised hands (and voices) that guide a failure to properly address the matter. There is much evidence on our files to deny that substantial claims of bullying are "groundless", as Cosla suggests. This is a legislated Health and Safety at work issue. What is desperately required is for the Scottish Government at least to commission root-and-branch departmental research of workplace bullying so the truth can emerge and be properly inspected - and this is before tackling that which so much evidence suggests is equally endemic in the private sector.

From: http://www.theherald.co.uk/features/letters

Disgraceful events at Nottingham University

CAFAS - Council for Academic Freedom & Academic Standards - 7 Benn Street, London E9 FSU

29 May

The Home Secretary
Home Office
2 Marsham Street
London SW1P 4DF


Dear Home Secretary

You are no doubt aware that a member of the staff of the University of Nottingham, Hicham Yezza, who has resided and worked in the UK for the last thirteen years, is currently under threat of almost immediate deportation.

Mr Yezza has found himself in this predicament as a consequence of having helped a postgraduate student, Rizwaan Sabir, who asked him to print a copy of an al-Quaida document that Mr Sabir had downloaded from a US military website in the public domain. Mr Sabir’s academic supervisors confirm that the document in question is directly relevant to his research. Both men were initially arrested in connection with this document, but subsequently freed without charge. But Mr Yezza was rearrested on grounds related to his immigration status, and now faces deportation.

CAFAS takes the view that the original arrest and detention of these members of the University was unwarranted. We accept that, in the current climate of opinion, the police may well have had concerns about Mr Sabir’s interest in the al-Quaida document, and the assistance Mr Yezza gave him. But these concerns could surely have been quickly resolved, without breaching the principle of academic freedom, simply by consulting the academic staff in charge of the research in question.

We are not in a position to evaluate the immigration problems Mr Yezza is now said to face. But it is clear that these problems have surfaced solely as a consequence of the involvement of the police in Mr Sabir’s academic research, the legitimacy of which is seemingly no longer challenged.

In the circumstances, we think it absolutely vital that Mr Yezza be provided with a proper opportunity to prepare his defence and to have his case impartially examined by the Courts. To deport him without his being allowed this opportunity to defend himself would be patently unjust. We therefore urge you to delay deportation long enough for this process to take its course.

If you do not feel able to do this, I should be grateful if you would explain why, so that I may circulate your explanation to our members in UK universities.

Yours sincerely

Geraldine Thorpe
Assistant Co-ordinator, CAFAS

Cc Liam Byrne, MP

Tips for handling power

In her book 'Bad Leadership', Barbara Kellerman suggests some tips for those in power, to help them avoid turning bad. These include:

• Limit your tenure. When leaders remain in power for too long, they tend to acquire bad habits
• Share power. When power is centralised, it is likely to be misused, and that puts a premium on delegation and collaboration
• Get real, and stay real. Virtually every bad leader loses touch with reality somehow
• Know and control your appetites. These include the hunger for power, money, success and sex
• Be reflective. Virtually every one of the great writers on leadership emphasises the importance of self knowledge, self control and good habits. Acquiring such virtues is hard. Intent is required, but so is time for quiet contemplation
• Encourage a culture of openness in which diversity and dissent are encouraged
• Bring in advisers who are strong and independent
• Avoid groupthink. Groupthink discourages healthy dissent and encourages excessive cohesiveness
• Establish a system of checks and balances

From: http://www.trainingzone.co.uk

Lincoln acts to lift morale of discontented staff

The University of Lincoln is implementing an action plan to improve staff morale after an internal survey revealed that only 49 per cent of respondents felt "valued" by the university.

The survey, which polled more than 800 employees, 64 per cent of staff, was undertaken at the end of last year. The results were published in the current issue of the University of Lincoln magazine Contact. The poll suggests that staff believe the university falls short on managing change, communication, reducing bureaucracy and offering career progression.

Of those surveyed, 86 per cent said they felt more could be done to help them "prepare for and cope with change" and 57 per cent felt they were "required to do unimportant tasks which prevent them from completing more important ones". On the subject of career advancement, 59 per cent said that there were not enough opportunities for progression in the university.

The action plan, drawn up in response to the results, includes developing a communications plan for major changes, a framework for staff development and promotion and "less use of paper/memos and more face-to-face and telephone contact".

"When the staff survey was conducted, we were halfway through the appraisal year and only 57 per cent of staff surveyed had had their appraisal," said Jayne Billam, the university's director of human resources. "This can lead to staff not feeling valued."

"Now up to 90 per cent of people have been appraised. We had the highest level of staff engagement for our staff survey ... (and) the largest response in the sector compared to the other 32 HEIs surveyed by the independent survey specialist Capita," Ms Billam said. "The survey also showed positive results, with 83 per cent (of respondents) saying that the university was a good place to work."

From: http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk

...and who is this man...

... an under-qualified arrogant professor nicknamed "Nick the Prick"...

Lame duck HEFCE...

So what do we have here? Students were asked to beef up their ratings of Kingston University. The whole issue became national news and placed a huge question mark on the reliability of the student satisfaction survey. Kingston University - a serial offender when it comes to workplace bullying - is off the hook because the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE, read: taxpayer's money) declares that it is 'in discussion with the institution about the allegation'... Excuse me, but it is not an allegation - there is an actual recording of the event. HEFCE is also in discussion with Kingston University about appropriate 'next steps'. Don't worry HEFCE because Kingston University have taken steps to ban students from recording similar incidents...

Who is this man?

A personal account...

After working for the University for 23 years, I have finally been driven out. I gave up my tenure and resigned in July. Both Spencer, my husband and I have been having problems with our Department Head. This has been going on for five years now, but the proverbial (and literal) final blow came last November when I was assaulted by a co-worker (‘colleague’ is a label he does not deserve). It is quite a long and sordid tale, so I offer the abridged, and yet still long version here. For this story, we’ll call my assailant ‘Bernard’.

A few weeks before the ‘fateful incident’ the same ‘man’ had sent me an email that given my experiences at work the last few years, seemed very much like a threat. What prompted his email was this: In what turned out to be an act of sedition, I recklessly asked him to improve the training given to our teaching assistants (only some of whom speak English, and most of whom suck, but all of whom are among the best paid teaching assistants on campus), and he “cautioned me” not to criticize him. Apparently, striving for improvement and getting people to do their jobs is no longer what we do. He ignored several attempts by me to get him to explain, so I went to his office. I asked him to explain what he meant by his threat (on the day before Remembrance Day no less – lest we forget!) Well, looks like he forgot. He began yelling at me and accusing me of being abusive (!?) and then he slammed his door in my face. He’d have broken my nose if I hadn’t put my foot in the door. There were several awkward moments as he continued to yell, pushing on the door while I tried to figure out how to get me and my foot out of there without getting hurt. Bernard is not a large, nor as it turns out, a strong man. I managed to extricate myself without further physical injury.

Now, I suspect I’ve been very lucky in that the last time any human tried to hit me was when I was about 9. Being a pacifist probably helps. And even after 23 years of dealing with university kids fresh out of high school - some of whom are very unhappy when I fail them - this is the first time someone has tried to attack me at university. I had a very hard time coping. There were, of course, no witnesses.

[Aside: I bought a Siamese Fighting Fish (Betta Splendens) and named it Bernard as part of my own personal therapy. They have much in common my colourful little Bernie and the man who assaulted me. Both are: Small. Angry. Insignificant. AND wear a suit that looks 3 sizes too big. Curiously, I ended up having to buy a second fish because the first Bernard I bought did not survive the night in his new home. My family thought it particularly fitting since we had put him in a vase with a Peace Plant - Bernard couldn’t, apparently, live with the Peace. (Wee Bernie the fish, is now nearly 3 years old, and each time I talk to him I am reminded that I have survived, and he – the human Bernie – is still small, angry and insignificant. It may seem silly, but it helps me.)]

Without skipping a beat our obdurate Department Head suggested that if I felt unsafe having my assailant’s office just down the hall from me, *I* should be the one to move. My office was the last thing I had in that department that I valued since he had already taken or canceled everything else, and unfortunately he knew that. I went on a medical leave and did not return until after classes were over.

Not long after getting back to work I learned that the man who assaulted me had filed a grievance against ME for harassment. Is that A) ironic or B) what? Turns out, the correct answer was ‘B’. I seemed to be the only person surprised by this. I’m learning though. Human Resources refused to acknowledge my doctor’s orders for reduced duties (they really ARE evil, like Dilbert says), and the ever-vigilant Campus Security had conveniently omitted the entire criminal incident from their report – all they said was that I had had an email threat. After all, it’s hard to claim our campus is safe if people go around reporting assaults. Can’t have that. Besides, there’d be all this paperwork. It’s just easier to claim nothing happened. As if that wasn’t enough, THIS year I’d gone all out in trying to implement the university President’s “plan” for a rich undergraduate experience. My students loved it. Not to be outdone by the perversity of a pseudo-police unwilling to enforce law, my annual assessment from the Head pretty much trashed everything I did this year. In spite of the fact that what I do in my classes is publishable work, my teaching was assessed by my head as inadequate. The problem, you see is that I’ve been treating my students as individuals. This is apparently bad.

Still I persevered – after all, we live in modern times, no? Violence against women is no longer condoned, especially in an enlightened Science Faculty, and even more so during a time when there are almost weekly news stories about how we need more women in IT (information technology). And besides, I come from a long line of people that do not give up easily. Can you guess what happened next? Machiavelli would have felt right at home. The brand new Dean of Science found ME guilty of harassment. Somehow, I am to blame because Bernard felt the need to hit me. My punishment: I was to be banished (they forced me to move out of my office WHILE I was still on a medical leave); I was to enroll in courses that would teach me how to get along with people, and if I bothered poor Bernie again I could be fired. Interestingly, when Spencer (who is in the same department as me) asked the Dean why I had to move my office to a different building, and to the top floor no less (a point as far away from the students as was possible), the Dean told Spence it was so I could be close to my HUSBAND. Isn’t that progressive of him? After 23 years of professional service, I am still just a wife. That’s when I realized I would not survive five years under this man’s “leadership”, nor would my staying make any difference. Tyranny wins. Sigh.

Ah, but the story doesn’t end here. Oh no my weary friends, there’s more. Administrative positions at the university come up for renewal about every five years, and this year it was our Department Head’s turn. A man known to be dishonest (he was caught in a lie during his “re-appoint me” talk!), who is known to treat some people like royalty and relentlessly bully others, was,…wait for it….RE-APPOINTED for another five years. The Dean clearly has a use for the likes of him, and that can’t mean good things. Our department has gone from a place that used to supply graduates to some of the coolest places on the planet to work (Disney, Industrial Light and Magic, Jet Propulsion Labs, …) to one of which I am ashamed, and who’s graduates are wanted almost nowhere. And, it seems Spencer and I are not the only ones who feel this way. The department HAD about 45 faculty, among them 9 women. Besides me, we lost two other faculty this year (one woman; the other world-renowned in his field), and by my last count we will loose 6 more this year (2 of them also women, and none of them due to retirement). Those are only the ones I know about, there may well be others. Tragically, Spencer is still there, but since he has a few years left before retiring, he has arranged to be one of the six leaving this year. This summer Spencer will be moving to the Faculty of Environmental Design. I think it will be interesting to work with architects. Spencer’s not so sure – but it’s bound to be better than working with reprobates. Meanwhile, the department that used to be one of only two in the country visited by Bell Labs recruiters continues to circle the drain.

So the moral of the story is…. (some) Universities remain mediaeval institutions where men get to be men, and women, well, they need to remember their place. It leaves me, for the first time as an adult, without a job. It is hard not to be bitter (as if the last two pages weren’t clue enough), but I’m working on it. Spencer and I have learned much about who our friends are, and it will take us a long time to heal. I know I for one will never again offer my loyalty freely to a place – only to people. On the plus side, through my experiences I have met a whole pile of very nice people who have been similarly abused by this University (not just women), and when I have some time I plan to write a book about it. It seems this institution has quite a history of what mobbing and bullying expert Ken Westhues calls “the envy of excellence”. He says that most people targeted in this way possess a perilous combination of traits: excellence AND integrity. A menacing pair of traits, huh? Clearly something a university must control.

In the mean time, if anyone knows of any job openings…

Anonymous