Creative Workforce 2.0

Program leader (QUT Australia): Greg Hearn
Program leader (QUT, Australia): Erica McWilliam

The central theme of the Creative Workforce Program of research and scholarship has been to investigate how formal education and training can be more fully engaged in building creative human capital. In 2010 the program will build on 2009 initiatives that extended its international and conceptual reach. It will draw on current empirical research to develop generic models of creative human capital development, and conduct related research focusing on the creative industries workforce.
The Creative Workforce Program's research agenda consists of six domains:

1) Integrating selected concepts and methodologies across different CCI programs, with a focus on human capital issues and/in innovation systems mapping

2)Career trajectories of embedded and specialist creatives

3) The role and impact of the creative workforce beyond the creative industries

4) Creative Industries workforce development, including worker identity, transition and renewal

5) Developing generic models for the role of the creative workforce in economic development both in developed and developing countries (via contract and consultancy bids)

6) Adoption and diffusion of web 2.0 learning technologies for creative capacity building (via work in the Singapore node).

PREVIOUS PROJECTS

Singapore node of the Creative Workforce Program. Following a series of consultations with key stakeholders in Singapore during 2008, Erica McWilliam led the establishment of the node at Singapore’s National Education Institute in December 2008. The node is focusing on the creative workforce, education and digital literacy. In 2009, the node made it possible for members of the Creative Workforce team to make a significant contribution to the Adult Learning Symposium, held at the Pan-Pacific Hotel in Singapore (Nov 5-6, 2009). Erica McWilliam and Peter Taylor presented a symposium on Learning in and for the 21st Century Workplace, and Greg Hearn and Jen Tan followed with a second symposium on Capacity Building for the Creative Economy. Erica McWilliam also chaired the final session of the conference, a panel in which all keynote presenters were asked to look over the horizon at the needs of adult learners in 21st century workplaces. Feedback on all these sessions was very positive indeed. The Creative Workforce Program via its Singapore node continues to build strong links with the Institute for Adult Learning in Singapore and has become affiliated with the Adult Learning Network, sponsored by the IAL.

Erica McWilliam was awarded a Fellowship with the Australian Council of Educators on the basis of her services to Australian Education. This award sits alongside her Associate Fellowship with the Australian Learning & Teaching Council, awarded for her research in pedagogical models for building creative workforce capacities in undergraduate students. Key outcomes include the National Creativity Showcase and the final report, Understanding Creativity: A survey of ‘creative’ academic teachers. The report, produced by Professor Erica McWilliam and Dr Shane Dawson, elaborates the link between creativity and higher education pedagogy through analysis of the perceptions and opinions of Australian and UK academics. For more information, go to the Carrick Associate Fellowship Report.

The creative workforce: How to launch young people into high-flying futures. Using both Australian and overseas examples, Erica McWilliam describes what creative capacities are, why they've become important to our work futures, and what can be done to optimise the creative capacities of young people. Click here to order a copy.

Student Media Centre Project. This design-based research project, led by Jennifer Pei-Ling Tan, was developed to address the need for innovation in formal educational contexts, with a view to facilitating the adoption and diffusion of new media technologies amongst students and teachers in post-compulsory schooling. It also involved implementing an online creative ecology for young people to publish their original locally-created content and develop the postmillennial literacies and competencies necessary for their cultural and economic futures. This project has facilitated cross-faculty collaborations between Creative Industries and Education, and consultancies for partner organisations such as Australasian CRC for Interaction Design (ACID). Negotiations are currently underway to replicate and scale-up this design-based new media project in post-compulsory schooling sectors internationally.

Skills deficiencies in Bahrain's Labour Market. Sandra Haukka was part of an Australian team that investigated skills deficiencies in Bahrain’s Labour Market. Allen Consulting Group partnered with Eidos Institute to undertake a nation-wide comprehensive research project covering current, emerging and future skills deficiencies and requirements in Bahrain’s labour market in terms of individual occupations, occupation sets and skills groups. This research covered the majority of economic sectors and activities in the Kingdom and will serve as a basis for formulating industry and occupational outlooks as well as career guidance and awareness activities by academic and training institutions across Bahrain.

CURRENT PROJECTS

Strengthening the role of the adult education sector in training workers for the digital content industries in Australia, Singapore and the United Kingdom.

Jennifer Pei-Ling Tan, , Sandra Haukka, Greg Hearn , and Ruth Bridgstock secured funding from QUT's Strategic Links with Industry Scheme to undertake the first stage of a larger international comparative study. This study will be the first of its kind to evaluate the contribution and effectiveness of the adult education sector in training new entrants and existing workers for the digital content industries in Australia, Singapore and the United Kingdom. The Creative Workforce team has partnered with the Institute for Adult Learning in Singapore to undertake this project. The report generated from the project will form the basis of an ARC Linkage Project application in 2010.

60Sox ARC linkage project. Research on human resource and human resource development issues in the digital content industries in Australia is limited. As a result, the Australian Research Council, three State governments, industry, and a large vocational education and training (VET) provider funded the 60Sox project to investigate a) education-to-work transition experiences of graduate and emerging creative professionals i.e. "aspiring creatives"; b) key drivers and conditions underpinning the profiles and trends of aspiring creatives; and c) how aspiring creatives can access existing industry distribution resources and further career development opportunities, including enterprising self-employment. Click here to read more.

Games Industry Skills Project. The aim of this project is to identify and evaluate skills sets and occupations required for employment in the Australia’s Digital Games Industry, both currently and in the future. The project, which is managed by Sandra Haukka, is also measuring the extent, source and impact of skills deficiencies. Click here to read more.

Year 1: Creating Innovators is a research project which builds and tests theory about the development and deployment of ‘innovative career capabilities’ in professionals working in the key sectors of science & technology, and the creative industries. The theory will then be used to inform curriculum development in university and professional education programs. Ruth Bridgstock in her role as a Vice Chancellor's Research Fellow is undertaking the project. Click here to read more.

Linking Older Australians to online products and services that can improve their daily lives. In October 2009, Sandra Haukka secured funding from the auDA Foundation to identify strategies that will a) raise the awareness that older people have about the types and benefits of current and emerging online products and services; and b) assist older people to gain the skills and knowledge to use those products and services that they believe can improve their daily lives now and in the future. Click here to read more.

FUTURE PROJECTS (from July 2010)

Human capital in the Creative Industries Innovation System. This comparative study will investigate the types, networks, and flows of human capital within and across agents that make up a Creative Industries Innovation System in selected countries.

Tracking career transitions for specialist and embedded creatives: Skills, policies and outcomes. This project will investigate the skills, educational backgrounds, and career trajectories of embedded and specialist creatives across the creative industries.

Creative Workforce 2.0 Symposium: Education for the 21st Century Creative Economy. CW2.0’s Singapore node international node and Institute of Adult Learning Singapore will host the symposium, bringing together leading thinkers and educators who are theorising and designing education for the creative economy.

Year 2: Creating Innovators. The project develops and tests a comprehensive theory of the growth and deployment of ‘innovation capabilities’ in individuals (Ruth Bridgstock’s VC’s Fellowship). Click here to read more.