Development Engineers' Conceptions of Learning at Work

Abstract

The purpose of the study, reported in this article is to explore development engineers' and product designers' conceptions of their learning in a work context from a process-oriented perspective. The empirical data consist of 6 weeks' observations and interviews with 18 employees in two companies in Finland. Phenomenographic analysis of the interviews yielded six categories of descriptions: learning through doing the work itself, learning through co-operation and interaction with colleagues, learning through the evaluation of work experience, learning through taking over something new, learning through formal education and learning from extra work contexts. The results reported here suggest that all the categories are relevant dimensions of the learning phenomenon, while the construction of competencies through work experience and learning as participation and collective action will receive closer scrutiny at a subsequent stage of this research effort.