LOCAL ACTION PILOT

Active Ageing Extending good practice on age management

policies and practices in Edinburgh’s businesses

Vanesa FuertesProf Ronald McQuaid, Dr Valerie Egdell and Dr Emma Hollywood

Employment Research Institute Edinburgh Napier University

www.napier.ac.uk/eri

Structure of the presentation

Local Action Pilot

How is been established and developed

How it relates to the baseline study

Overview of the local action pilot

In what ways it introduces “social experimentation”

What steps have been taken to implement it

What issues are emerging

Establishment and development

Meetings with local partners Agreed to local pilot Set up the Local Action Research Group (LARG)

Setting up the LARG Policy makers (Scottish Government Older People and Age Team

Equality Unit ) Organisations dealing with businesses (Edinburgh Chamber of Commerce; Join Up For

Jobs) Employers (National Health Service Lothian; City of Edinburgh Council Economic

Development; City of Edinburgh Council Corporate Services) Organisations working with older people (Centre for Older Person’s Agenda; City of

Edinburgh Council A City For All Ages; Jobcentre Plus; Scottish Institute for Human Relations)

Academic with expertise on the experiences of older workers Trade Unions (STUC) Individuals (Advisor to ACFAA)

Continuation (establishment and development)

Contact with local partners Reasoning behind methodology and outcomes to be measured for the

local pilot Sectors and contact strategy for businesses Tools for the local pilot

Transnational methodology/methodological framework Focus group with 50+ unemployed people looking for paid

employment

How it relates to the baseline study

Focus on attitudes and practices at various levels within

businesses

Selection of sectors and size of businesses

Difficulty to asses the effectiveness and deficiencies, of the

various guidance and workshops to promote best practice

in age management

Explore gender and age bands within the 50+

Continuation (how it relates to the baseline study)

Stakeholder interviews Identify and explore themes and issues regarding labour market

participation for older people. Explore potential sectors and businesses for the case studies.

Stakeholders (11) Organisations dealing with employers/businesses (ECC, JUFJ) Employers (NHS, City of Edinburgh Council) Age management guidance and workshop providers (EFA) Policy makers (Scottish Government) Organisations working with older people (COPA, ACFAA, JC+) Academics with expertise on the experiences of older workers Trade Unions (STUC)

Overview of the local action pilot

First wave of case studies

Social experiment workshops Employers who took part in the case studies will be invited to

participate in workshops that will focus on the business case for age management and existing good practice

Brochures specifically targeted at each business

Second wave of case studies and control group Case studies will be re visited 6 months after the workshops and the

brochure distribution

Analysis and comparison of data collected in the first and

second waves of case studies7

In what ways it introduces “social experimentation”

Social experimentation - “interest in some new program or a desire

to determine whether an existing program is achieving its

objectives”1

The purpose of Edinburgh social experimentation is to determine if

current tools and methods of promoting age management amongst

employers are working and to establish if a new intervention, with

the same aim, will yield better results

Measurable outcomes: Awareness, policies, practices, attitudes and general work environment Effect of interventions already in place and the effect of our intervention

(social experimentation)

What steps have been taken to implement it

Communication sent to some sectors To select 2 Edinburgh SMEs within each of the following sectors: care

sector, construction, banking and finance, hospitality, manufacturing and the public sector

One employer has agreed to take part

Questionnaire developed Awareness Policies (recruitment, retention, promotion, training and retirement) Practices (as above) Attitudes (3 measuring tools) General environment

Stakeholder interviews finished

What issues are emerging

Baseline study distribution

Test Battery - Focus group of unemployed older people

looking for work Themes to be discussed: Reasons for ending paid employment; Type of job

sought; Desired retirement age; Barriers to entering paid employment and how these could be overcome; Awareness and attitudes towards policy

Self completion questionnaire (includes questions from the Test Battery) - personal details, employment history, the type of occupation being sought, barriers to employment, social networks

Spider tool - Comparing attitudes before and after the

intervention

Final report10

Time line

References

1 Basic Concepts and Principles of Social Experimentation, Part 2: Social experimentation:

evaluating public programs with experimental methods

http://www.qec-ran.org/projects/SEFAA/documents/Orr-Basic_Concepts_of_Social_Experiments.pdf

11

Timeline: baseline and pilot

ACTIVITY

DATE

May-Aug 2010 Sep-Dec 2010 Jan-Apr 2011 May-Aug 2011 Sep-Dec 2011

Key stakeholder consultation                      

Baseline                                

Survey development and management                              

Case studies              

Workshops and brochures

Focus group

Matched pairs                    

Analysis              

Interim report                                    

Local Evaluator – Paul Guess               •                        

QeC-ERAN               z                        

Final report development                                  

Local Evaluator – Paul Guess                                 •      

QeC-ERAN                           z z z z      

Trans-national Workshops                                  

back