scholarly journals Well-Being at Work as Human Capital

Author(s):  
Claudia Senik

Chapter 12 turns to human capital. Human capital is typically associated with the stock of skills and experience that an employee accumulates through education and training. However, the chapter refers to it in a broader context of well-being at work. This is affected not just by wages and working hours but also by the degree of hierarchy in an organization, management style, wage differences, prospects for upward mobility, and corporate identity. Alongside hierarchy, status, career progression, and inclusiveness, corporate culture (defined as shared beliefs, understanding, values, goals, and practices) plays a key role in determining well-being at work. The chapter records that it is possible to construct actionable metrics of well-being at work based on these factors that can be used to identify pain points within firms and the actions that are needed to address them.

Author(s):  
Bill Emmott

Gender inequality lies at the core of Japan’s human capital weakness as well as of its social ailments of declining marriage and low fertility. Prime Minister Abe Shinzo declared his ambition, soon after taking office in late 2012, of achieving much greater female empowerment. Progress has been made, notably in increased childcare provision, but considerable barriers remain. The human capital embodied in Japanese women has improved greatly thanks to the rise in access to university education for female students in the 1990s and 2000s, but this has not yet been translated into leadership roles in part because most organizations use hierarchies ordered strictly by age but also because corporate culture (in the private and public sectors alike) is oriented towards long working hours, enforced socializing, and short-notice job postings, in continued disregard of families and of the now-dominant double-earner households. More women are however fighting back against overt discrimination, the Abe government has introduced a Work-Style Reform Bill to combat long working hours, and more companies are taking the need for diversity seriously. Role models have emerged in a wide range of fields and soon a critical mass of women in decision-making positions will be achieved.


2019 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 12-23
Author(s):  
Binayak Krishna Thapa ◽  
Aishwarya Rani Singh

The key approaches utilised for the understanding and implementation of a Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) are primarily human capital and human rights approaches. While human capital approach advocates enhanced skills for the productivity, human rights approach systematically demands distributed enhancement of skills through short- or long-term trainings for all. The former approach connotes economic growth through better employment and income opportunity, whereas the latter situates itself for distributive opportunity, social inclusion and social justice. Both approaches target increasing employment and enhancing chances for better livelihood and well-being. These two approaches, however, are not the ultimate and only approaches for understanding the technical and vocational education and training. The major limitations of these approaches are that they conceptualize employment, income, better opportunity and even distribution to be ends or goals, while in this paper, the authors argue that the mentioned concepts are just means to a general end that is human development. Given this context, this paper offers an alternative lens to look at technical and vocational education and training. This alternative lens is arguably capability approach. The capability lens potentially explains how skill enhancement improves the ‘being’ and ‘doing’ of a person who engages in taking training and how the trained person can implement the learned skills to improve his/her well-being. In this regard, this approach helps understand how TVET can directly be linked with human development. This paper finally argues that TVET is also a tool for human development, albeit it is primarily, still concerned with productivity, employment and better incomes.


2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (17) ◽  
pp. 6754
Author(s):  
Peter Heimerl ◽  
Marco Haid ◽  
Urban Perkmann ◽  
Martin Rabensteiner

This study investigated the drivers of job satisfaction in the Alpine tourism industry. Intention to work in the profession in the future and training satisfaction were also examined. A total of 316 employees in two Alpine tourism regions were interviewed by means of a questionnaire and asked about the factors influencing their job satisfaction, their intention to remain in the sector, and their satisfaction with training. The results reveal significant differences between the two regions in the dimensions of appreciation, international job opportunities, compatibility of family life and career, workplace climate, working hours, and remuneration. The findings also highlight differences in training satisfaction and intention to remain in the job. These regional differences provide important insights into job satisfaction and the influences upon it, from which various approaches to pursuing sustainable development potential can be derived, including personnel management, reduction of employee turnover, and appreciative corporate culture towards guests and employees as well as image cultivation among the general public.


2019 ◽  
Vol 63 (3) ◽  
pp. 115-128 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maie Stein ◽  
Sylvie Vincent-Höper ◽  
Nicole Deci ◽  
Sabine Gregersen ◽  
Albert Nienhaus

Abstract. To advance knowledge of the mechanisms underlying the relationship between leadership and employees’ well-being, this study examines leaders’ effects on their employees’ compensatory coping efforts. Using an extension of the job demands–resources model, we propose that high-quality leader–member exchange (LMX) allows employees to cope with high job demands without increasing their effort expenditure through the extension of working hours. Data analyses ( N = 356) revealed that LMX buffers the effect of quantitative demands on the extension of working hours such that the indirect effect of quantitative demands on emotional exhaustion is only significant at low and average levels of LMX. This study indicates that integrating leadership with employees’ coping efforts into a unifying model contributes to understanding how leadership is related to employees’ well-being. The notion that leaders can affect their employees’ use of compensatory coping efforts that detract from well-being offers promising approaches to the promotion of workplace health.


2013 ◽  
Vol 1 (3) ◽  
pp. 9
Author(s):  
Jennifer Lee Brady ◽  
Annie Hoang ◽  
Olivia Siswanto ◽  
Jordana Riesel ◽  
Jacqui Gingras

Obtaining dietetic licensure in Ontario requires completion of a Dietitians of Canada (DC) accredited four-year undergraduate degree in nutrition and an accredited post-graduate internship or combined Master’s degree program. Given the scarcity of internship positions in Ontario, each year approximately two-thirds of the eligible applicants who apply do not receive a position XX, XX, XX, XX, XX, XX, in press). Anecdotally, not securing an internship position is known to be a particularly disconcerting experience that has significant consequences for individuals’ personal, financial, and professional well-being. However, no known empirical research has yet explored students’ experiences of being unsuccessful in applying for internship positions. Fifteen individuals who applied between 2005 and 2009 to an Ontario-based dietetic internship program, but were unsuccessful at least once, participated in a one-on-one semi-structured interview. Findings reveal that participants’ experiences unfold successively in four phases that are characterized by increasingly heightened emotional peril: naïveté, competition, devastation, and frustration. The authors conclude that the current model of dietetic education and training in Ontario causes lasting distress to students and hinders the future growth and vitality of the dietetic profession. Further research is required to understand the impact of the current model on dietetic educators, internship coordinators, and preceptors as coincident participants in the internship application process.


Author(s):  
Arti Awasthi

India has gradually evolved as knowledge based economy due to the abundance of capable, flexible and qualified human capital. With the constantly rising influence of globalization, India has immense opportunities to establish its distinctive position in the world. However, there is a need to further develop and empower the human capital to ensure the nations global competitiveness. Despite the empathetic stress laid on education and training in this country, there is still a shortage of skilled manpower to address the mounting needs and demands of the economy. Skill building can be viewed as an instrument to improve the effectiveness and contribution of labor to the overall production. It is as an important ingredient to push the production possibility frontier outward and to take growth rate of the economy to a higher trajectory. This paper focuses on skill development in Small and Medium Enterprise (SMEs) which contribute nearly 8 percent of the country's GDP, 45 percent of the manufacturing output and 40 percent of the exports. They provide the largest share of employment after agriculture. They are the nurseries for entrepreneurship and innovation. SMEs have been established in almost all-major sectors in the Indian industry. The main assets for any firm, especially small and medium sized enterprises are their human capital. This is even more important in the knowledge based economy, where intangible factors and services are of growing importance. The rapid obsolescence of knowledge is a key factor of the knowledge economy. However, we also know that for a small business it is very difficult to engage staff in education and training in order to update and upgrade their skills within continuous learning approach. Therefore there is a need to innovate new techniques and strategies of skill development to develop human capital in SME's.


2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 74-80 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kaitlyn E. Davis ◽  
Pascale Meehan ◽  
Carla Klehm ◽  
Sarah Kurnick ◽  
Catherine Cameron

AbstractGraduate schools provide students opportunities for fieldwork and training in archaeological methods and theory, but they often overlook instruction in field safety and well-being. We suggest that more explicit guidance on how to conduct safe fieldwork will improve the overall success of student-led projects and prepare students to direct safe and successful fieldwork programs as professionals. In this article, we draw on the experiences of current and recent graduate students as well as professors who have overseen graduate fieldwork to outline key considerations in improving field safety and well-being and to offer recommendations for specific training and safety protocols. In devising these considerations and recommendations, we have referenced both domestic and international field projects, as well as those involving community collaboration.


2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 51-57 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Schmitz-Rixen ◽  
Reinhart T. Grundmann

AbstractIntroductionAn overview of the requirements for the head of a surgical department in Germany should be given.Materials and methodsA retrospective literature research on surgical professional policy publications of the last 10 years in Germany was conducted.ResultsSurveys show that commercial influences on medical decisions in German hospitals have today become an everyday, predominantly negative, actuality. Nevertheless, in one survey, 82.9% of surgical chief physicians reported being very satisfied with their profession, compared with 61.5% of senior physicians and only 43.4% of hospital specialists. Here, the chief physician is challenged. Only 70% of those surveyed stated that they could rely on their direct superiors when difficulties arose at work, and only 34.1% regarded feedback on the quality of their work as sufficient. The high distress rate in surgery (58.2% for all respondents) has led to a lack in desirability and is reflected in a shortage of qualified applicants for resident positions. In various position papers, surgical residents (only 35% describe their working conditions as good) demand improved working conditions. Chief physicians are being asked to facilitate a suitable work-life balance with regular working hours and a corporate culture with participative management and collegial cooperation. Appreciation of employee performance must also be expressed. An essential factor contributing to dissatisfaction is that residents fill a large part of their daily working hours with non-physician tasks. In surveys, 70% of respondents stated that they spend up to ≥3 h a day on documentation and secretarial work.DiscussionThe chief physician is expected to relieve his medical staff by employing non-physician assistants to take care of non-physician tasks. Transparent and clearly structured training to achieve specialist status is essential. It has been shown that a balanced work-life balance can be achieved for surgeons. Family and career can be reconciled in appropriately organized departments by making use of part-time and shift models that exclude 24-h shifts and making working hours more flexible.


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