Report

Teaser, summary, work performed and final results

Periodic Reporting for period 2 - QuInnE (Quality of Jobs and Innovation Generated Employment Outcomes)

Teaser

Context:The EU faces structural challenges compounded by the recent economic crisis. More and better jobs are needed to lower unemployment, raise employment participation rates, and tackle social exclusion and inequality. The Europe 2020 growth strategy wants smart...

Summary

Context:
The EU faces structural challenges compounded by the recent economic crisis. More and better jobs are needed to lower unemployment, raise employment participation rates, and tackle social exclusion and inequality. The Europe 2020 growth strategy wants smart, sustainable and inclusive growth, with innovation and job quality as flagship initiatives. Questions arise about innovation\'s impact on the number and quality of jobs. Research on the mutual impact of innovation and job quality and mechanisms whereby this takes place is needed.

Objectives:
QuInnE contributes to the EU growth agenda by exploring the mutual relationship between innovation and job quality and identifying mechanisms leading to more and better jobs, and actions to help tackle social exclusion and inequality. QuInnE delivers:
1. new scientific understanding of the innovation-job quality-employment dynamic;
2. new diagnostic and developmental tools to help monitor and measure this dynamic and improve practice in firms;
3. evidence-based advice for policy.

Results:
Policy analysis findings:
Despite an evolution in EU and member states’ innovation policy from a narrow towards a broader conception of innovation, innovation policy still primarily privileges an R&D and Science and Technology (STI) orientation, with deficient recognition of smaller, incremental, and non-technological innovation. The latter have an underappreciated value per se, and in supporting other types of innovation. When the broad conception of innovation is recognized in declarative policy statements, an overwhelming return to the STI perspective occurs when measurement and action plans are created. A very uneven level of policy learning across the EU is also documented.

Quantitative Findings:
Innovation and the QuInnE job quality indicators correlate, with longitudinal data analysis indicating a causal relationship. The strongest correlations are with product, followed by process innovation. Organizational innovation correlates weaker, likely due to the “organizational innovation” concept containing heterogenous elements. Innovation was found to increase employment levels, even process and organizational innovations, which generally are regarded as oriented towards labour rationalization and thereby job destruction. The studies support the “skill-biased technological change” thesis, that posits that technological change and innovation leads to more higher skilled jobs but not lower-skilled jobs. Thus, innovation tends to increase inequalities between the higher and lower skilled by creating more high-skill, high quality jobs, exacerbating inequality.

Qualitative Findings:
58 case studies were carried out as summarized in Table 3.
Despite some industry and national/institutional specificity, several common processes were found: 1.Rather than technological determinism, firm, managerial and to an extent worker choice played a large role in which innovations were developed or adopted, as well as when, how, and upon whom innovations were applied. 2. The operation of virtuous circles where innovations improved job quality and job quality positively impacts the generation and/or adoption of innovations, and vicious circles where the opposite obtained were analysed. Central to the virtuous circles was management\'s investment in employees’ innovative capacity, whereas cost-cutting and deskilling characterized vicious circles. 3. Over-optimism about the ability to efficiently automate led to negative consequences in terms of overinvestment in automation technologies and underinvestment in employee recruitment, development and education, leading to qualified labor shortages. 4. Regarding inclusion and inequality, the use of advanced technologies often led to more males, younger, and recently credentialed workers, at the expense of women, older, lower-skilled and workers with older credentials. 5. With regard to social inclusion, only two (both public sector) organisations had

Work performed

QuInnE produced 15 scientific working papers, and 2 web-based tools (all available at quinne.eu) via policy, quantitative, and qualitative analysis. Primary results are detailed above, with the exception of the two tools.
The diagnostic tool allows the user to obtain detailed information on 22 EU member states’ performance on a number of parameters with regard to employment, job quality and innovation, as well as compare these measures with the EU median, and with another selected country.
The developmental tool gives access to all QuInnE publications, as well as specially developed education, and management and employees development materials in a fully searchable manner. A structured search tree within the tool provides a step-by-step guide through a recommended search and discovery process.
With regard to exploitation, the QuInnE project team has worked in close collaboration with national level stakeholders and case firms throughout the project, engaging in continuous dialogue. As results became available, QuInnE members held seminars and workshops at the supra-national level for the OECD, the L20 summit in advance of the G20 meeting in Argentina, and a dissemination event in Brussels to which members of the European Commission, European Parliament, Business Europe, and trade union and civil society organisations were invited. Project members also held workshops with industry associations, government representatives, unions and employers\' organisations at the national level. Furthermore, the QuInnE job quality framework has already been adopted by national level parliamentary enquiries, trade associations, and sectoral working groups.

Final results

Progress beyond the state of the art has been made in these areas:
Theoretically and empirically linking job quality and innovation.
Quantitatively investigating the correlation of job quality with product, process, and organizational innovation; as well as generating new analyses on innovation effects on levels and types of employment.
Qualitatively investigating the mutual and causal relationships between job quality and product, process and organizational innovation, leading to an elaboration of factors and mechanisms behind virtuous and vicious circles. Producing robust and nuanced findings on how innovation exacerbates inequalities.
Elaboration at the workplace level of which and how factors that could promote inclusion are cancelled out by countervailing forces.
Detailing the extent to which conceptions of innovation at the EU and national levels remain R&D, Science and Technology oriented.
Findings can be used to intelligently promote growth and combat inequalities.

Website & more info

More info: http://www.quinne.eu.