In our previous post, we looked at the current IfATE Engineering Technician standard and found that most of its options were potentially misplaced in the current IfATE occupational map. This represents a considerable rework to the map if it were…
Continue ReadingIn our previous post, we suggested that the upcoming review of IfATE’s occupational maps might also be a good time to review their purpose, audience and terms of reference and rework them into the form of skills frameworks, such as…
Continue ReadingThe Institute of Apprenticeships and Technical Education’s (IfATE’s) Engineering and Manufacturing occupational map is due for review. In this short blog series’ we ask if this might be an appropriate time to take a look at its potential for an…
Continue ReadingIn our previous posts[1][2][3], we drew comparisons between occupational requirements and job content for technologists in Industrial Engineering and Mechanical Engineering. A closer look at the table below, showing the job titles in the O*NET database corresponding to the two…
Continue ReadingIn our previous posts[1][2], we observed that the occupational requirements and job content profiles shown in O*NET for Industrial Engineering Technologists indicate that higher entry qualification levels may be required than for Mechanical Engineering Technologists. We further found that Industrial…
Continue ReadingIn our previous post we observed that the Revealed Comparative Advantage (RCA) technique for O*NET work styles indicates that Industrial Engineering Technologists, along with Mechanical Engineers, score relatively higher in Innovation than the other occupations we were examining. We will…
Continue ReadingIn this previous post, we identified that the education profiles for industrial engineering and mechanical engineering technologist occupations in O*NET data deviate from the pattern we would expect to see. In Industrial Engineering, the proportion of technologists with bachelor’s degrees…
Continue ReadingThe titles and meanings of engineer, technician and – increasingly – technologist occupations are still very loose. In the Institute for Apprenticeships (IfATE’s) apprenticeship standards, for instance, we see ‘engineer’ standards as low as level 2[1] and ‘technician’ standards as…
Continue ReadingIn the UK labour market there appears to be a distinct and emerging set of occupations referred to as ‘technologists’. However, they are not properly recognised as occupations within the UK Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) in the same way as,…
Continue ReadingIn our previous post, we described how O*NET Intermediate Work Activities (IWAs) can be used as proxies for competences, both within and across occupations. This post shows a pair of observations in the increase in the significance of certain IWAs…
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