Career guidance challenges and opportunities

1 Career guidancechallenges and opportunities2 DisclaimerThe views expressed in this publication are not necessarily thoseof the South African Qualifications Authority (SAQA).CopyrightAll rights reserved. No part of this publication may bereproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in anyform or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying,recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission ofthe South African Qualifications Authority (SAQA).Compiled and distributed by the Directorate: Strategic Support, date: February 2009 ISBN: 978-0-9802748-4-4 Postnet Suite 248 Private Bag X06 Waterkloof0145 Facsimile: 012 431-5039 Website: : 086 010 3188E-mail: and abbreviations4 EditorialProfessor Shirley Walters5 The role of Career guidance in the development of the National Qualifications Framework in South AfricaProfessor Tony Watts7 Plenary discussion Johannesburg14 List of participants15 Plenary discussion Cape Town17 Career development in the workplaceProfessor Tony Watts18 List of participants21 Navigational tools for learners, really?

2 What is available, what are the challenges and what should be done?Patricia Flederman223table of contentsCareer guidance : challenges and opportunitiesProfessor Tony Watts4acronyms and abbreviationsCEDEFOPC entre for the Development of VocationalTrainingCRICC areers Research and Information CentreILOI nternational Labour OrganisationEUEuropean UnionNICECN ational Institute for Careers Education andCounsellingNQFN ational Qualifications FrameworkOECDO rganisation for Economic Cooperation andDevelopmentPACEP ublic and Continuing EducationSAVGEAS outh African Vocational guidance andEducational Association5editorialWhat is Career Development?Do you have a Career ? This was one of the questions 300 or so careerguidance practitioners were asked during the visit of Professor TonyWatts in October 2008.

3 He spoke of the traditional notion of Career as being an elitist concept held by only a few, which refers toprogression up an ordered hierarchy within an organisation orprofession. The notion was that people chose their careers, whichthen unfolded in an orderly way. But the reality was that some peoplehad a Career while most people only had a job; and many did not haveeven that. Professor Watts explained that for some time now that concept ofcareer has been fragmenting. The pace of change, driven bytechnology and economic globalisation, means that organisations areconstantly exposed to change. They are less willing to make long-termcommitments to individuals; where they do, it is in exchange forflexibility about roles and tasks the individual will , therefore, security lies not in employment but inemployability.

4 Individuals who want to maintain their employabilityhave to be willing to regularly learn new skills. So careers are nowincreasingly being seen not as being chosen but as beingconstructed through the series of decisions about learning and workthat people make throughout their lives. Career development in thissense need not be confined to the few: it can, and must, be madeaccessible to all. Elaborating this point, Professor Watts pointed outthat Career development is not only a private good, of value toindividuals; it is also a public good of value to the country as a is true in at least three respects. First, it is important for effective learning. If individuals make decisionsabout what they are to learn in a well-informed and well-thought-through way, linked to their interests, their capacities and theiraspirations, and are given realistic information about the opportunitiesto which the learning can lead, then they are likely to be moresuccessful learners, and the huge sums of public money invested ineducation and training systems are likely to yield much higher returns.

5 Second, it is important for an effective labour market. If people findjobs and Career paths that utilise their potential and meet their owngoals, they are likely to be more motivated and therefore moreproductive, enhancing national prosperity. Third, Career development has an important contribution to make tosocial equity, supporting equal opportunities and promoting socialinclusion. It can raise the aspirations of disadvantaged groups andgive them access to opportunities that might otherwise be denied development is crucial to the success of lifelong learningpolicies. Governments regularly state that such policies need to besignificantly driven by individuals.

6 The reason is simple: schoolingcan be designed as a system, but lifelong learning cannot. It needsto embrace many forms of learning, in many different settings. It isthe individual who must provide the sense of impetus, of coherenceand of places Career development centre-stage. It means that if, asmany governments believe, lifelong learning is crucial to a country seconomic competitiveness and social wellbeing, then the country sfuture depends significantly on the quality of the decisions andtransitions made by individuals. This publicationThis publication includes the products of an intensive few monthsin which SAQA has facilitated explorations and discussions aboutthe state of Career guidance in the country.

7 SAQA s overarchingquestion in this exploration is: what navigational tools are there tohelp learners in all age-groups explore education and careeropportunities? A relevant question we have been asked in responseto this initiative is: why is SAQA doing this? SAQA was established under the 1995 SAQA Act to develop andpromote the National Qualifications Framework (NQF). The NQF wasseen by the new democratic government as a key driver of a cultureof lifelong learning in the country. The NQF was an aspiration drivenby a broad range of constituencies from trade unions, business andcivil society. Among all constituencies was the desire that bothqualifications in general, and the specific learning achievements oflearners (children and adults) in particular, should be recognisedin more transparent ways, so that there could be greater mobilityand flexibility as people progressed in their learning lives and alongcareer the last 13 years SAQA has helped construct a complexplatform with scaffolding for the education and training system.

8 Thefollowing figures are an example of SAQA s achievements: By July 2007, million learner achievements were registeredon the National Learners Record Database (NLRD). 787 newqualifications and 10 988 unit standards had been addition there were 23 999 providers accredited for 6 683qualifications. There were 31 accredited Education and TrainingQuality Bodies. And during the 2007/08 financial year, 29 848foreign qualifications were evaluated for persons seeking workand study this brief sketch, it s clear that great effort has been expendedin constructing the South African NQF, which is now seen as one ofthe most developed in the world; there are 70 worldwide. Career guidance : challenges and opportunities6 The system has now reached sufficient maturity for SAQA to ask thenext question: how easily can learners navigate this complexsystem?

9 One of the critical cross-field outcomes for allqualifications is exploring education and Career opportunities across the lifespan. SAQA, which was established to give leadershipon these matters, therefore felt that it was time to ask whether itshould be doing something more to make it easier for learners tofind their way through the education and training systems as theymake life try to answer this question, we contracted Patricia Flederman toundertake an environmental scan. The results of her work arecontained in her report in this publication. A draft report waspresented to a consultative meeting in early September 2008 ofcarefully chosen people across the careers guidance field, fromrural and urban areas and from various provinces.

10 A number ofimportant insights were gleaned from this meeting, including strongsupport for SAQA to explore setting up a national helpline, alongthe lines of Learndirect in the United Kingdom or the CareersService helpline in New Zealand. It was envisioned that such ahelpline would work closely with all the Career guidance initiativesacross the country. In October 2008, Professor Tony Watts from England, a worldauthority on careers guidance , was invited to present the SAQAC hairperson s Lecture and to offer seminars in Johannesburg andCape Town on Career Development in the Workplace and on Careers guidance : opportunities and challenges . The seminarswere part of a national initiative on research into work and learningsupported by SAQA, the University of Western Cape and theInsurance SETA.