Introduction
Many of the difficulties with “regular” training approaches arise from too little attention on the one hand or excessive administrative trappings on the other. In regard to what has to be learned, the insufficient effort leaves the definition largely up to the employee to discover in a hit-and-miss fashion and gives little assurance that an efficient performance method will emerge. Inefficiency in the learning process and frustration are almost inevitable results. In the misguided approach, we are likely to overburden the learning with schedules and targets, to place great reliance on explanation and perhaps demonstration, to minimize the use of guided practice, and to fail to conceive of learning in terms of skill development. The aim of the research is to analyze skills deficiencies in occupational training and provide effective on-the-job-experience as well as the basic educational services and leadership development counseling to disadvantageous youth.
Whether a proposed new program involves the overhauling of an existing training program, or job-performance improvement through training, or the teaching of new or changed duties, the lessons derived from our experience in training and from the learning research should inform our effort. It is assumed that skill in performance is the criterion of learning in industrial jobs, and such skill requires an efficiency in motions and perceptions that can be acquired only through practice; it is not instantaneously acquired but develops. This process is not to be confused with the eliciting of a few simple motions, requiring little or no skill development, to satisfy a performance criterion little concerned with degrees of excellence.
Problem Identification
Experience with training would appear to support the view that reinforcement serves both an informational and motivational function as skill is developing. Trainees should be cognitively aware of the connection between their acts and the praise and recognition that follows them; they should know what is being approved. They should not be left in doubt, through nonreinforcement or inconsistent or delayed reinforcement, as to the contingent relationship between acts representing good or improving performance and the reinforcement. They know then what to continue to do if they want the reward; and the rewarding effect of the reinforcer serves to motivate them to repeat the act. Through repetition, habits of skilled execution develop. It is useful, they know, to provide incentives for the trainees in terms of rewards the trainees can anticipate receiving when good performance is achieved by them. These are primarily the larger extrinsic rewards (like pay, job security, promotion prospects) the company has to offer. They may serve a broad motivational purpose, but since their attainment is delayed they may not sustain the trainees’ efforts through the long learning process. They represent something we should use but not everything. The more pertinent and stronger reinforcers in the training period would appear to be the signs of approval and recognition the instructor can attach to good or improving acts of performance minute by minute as the individual trainee practices the job tasks. These reinforcers occur after the fact, though the instructor should indicate progressively what kind of improvement is being sought. The trainer demonstrates and explains the performance that is wanted and will be approved. Such performance would represent improvement. But the instructor cannot, in advance, indicate all the skill manifestations that will be reinforced with expressions of approval–that is, all the forms an improvement might take that would be regarded favorably. There are limitations, therefore, in connecting the incentive–the promised and anticipated reward–with the trainee’s precise acts. The assurance of a connection between act and reward is strengthened if the reinforcement is given without delay upon the execution of the act (Alvesson & Sköldberg 2000).
Methodology
Research Design
One of the most time-honored forms of research in the helping professions is the traditional case study. Yin (1994) defines the case study as “an empirical inquiry that investigates a contemporary phenomenon within its real-life context, especially when the boundaries between phenomenon and context are not clearly evident” (p. 13). Extensive description of the context in which the case is found is thus characteristic of case studies. This description includes both the context in which the case itself is embedded and the observational context in which the data about the case are gathered. The case study method will help to analyze skills deficiencies in occupational training and provide effective on-the-job-experience as well as the basic educational services and leadership development counseling to disadvantageous youth. The case study approach will be used to generate a comprehensive and holistic understanding of social events within a single setting, in this instance a single household in an urban neighborhood with high rates of poverty. The study method will be used to obtain firsthand knowledge of real-life situations and processes within naturalistic settings These are typical goals for case studies that use flexible methods of inquiry (Alvesson & Sköldberg 2000).
The case-study method is one more design strategy under the qualitative rubric. Case studies can be single-subject designs or based on a single program, unit, or school. The case study will begin with translating the research question into more specific and researchable problems, followed by techniques and examples of how to collect, organize, and report case-study data. In addition, she argues that case study is a helpful procedure when one is interested in such things as diagnosing learning problems, undertaking teaching evaluations, or evaluating policy (Goodley et al 2004). Consistent with assumptions of qualitative research philosophy, the critical emphasis in case studies is revealing the meaning of phenomena for the participants. The case-study knowledge is concrete, contextual, and interpreted through the reader’s experience. The case-study method is preferable because of its epistemological similarity to a reader’s experience.
Sample Size
Because research methods differ so markedly from those used in fixed method research, methods of selecting study participants or occasions of observation and the rationales that underlie them differ as well. First of all, many method studies take place in the field, in the settings in which the events in question or the people of interest are naturally found. Thus the first step in developing or evaluating a sample in method research is often the choice of a study site or of the settings and occasions of observation (Alvesson & Sköldberg 2000).
Sample sizes in research are determined by the level of precision necessary in assessing any association found or the power needed to detect an association that is clinically or substantively meaningful. For this research, claster sampling will be used. Data collection methods are generally highly structured, and results are generally numerical and thus handled statistically (Goodley et al 2004). Relational studies vary greatly in the degree of emphasis they place on the representativeness sought in the relationships described, in the degree to which the observational context can be or is controlled, and in whether they are cross-sectional or longitudinal. Many studies in epidemiology, sociology, social work, and developmental psychology are relational in nature. Data collected in experiments are generally highly structured, and data collection methods are designed to exercise a high degree of control over the observational field. The key characteristics of samples in group experimental studies is that they be randomized and that they be large enough so that conclusions drawn about group differences will be clinically as well as statistically meaningful. Experiments have most often been used in psychology and in clinical medicine, but there have been some experiments reported in the social work literature as well, particularly in the area of treatment and program evaluation (Yin, 1989).
Data Collection
Case-study data come from strategies of information collection: interviews, observations, documents, and historical records. Many of the hallmarks of quality in case study research have to do with data collection. Large amounts of data are usually collected, often using more than one data collection method. It is also characteristic of case study research that phenomena are studied in context, meaning that data are derived from naturalistic, or everyday, settings—the home, the community, the day-to-day world of professional practice (Goodley et al 2004). Often there is also an effort to verify the data gathered, either by using more than one observer or by recording observations and interview data in such a way that another professional could have access to it for checking out the interpretations made of it. Like other forms of flexible method research, the case study therefore often results in prolonged engagement of the researcher with the case being studied and the generation of large amounts of data, often as much as in a group-based flexible method study (Yin, 1989).
Case-study methodology has potential for increased validity for several reasons. First, because multiple data-collection techniques are used (e.g., interview, document study, observation, and quantitative statistical analysis), the weaknesses of each can be counterbalanced by the strengths of the others. Conclusions related to a certain aspect of a phenomenon under study need not be based solely on one data source (Goodley et al 2004). Second, validity may be increased by checking the interpretation of information with experts. Third, with case studies there are generally a variety of data sources. There should be a structural relationship among these sources. To the extent that these findings are consistent within the case, the validity is enhanced. Conceptually, this is similar to giving a battery of tests to obtain an estimate of consistency in the underlying constructs. Fourth, using a scientific methodin which one hypothesizes something about the case and collects data to determine if the hypothesis should be rejected could add to validity and also help future researchers determine starting places for their research. All of these approaches would tend to improve understanding of the case and give in-depth descriptive information (Dicks et al 2005).
One of the hallmarks of research is that the parts of the research process—sampling, data collection, and data analysis—often do not take place in distinct and sequential steps as they do in fixed method research. The initial research plan may only specify the setting to be tried first or how the first sample member or members will be chosen (Dicks et al 2005). Once data collection is ongoing, further sampling and data collection activities may be defined based on what happened initially (Denzin and Lincoln 1995). Data are often analyzed as soon as they are collected, with the results feeding directly back into the ongoing sampling and data collection processes. In short, decisions about method evolve from the data as the study proceeds, and the parts of the research process are not as distinct from each other in time as in other kinds of research. Nevertheless, it is useful to consider the traditional elements of research design in the traditional order in relation to flexible method research. Such an examination will make clear and concrete the nature of flexible method research and how it differs from fixed methods of inquiry (Yin, 1989).
Analysis of the Results
Because the nature of the study site often determines who will be studied, it is important to consider how the locus of the research has been chosen. As in all research, convenience to the researcher always plays a role to some degree or another, but within the practical constraints that every research project must face, the point of entree to the worlds of the study participants should be carefully considered. The way the researcher is introduced into the setting, by whom, and for what purposes are all matters that will influence how the various gatekeepers and participants relate to the researcher and thus the nature of the information that will become available to the research (Levine & Sharpe 1998). All of these issues—the selection of the study site, the negotiation of entree, and the selection of informants within the setting—must be explicitly set forth so that the reader may evaluate the data obtained in context (Borg and Gall 1989). In the process of gaining access to a study site, it is important to consider carefully the ethical and consent issues that must be negotiated with participants. In the research will involve long exposure to people and settings, imposing a degree of scrutiny not often encountered in most fixed method studies. Given the volume and detail of the data obtained about both sites (specific institutions or locations) and participants (individual people) in intensive interviewing or extended observation, issues of identifiability may become quite difficult to manage. Some possible solutions to this problem, such as the alteration of characteristics to “disguise” the identity of informants, can present their own problems of distortion. Clear understandings about the ways such problems will be dealt with in the research must be negotiated with participants when the study is begun (Denzin and Lincoln 1995).
Data analysis in case study design basically involves “the organization and communication of findings”. Case study data, as in other forms of research, are organized according to the conceptual or theoretical categories or issues that are most salient in making the results interpretable. A good case study report discusses what the categories are and how they were derived. This involves an analytic strategy known as pattern matching, or comparing patterns in the data with what theory might predict (Denzin and Lincoln 1995).While some case studies may be simply descriptive, having a theoretical or conceptual framework within which to present case study findings is generally regarded as preferable (Levine & Sharpe 1998). One of the hallmarks of case study research is the richness of the data that result. This necessary style of presentation results in the readability and common appeal of case study research reports even to non-research oriented readers. In short, a good case study report often tells one or more stories in an accessible and interesting way. First the analysis “should show that it relied on all the relevant evidence” (Borg and Gall 1989, p. 123). While no case study report can or should recount every observation made or every instance of a phenomenon encountered, there must be some basis on which to trust that findings presented were based on a process of analysis that took all of the available data into account. As in other forms of flexible method research, some account of how this was done must be given. In addition, enough descriptive data must be presented so that the reader of the case study report has an idea of the kind of evidence on which a given conclusion was based and can form some idea of whether or not the data seem to support the interpretation given to it. The richness of the data obtained may make it difficult to keep the main questions that initially gave rise to the case study central to the analysis and presentation of results. Opportunities to explore new or unexpected findings should not be overlooked. However, the process of analysis and presentation of results must be organized around the most important questions and findings from the study (Levine & Sharpe 1998).
Conclusion
The experience of success has a potential for especially beneficial effect in the different case of young trainees who are willing to exert themselves but have little reason to expect success. The building-up of efficacy expectations, through the kind of training that proceeds from success to success and ensures effective performance at each stage, is an important task of the instructor in the training of all learners. It is a crucial factor in the training of those learners whose history has been marked by failures and who lack confidence in their ability to master a new job. It is possibly part of the answer to the problem of dealing with young learners who are poorly prepared by educational achievement to enter the labor market (Coffey and Atkinson 1999). Before retraining is undertaken, the need for it should be conclusively ascertained. Not all performance requirements necessitate a training response, although training has served, somewhat unhappily, as a catch-all solution for all kinds of operational situations, inside and outside the realm of learning. Assuming that performance is genuinely the issue to be confronted, the difficulty may indeed involve a lack of skill or knowledge but may also involve insufficient motivation, poorly engineered jobs, or unmanageable job or environmental conditions–or a combination of these. Diagnosis is required so that the pertinent actions can be brought to bear (Borg and Gall 1989).
Recommendations
Research study should pay a special attention to validity and ethical issues in research. Reliability refers to the consistency with which observations are made. Validity refers to both the consistency with which theories (or concepts) and observations are linked to each other and the value of the theory generated from the results, most especially what the results mean and to what extent and under what conditions the explanations offered for the study results will be seen as credible (Byman and Burgess 1999). Whether or not the results of a flexible method study are valid in the sense that they might be verified in a different or subsequent study depends on making explicit the general methods and assumptions that have informed the research (Borg and Gall 1989). If replications later produce different results, the basis for the difference may be understood by comparing the situations and procedures that undergirded each work. In other words, ethics address research activities in their human and social context. They have to do with how researchers enter and conduct themselves in the field of investigation, as well as with how researchers conduct themselves toward fellow professionals and research consumers of all kinds.
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