Supporting Skill-Development Through the Creation of Learning Aids Over the Professional Life Course

In the transformation context of work and of production methods, training plays a strategic role in the management of work efficiency and safety. However, training and human resource specialists run into a persistent gap between training and work reality, and this gap affects the successful application of training knowledge in the workplace itself. The exploration of new ways of bringing together training and the work environment in a balanced relationship is required. This article explores such tools through a reflection concerning the development of a planning model whose aim it is to enrich an initial training program for truck drivers by taking into account the reality of work itself.Three approaches that formulate the problem of training creation have been identified: one approach using human resource competencies, an approach with the transfer of training knowledge, and a third approach with the creation of action situations in the course of life. The study of these approaches makes it possible to define the nature and the means of intervention in training as linked to work reality. In the first approach, training is a tool that makes it possible to channel skills towards the company’s goals and strategies. This approach is based on the needs analysis of the organization as a prerequisite to determining desired behaviours in practice. The second approach asks about favourable conditions and of the means to ensure the application, in the work situation, of the knowledge learned. Finally, for the third approach, which is the one we favour, the problem of training and of practice is based on the problem of knowledge required to confront life situations. This approach sets out to facilitate learning in professional life course situations through the setting up of consistent sets of conditions conducive to learning. Training becomes one aid to learning among others. The course of life is defined as the ongoing process of constructing knowledge through action in life situations. The learning built up in this way makes up an individual’s knowledge base and is inseparable from his life experience. Any human action is a manifestation of prior life experience and also a transformation of this experience in the situation encountered.Using this approach makes it necessary, as a prerequisite, to document this life course reality from the perspective of human activity as a learning process. We have identified three trends: the situated learning approach, the praxeology trend, and the activity analysis approach. These share three beliefs on human activity: (1) knowledge is integrated into the action process, and is difficult to put into words; (2) to have access to practice content, it is necessary to have specific conditions which place the action process as the focus of the analysis; (3) the practice analysis requires that the actor be assisted in his reflection process by an outside person. In light of these approaches, we conducted a participative observation of the initial training of a truck driver as well as an analysis of the driver’s work activity.This qualitative approach enables us to have a very detailed comprehension of the activity of the learner undergoing training, and of the activity of the truck driver at work, in order to help him in his life course. Although our analysis identifies several aspects of the activity and of the underlying competencies, this reflection is limited here to the characteristics of the mechanical state management performed by the truck driver.The analysis of the learner’s training activity reveals learning oriented towards the integration of a standardized method to verify components covered by regulations. In this context, the learner’s focus is to follow as faithfully as possible the procedure learned, without forgetting the various steps. The analysis also reveals the more or less conscious use of knowledge as to the mechanical functioning of vehicles in the application of these verifications. From these characteristics of the training activity there emerge several difficulties on the level of the use of prior experiences in the carrying out of the training and in terms of the preparation for confronting the reality of work.The analysis of the truck driver’s activity when managing the mechanical state brings to light a reality very different from that learned in training. This management is characterized by three categories of action on the part of the truck driver: (1) characterize the various mechanical components and define the conditions of use as a function of the work to be done; (2) follow the dynamic process of the truck’s components and (3) act on the transformation process of the truck’s dynamic change. Thus, the work activity reveals the dynamic aspect of the mechanical state in the course of work, and brings out the importance of a continuous follow up of these transformations. From this point of view, the verification before departure is not a goal in itself but rather a characterization step of the truck within an ongoing process during work.From these results of the training activity analysis and of the work activity emerge several possible directions for recommendations on conditions for carrying out the training activity of learners, on training content, and on the conditions of carrying out the work of truck drivers. The content of these recommendations concerns training but also the setting up of technical tools and organizational adjustments which could be an aid to action and to learning in the truck driver’s professional life course. In light of these results, a model to plan training was set up. This model proposes to set up tools that can assist individuals to act and to learn in life situations. From this perspective, this model attempts to intervene both on the training level and also on the level of the work situation, seen as situations in the professional life course. The training situation intervention implies acting in two ways. First, it proposes actions upon the conditions of carrying out training. This requires the documentation of the training activity. Secondly, it proposes actions upon the training content as an aid to help the learner successfully deal with the reality of work. This second aspect also presupposes knowledge of the training activity but also of the truck driver’s work activity. Intervention in the work situation means helping the worker to act in a safe and efficient manner by means of his action situations. These interventions imply previous understanding of his work reality.

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