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The Concept of Employability

Ronald W. McQuaid and Colin Lindsay

[Paper first received, March 2004; in final form, June 2004]

Summary. The concept of ‘employability’ plays a crucial role in informing labour market policyin the UK, the EU and beyond. This paper analyses current and previous applications of the termand discusses its value as an exploratory concept and a framework for policy analysis. It then tracesthe development of the concept, discusses its role in current labour market and training strategies(with particular reference to the UK) and seeks to identify an approach to defining employabilitythat can better inform labour market policy, by transcending explanations of employment andunemployment that focus solely on either supply-side or demand-side factors. Although theliterature offers a range of definitions of ‘employability’, many policy-makers have recently usedthe term as shorthand for ‘the individual’s employability skills and attributes’. It is argued thatthis ‘narrow’ usage can lead to a ‘hollowing out’ of the concept of employability. The paperconcludes by presenting a broad framework for analysing employability built around individualfactors, personal circumstances and external factors, which acknowledges the importance ofboth supply- and demand-side factors.

1. Introduction

‘Employability’ plays a crucial role in inform-ing labour market policy in the UK, the EUand beyond. The concept of employabilityhas been deployed to describe the objectivesof the economic strategies promoted byimportant supranational institutions andlabour market policies at national, regionaland local levels (see for example OECD,1998; CEC, 1999; ILO, 2000; UN, 2001). Inthe UK, employability has emerged as acentral tenet of so-called ‘Third Way’ pol-icies: ‘a cornerstone of the New Labourapproach to economic and social policy’(Haughton et al., 2000, p. 671). Despite, orperhaps because of, its ubiquity, the conceptof employability continues to be used in anumber of contexts and with reference to a

range of meanings (Hillage and Pollard,1998; McQuaid and Lindsay, 2002). Indeed,for some, employability is little more than a‘buzzword’ that is more often used than prop-erly understood (Philpott, 1999); or “a fuzzynotion, often ill-defined and sometimes notdefined at all” (Gazier, 1998a, p. 298).

This paper seeks to contribute to the debatesurrounding employability, by analysingcurrent and previous applications of the termand discussing its potential value as an explora-tory concept and a framework for policy analy-sis. The aims of the paper are therefore: to tracethe development of the concept; to discuss itsrole in informing current labour market andtraining policies (with particular reference tothe UK); and to identify an approach to definingthe concept that can better inform labourmarket policy, by transcending explanations

Urban Studies, Vol. 42, No. 2, 197–219, February 2005

Ronald McQuaid and Colin Lindsay are both in the Employment Research Institute, Napier University, Edinburgh, EH14 1DJ,Scotland, UK. Fax: 0131 455 4311. E-mail: [email protected] and [email protected]. An earlier version of thispaper was presented at the seminar series on ‘Employability and labour market policy’ at Napier University and the Universityof Warwick, sponsored by the Regional Studies Association and the Regional Science Association (British and Irish Section).

0042-0980 Print=1360-063X Online=05=02197–23 # 2005 The Editors of Urban Studies

DOI: 10.1080=0042098042000316100

of unemployment that focus solely on eithersupply- or demand-side factors.

Following this introduction, section 2 of thepaper discusses the importance of the conceptof employability to local, national and inter-national labour market policy. Section 3 con-siders working definitions of employabilityand traces the historical development of theconcept. Section 4 examines in detail themanner in which the concept is currentlyapplied in discussions of labour marketpolicy in the UK. In section 5 of the paper,we argue that the manner in which the term‘employability’ is currently used by manypolicy-makers, as shorthand for ‘the individ-ual’s employability skills’, represents a‘narrow’ usage of the concept and contrastthis with attempts to arrive at a morebroadly defined concept of employability. Insection 6, an holistic framework for under-standing employability is set out, acknowled-ging the importance of both supply-side anddemand-side factors affecting the labourmarket outcomes experienced by individuals.Finally, some conclusions are presented. Theconcept of employability relates to those: inwork and seeking to improve or sustain theirposition in the labour market; in education;and out of work. However, the focus of thispaper is largely, but not exclusively, onemployability as it relates to unemployed jobseekers and labour market policy.

2. Employabilityand Labour Market Policy

Employability, a relatively obscure concept adecade ago, now commands a central placein labour market policies in the UK, manyother European states and beyond. At thesupranational level, employability formedone of the four original pillars of the EuropeanEmployment Strategy, having emerged as adefining theme of the Extraordinary EuropeanCouncil on Employment (the so-called JobsSummit), which took place in Luxembourgin November 1997 (CEC, 1999). The pro-motion of employability in the workplaceand among young people, the unemployedand other potentially disadvantaged groupsin the labour market remains an important

goal for the revised European EmploymentStrategy, formulated in 2003, which empha-sises three overarching objectives: full employ-ment; quality and productivity at work; andcohesion and an inclusive labour market(CEC, 2003a).

Whereas the original EU strategy includedemployability as a pillar of its approach, themore flexible, longer-term strategy now advo-cated by the European Commission speaks ofpromoting more and better ‘investment inhuman capital and strategies for lifelonglearning’. However, this and many of theCommission’s other guidelines for imple-menting the strategy (or so-called ten com-mandments) reflect the pre-existing focus onemployability, including: the promotion ofactive and preventative measures for the(especially long-term) unemployed and inac-tive; improving financial incentives to makework pay; and promoting active ageing(CEC, 2003b).

Other cross-national institutions concernedwith labour market policy have similarlyemphasised the importance of employability.The United Nations (UN) has made employ-ability one of its four priorities for nationalpolicy action on youth employment (alongwith entrepreneurship, equal opportunitiesbetween young men and women and employ-ment creation). To this end, the UN’s YouthEmployment Network has suggested that

All countries need to review, re-think andre-orient their education, vocational train-ing and labour market policies to facilitatethe school to work transition and to giveyoung people . . . a head start in workinglife (UN, 2001, p. 4).

Finally, the OECD’s influence in promotingemployability-focused labour market policiesarguably pre-dates both of these initiatives.Although less inclined to deploy the conceptof ‘employability’, by the mid 1990s theOECD (1994a, 1994b) had begun to advocatestrongly more active labour market policies inorder to break the ‘dysfunctional division’between the working population and theunemployed. The need for strategies targeting“low-paid and unskilled job seekers [and]

198 RONALD W. McQUAID AND C. LINDSAY

enhancing the effectiveness of active labourmarket policies and lifelong learning to main-tain employability” continued to form thecentral focus of the Organisation’s labourmarket policy agenda throughout the 1990s(OECD, 1998, p. 4). Indeed, it has beenargued that by the end of the decade theOECD (particularly through its 1994 ‘JobsStudy’) had played a crucial role in promotingactive policies to improve the employabilityof the unemployed across international bound-aries (Sinfield, 2001).

At the national level in the UK, as in manyother EU states, the European EmploymentStrategy’s focus on employability (andespecially on providing a ‘fresh start’ to theyoung unemployed who have been out ofwork for at least six months) has been particu-larly influential. Employability was a keytheme of UK’s EU presidency in 1998(Verhaar and Smulders, 1999). The concepthas found expression within the UK’s nationalEmployment Action Plans and the currentgovernment’s welfare to work agenda, withthe New Deal programmes at its centre(DfEE, 1997a, 1997b, 1998; DWP, 2002).Improving the employability of youngpeople, the long-term unemployed, loneparents, the disabled and other disadvantagedjob seekers is the primary objective for theNew Deal, which seeks to provide interven-tions designed to address the skills of partici-pants while also ‘re-attaching’ them to thelabour market. Indeed, ministers havedescribed the New Deal as being defined bythe principles of ‘quality, continuity andemployability’ (DfEE, 1997a). At regionaland local levels, many of these, or similar,policies to tackle employability issues havebeen implemented or devised by area-baseddevelopment agencies, local authorities andother bodies such as careers services.

This discussion illustrates that employabi-lity is not merely a subject of theoreticaldebate. The concept has become a cornerstoneof labour market policies and employmentstrategies in the UK and elsewhere. Yet it isperhaps only the relatively recent emergenceof employability as an all-embracing objec-tive for national and supranational policies

to address unemployment that has led toattempts to arrive at a thoroughgoing defi-nition. Prior to discussing a broad concept ofemployability, however, we will reviewsome established definitions and current andhistorical uses of the term.

3. What Is Employability?

3.1 Working Definitions

As noted above, the concept of employabilitycontinues to be applied within a range ofdifferent contexts and to both those in workand those seeking work. Accordingly, whileit is simple enough to assign ‘employability’a straightforward dictionary definition, suchas ‘the character or quality of being employ-able’, arriving at a working definition is a farmore complex process. Perhaps understand-ably, employers have tended to view employ-ability as primarily a characteristic of theindividual. The Confederation of BritishIndustry (CBI) has defined employability thus

Employability is the possession by an indi-vidual of the qualities and competenciesrequired to meet the changing needs ofemployers and customers and thereby helpto realise his or her aspirations and potentialin work (CBI, 1999, p. 1).

The UK government has similarly arrived at adefinition that, while implying that employ-ability-development is a priority for govern-ment, again places individuals’ skills at thecentre of the concept

Employability means the development ofskills and adaptable workforces in whichall those capable of work are encouragedto develop the skills, knowledge, techno-logy and adaptability to enable them toenter and remain in employment through-out their working lives (HM Treasury,1997, p. 1).

Other attempts to define the concept havehinted at a more holistic approach, emphasi-sing the impact of both individual characte-ristics and labour market conditions—i.e.both labour demand and supply factors. TheCanadian government’s Labour Force

THE CONCEPT OF EMPLOYABILITY 199

Development Board offered the followingdefinition

Employability is the relative capacity of anindividual to achieve meaningful employ-ment given the interaction of personalcircumstances and the labour market(Canadian Labour Force DevelopmentBoard, 1994, p. viii).

Similarly, research for the Northern IrelandExecutive has explicitly suggested a wideworking definition of employability

Employability is the capability to move intoand within labour markets and to realisepotential through sustainable and accessibleemployment. For the individual, employ-ability depends on: the knowledge andskills they possess, and their attitudes; theway personal attributes are presented in thelabour market; the environmental andsocial context within which work issought; and the economic context withinwhich work is sought (DHFETE, 2002, p. 7).

The Northern Irish approach appears to followon from approaches such as that suggested byHillage and Pollard (1998) who developed abroad-ranging definition of the concept,seeing employability as an individual’sability to gain initial employment, maintainemployment, move between roles within thesame organisation, obtain new employmentif required and (ideally) secure suitable andsufficiently fulfilling work. Hence this coversboth unemployed people looking for workand employed people seeking alternativejobs or promotion. Employability thusinvolves

The capability to move self-sufficientlywithin the labour market to realise potentialthrough sustainable employment. For theindividual, employability depends on theknowledge, skills and attitudes theypossess, the way they use those assets andpresent them to employers and the context(e.g. personal circumstances and labourmarket environment) within which theyseek work (Hillage and Pollard, 1998,p. 12).

In general, the differences in perspectivesappear to revolve fundamentally aroundwhether the focus is upon the individual’scharacteristics and ‘readiness’ for work, orupon the factors influencing a person gettinginto a job (or job ‘match’ in job searchtheory), moving jobs or improving their job.

3.2 The Historical Evolution of the Conceptof Employability

The historical antecedents of the currentemployability debate can be traced back atleast a century. Gazier’s (1998a, 1998b, 2001)work on employability provides a useful over-view of the concept’s development towardscurrently accepted definitions. He distinguishesbetween seven operational versions of theconcept of employability—namely

–Dichotomic employability—emerging at thebeginning of the 20th century in the UKand the US. Gazier describes this formulationof the concept of employability as ‘dichoto-mic’ due to its focus on the opposite polesof ‘employable’ and ‘unemployable’, initiallywith little or no gradation: employable refer-ring to those who were able and willing towork; unemployable referring to thoseunable to work and in need of ‘relief’.

– Socio-medical employability—emergingbefore the 1950s in the US, the UK,Germany and elsewhere, referring to the dis-tance between the existing work abilities ofsocially, physically or mentally disadvan-taged people and the work requirements ofemployment.

–Manpower policy employability—developedmainly in the US since the 1960s, and extend-ing underlying discussions of socio-medicalemployability to other socially disadvantagedgroups, with the emphasis again on the dis-tance between the existing work abilities ofthe disadvantaged and the work requirementsof employment.

–Flow employability—emerging in the Frenchsociology literature of the 1960s, and focus-ing on the demand side and the accessibilityof employment within local and nationaleconomies, with employability defined as


“the objective expectation, or more or lesshigh probability, that a person looking for ajob can have of finding one” (Ledrut, 1966;quoted in Gazier, 1998b, p. 44).

– Labour market performance employabi-lity—used internationally since the end ofthe 1970s. This understanding of theconcept focuses on the labour market out-comes achieved by policy interventions,measurable in terms of days employed,hours worked and payment rates, and otherlabour market outcomes for individuals par-ticipating in employability-related pro-grammes.

– Initiative employability—emerging in theNorth American and European humanresource development (HRD) literature ofthe late 1980s, reflecting an acceptanceamongst individuals and organisations thatsuccessful career development requires thedevelopment of skills that are transferableand the flexibility to move between jobroles. Again, the focus is on the individual,with the onus on workers to develop theirskills and networks in the workplace, sostrengthening their position when theywish, or are required, to move.

– Interactive employability—emerging first inNorth America and then internationallysince the end of the 1980s, and maintainingthe emphasis on individual initiative, whilealso acknowledging that the employabilityof the individual is relative to the employ-ability of others and the opportunities, insti-tutions and rules that govern the labourmarket. This can be seen as implying theimportance of the role of employers andlabour demand in determining a person’semployability. Gazier identifies two mainoperational implications arising from thisapproach to employability: the targeting oflong-term unemployed people and other dis-advantaged groups by policy-makers; andthe resulting focus of many Western govern-ments on activation policies which seek tointervene to prevent long-term unemploy-ment and labour market disadvantage.

Gazier suggests that these seven versions ofthe concept of employability can be identified

as emerging in three waves. The first wave,and the first use of the concept, centring on‘dichotomic employability’, emerged in theearly decades of the 20th century. Althoughuseful for distinguishing the ‘employable’from the ‘unemployable’ (i.e. those eligiblefor welfare benefits), this rather simplisticversion of the concept was more an ‘emer-gency distinction’ than a labour marketpolicy tool. However, a version of thisconcept has been raised more recently inlabour market models concerning whetherunemployed people may be ‘unemployable’,partly due to technological change (Saint-Paul, 1996). The second wave began aroundthe 1960s, as three very different versions ofthe concept were used by statisticians, socialworkers and labour market policy-makers.‘Socio-medical employability’ and therelated ‘manpower policy employability’focused on identifying and measuring the dis-tance between individual characteristics andthe demands of work in the labour market.‘Flow employability’, limited almost entirelyto the French policy literature, offered aradical alternative, focusing on the demandside of the labour market, macro-level econo-mic change and (crucially) the absorption rateof the economy.

Gazier acknowledges that these versions ofemployability have now largely given way toa third wave incorporating three new formu-lations of the concept, originating in the1980s and developed in the 1990s: theoutcome-based ‘labour market performanceemployability’; ‘initiative employability’, withits focus on individual responsibility; and‘interactive employability’, which “maintainsthe focus on individual adaptation, but intro-duces a collective/interactive priority” (Gazier1998a, p. 300). Gazier concludes that whileearlier versions of the concept of employabilityhave fallen away, having been exposed as toostatic and one-sided, ‘labour market perform-ance employability’ remains a basic compo-nent of policy evaluation (although, notably,it is not explicitly attached to any moregeneral view of employability), while ‘initiat-ive employability’ has retained a limited rolein HRD thinking.


Indeed, human resource development lit-erature has continued to use employability asan important explanatory and descriptiveconcept, with employer–employee relationsno longer being seen as being based on the tra-ditional model of reciprocal loyalty (Rajan,1997; Ellig, 1998; Baruch, 2001). Instead,they involve a form of personal, psychologicalcontract from which the individual seeks: asense of balance between personal time andwork; a form of work organisation thatallows autonomy to concentrate on specifi-cally defined objectives; and, personal devel-opment made possible through continuouslearning that adds to individual employability.From a business perspective, the promotion ofemployability both within and beyond theorganisation has therefore become increas-ingly viewed as the key to developing a ‘flex-ible and adaptable’ workforce (CBI, 1999).Similarly, the UK government has recognisedthat an individual’s employment securityincreasingly depends not upon attachment toa single employer, but on their having skillsthat will attract a range of employers (DfEE,1997c).

Finally, Gazier suggests that a consensushas gradually emerged around the concept of‘interactive employability’ as a defining ideain labour market policy, reflecting an accep-tance that employability is about overcominga broad array of barriers to work faced by indi-viduals and that employability policies shouldtherefore focus not just on individuals.However, as we argue below, there is evi-dence that the current application of theconcept of employability, at least withinlabour market policy, often, but not exclu-sively, leans heavily upon its individual-centred, supply-side components.

4. The Rise of the Concept ofEmployability

We have seen that the concept of employabi-lity has been used in various contexts andformats over a century. In the past decade orso, factors that have given increased impetusto the use of the concept of employability

have included: its potential role in tacklingthe social inclusion of disadvantaged groups;a reaction to the consequences of highlevels of the long-term unemployed and inac-tivity; and the trend towards new types ofrelationships between employers and employ-ees. First, the increasing importance ofemployability in labour market policy can bepartly sourced to an “emphasis on skills-based solutions to economic competition andwork-based solutions to social deprivation”(Hillage and Pollard, 1998, p. 4). Within thiscontext, the drive for employability is morethan a means of offering workers the opportu-nity to develop flexible skills as an alternativeto security of tenure. Rather, the developmentof individuals’ employability is viewed as acrucial step towards improving access toemployment (particularly for disadvantagedgroups) and therefore a necessary elementwithin strategies seeking to address unem-ployment and social exclusion.

However, the emphasis on the skills of indi-viduals implicit within much of the labourmarket policy literature has raised concernsthat the ‘interactive’ elements of the conceptof employability have been lost amongst awelter of discussions centring on how best toactivate and ‘up-skill’ the unemployed andother disadvantaged groups. While Gazier(2001) and others suggest that employabilityis now commonly understood as involvingan interaction between the individual andother actors and conditions in the labourmarket, the policy debate and the content oflabour market strategies have often focusedon individual-centred, supply-side solutions.This supply-side policy orthodoxy has antece-dents in both economic and social theory,related to responses to economic instabilityand labour market change, and attempts tore-establish the balance between the rightsand responsibilities of individuals withinWestern welfare states. These issues are dis-cussed below, with particular reference toUK labour market policy (although, as notedabove, they are of similar importance withinthe EU and international policy context).However, most local strategies (as opposedto specific policies within them) appear to


consider both demand and supply factors,although the two may not necessarily bewell integrated.

There is little doubt that structural shiftshave created mismatches between laboursupply and demand—in sectoral terms, therehas been a shift in the UK, as elsewhere,towards various service industries. This hasresulted in changing skills needs (with ‘softskills’, such as interpersonal and communi-cation skills increasingly valued (see, forexample, Belt and Richardson, 2005), butalso a shift towards part-time and more flexiblework practices. In occupational terms, therehas been a shift towards non-manual work ingeneral and knowledge work (requiringhigher level skills and qualifications) in par-ticular. Those without the skills to adapt tothese changes are often faced with the choiceof long-term unemployment or low-paid,unstable work. That the policy response tothese problems has focused on the individualaspects of employability and has particularlytargeted the long-term unemployed, reflects:first, a belief that measures to ‘up-skill’ andactivate unemployed people will have positiveimpacts in terms of labour market partici-pation, economic competitiveness and pro-ductivity; and, secondly, that long-termunemployment specifically is a crucial barrierto increased participation in the economy andwider society, and so to the realisation ofthese associated macro-economic benefits.

The UK government has explicitly iden-tified concerns over structural unemploymentand the impact of poor basic skills attainmenton national productivity as informing itsemployability policy agenda (DWP, 2002).Although delivering ‘employment opportu-nity for all’ is seen by government ministersas an important element in social inclusionand poverty reduction, this egalitarian aspectof the employability agenda is consistentlylinked to broader economic concerns, includ-ing improved productivity and the control ofwage inflation. As the then Secretary ofState for Education and Employment noted

The employability agenda is about chan-ging the culture—helping people to gain

skills and qualifications they need to workin a flexible labour market . . . If we canincrease the numbers in work and improvethe chances of work for the most disadvan-taged, then more vacancies will turn intojobs rather than bottlenecks, skillsshortages and inflationary pressures (Blun-kett, 1999).

Thus, it has been argued that the Labour Partyreplaced its ‘historic’ commitment to fullemployment with a promise of ‘full employ-ability’ (Finn, 2000)—equality of outcome isless the objective than equality of opportunity(Lister, 2001). The objective of the employ-ability agenda as formulated here is the cre-ation of a higher-skilled labour force and amore inclusive and competitive active labourmarket, leading to the combined benefits ofsocial inclusion on the one hand, and down-ward pressures on wage inflation andimproved productivity and competitivenesson the other. Philpott (1998, 1999) suggeststhat this inevitably leads to a two-partapproach to employability policy—one focus-ing on activation and labour market attach-ment (or what Philpott calls ‘access’) andthe other focusing on ‘up-skilling’ the labourforce through employability training and life-long learning (or ‘performance ability’).

As suggested above, a crucial elementinforming labour market policy in the UKrefers to the particular importance attachedto tackling long-term unemployment. Labourmarket economists have successfully arguedthat duration dependency—the increased like-lihood of continued unemployment amongstthe long-term jobless due to the deteriorationof skills, work habits and commitment overtime—has a major role to play in explaininghigh levels of structural unemployment (Blan-chard and Summers, 1987; Layard et al.,1991; Layard, 1997; Abbring et al., 2001).This ‘withering flowers’ argument leads tothe logical conclusion that effective activelabour market programmes, aimed at activa-ting and improving the skills of the long-term unemployed, have the potential both toimpact positively on the employability of indi-vidual clients and permanently to ratchet


down the rate of unemployment in the widereconomy.

A second major strand of thinking inform-ing current policies on employability (in theUK and elsewhere) reflects both a reactionto the social consequences of high levels oflong-term unemployment, concern at increas-ing inactivity rates and an attempt to curtailrising social expenditure directed towardswelfare recipients of working age. It isargued that policies to enhance the employ-ability of unemployed groups (using a combi-nation of ‘access’ and ‘performance ability’measures) are required in order to re-establishthe balance between the right to financialsupport through the social security systemand the responsibilities of unemployedwelfare claimants.

The theoretical bases for this approach havebeen cited as, amongst others: the ‘underclass’thesis popularised by social theorists duringthe 1980s and 1990s (see for exampleMurray, 1990); and the alternative visions ofcentral European Christian Socialism andsocial communitarianism (see for exampleEtzoni, 1993). What is clear is that, as withthe duration dependency thesis in economicpolicy, there is a renewed acceptance insocial policy circles that responses to unem-ployment must focus on the attributes andresponsibilities of the individual. Indeed,with the introduction of major active labourmarket policies such as the New Deal, theUK has seen a shift towards ‘a work-focusedwelfare state’ (Evans, 2001) where labourmarket participation is arguably viewed asthe ultimate solution to social and economicexclusion (Powell, 2000). The objective ofthe government is to provide ‘work for thosewho can and security for those who cannot’,by ‘rebuilding the welfare state aroundwork’ (DSS, 1998). From the government’sperspective, ‘work is the best form ofwelfare’ (DfEE, 2001) and “the best anti-poverty, anti-crime and pro-family policy yetinvented” (Labour Party, 2001, p. 24).

The recent development of employability-focused welfare to work policies in responseto this agenda has been supported by thosewho argue that client-centred training

programmes, even if compulsory, mark a con-siderable advance on the approach of govern-ment policy during the 1980s and early 1990s,which included using benefit cuts and anincreasingly stringent job-seeking regime inan attempt to force unemployed people toenter low-paid work (White, 2000; Lindsay,2001). Furthermore, the development ofpolicies designed to ‘make work pay’, suchas the 2003 Child Tax Credit and WorkingTax Credit reforms, arguably representan acknowledgement by government of theneed for additional financial support forthose making the transition from welfare towork (Bryson, 2003).

Nevertheless, there remain considerableconcerns regarding the employability agendaas currently formulated within labour marketpolicy in the UK and elsewhere. Peck andTheodore (2000, p. 729) suggest that, whilethe concept of employability may seem rela-tively new, “the kind of supply side funda-mentalism that it signifies most certainly isnot”. Similarly, Serrano Pascual (2001a,2001b) argues that the concept of employabi-lity, as understood within the EuropeanEmployment Strategy and national welfareto work policies, evokes a ‘traditional’ reac-tionary understanding of unemployment,which seeks to blame the jobless individual’spredicament upon his or her inadequacies,rather than acknowledging a lack of opportu-nity within the labour market.

The supply-side orthodoxy that informsmost current approaches to employability pol-icies at the UK and EU levels has been chal-lenged by those who question the extent towhich labour market inclusion and socialinclusion can be equated. Cook et al. (2001)argue that the preponderance of low-paid,casualised work within the UK economymeans that work-first approaches have thepotential to accentuate rather than mitigatethe social exclusion. There is also evidencethat current supply-side initiatives have notbeen effective in addressing the needs ofpeople with multiple or severe disadvantages(Millar, 2000). Clearly, ‘one size fits all’employability programmes which emphasisea work-first, labour market attachment


approach cannot be expected to assist allpeople facing severe health, personal orsocial problems that require interventionsthat are personalised, intensive, flexible and(if necessary) long-term (Lakey et al., 2001).It has also been argued that the situation ofthese individuals is not assisted by “the cor-rosive effects of an ideological ethos thatencourages people with multiple needs andproblems to blame themselves for theirfailure in the labour market” (Dean et al.,2003, p. 24).

The assumptions underlying the currentemployability policy agenda have facedfurther challenges, questioning the extent towhich the ‘long-term unemploymentproblem’ is independent of general levels ofunemployment with the economy (Machinand Manning, 1999; Webster, 2000) and theneed to address problems of demand in locallabour markets. From this perspective,welfare to work initiatives which focus onimproving the individual aspects of employ-ability fail to acknowledge the strong linkbetween weak labour demand and high‘welfare usage’ in disadvantaged commu-nities (Peck, 2001). The ‘jobs gap’ in manyof Britain’s cities (in a large part a result ofthe restructuring of manufacturing industries)has meant that employability-focused pro-grammes have encountered far larger clientgroups in these areas and have predictablystruggled to match the results achieved inmore affluent, ‘job-rich’ areas (Turok andEdge, 1999; Martin et al., 2003). In moregeneral terms, labour market analysts haveargued that a purely supply-side focus failsto acknowledge the impact of employers’attitudes and the nature of contracts andconditions (such as shift patterns, wages,location) on the ability of job seekers topursue certain opportunities (Adams et al.,2000, 2002).

What Gazier (1998b, 2001) describes as the‘interactive’ formulation of the concept ofemployability has in reality been adapted bypolicy-makers and labour economists tobecome a buzzword for supply-side labourmarket strategies (Peck and Theodore,2000). The focus is indeed on the interaction

of the individual with the labour market,but the ‘problem’ is often seen as restingwith the individual. Accordingly, ‘so-called’employability policies have too oftenfocused solely on activating the unemployedthrough a combination of compulsory trainingand job-seeking activities. That the success ofthese policies tends to differ significantlyacross regions and labour markets points to afundamental weakness—that the concept ofemployability as currently formulated withinmany activation policies fails to acknowledgethe importance of the geography of labourmarkets, issues surrounding travel to work,employer attitudes and behaviour, demandwithin local economies and other ‘context’factors impacting on the experiences of jobseekers.

5. Supply-side and Broader Concepts ofEmployability

5.1 Employability and the ‘Supply-sideOrthodoxy’

It might therefore be argued that the conceptof employability—particularly as appliedwithin many supply-side labour market pol-icies—has been ‘hollowed out’ in manycurrent theoretical and policy discussions. Inmany cases, the interactivity supposedly atthe centre of the concept appears to havebeen replaced by a singular focus on the indi-vidual and what might be termed their‘employability skills’. The employabilityskills or individual assets possessed byworkers and job seekers, and the extent towhich these tie in with the immediate needsof employers, have come to define manypolicy-makers’ identification of skills gapsand understanding of the concept of employ-ability. Lister (2001) characterises thecurrent government’s approach as concernedwith the supply side of ‘employability’rather than the demand side of ‘employment’.Similarly, for Haughton et al.

[The current government’s] rendering of theemployability agenda taps into the orthodoxstrain of economic thinking which has itthat both the underlying causes of, and the


appropriate remedies to, unemploymentessentially lie on the supply-side of thelabour market; that the unemployed shouldbe induced to price themselves back intowork; that the government has neither theresponsibility nor the capability to createjobs, but instead should direct its energiesto the supply-side of the labour market(Haughton et al., 2000, p. 670).

In local labour markets, the issues associatedwith labour demand are generally significant(both in terms of the opportunities that existand the competition for jobs). Peck and Theo-dore argue that

employability-based approaches, whichlocate both the problems and the solutionsin labour market policy on the supply-sideof the economy, are not sufficient to thetask of tackling unemployment, socialexclusion and economic inequality (Peckand Theodore, 2000, p. 731).

As the previous discussion illustrates, theconcept of employability pre-dates currentdefinitions linked to neo-liberal and/or‘Third Way’ labour market policies. What isimportant is the substance of the concept,and if employability is fundamentally about‘the character or quality of being employable’then there clearly must be a role for individualcharacteristics, personal circumstances,labour market and other external factors inexplanations of the responses of employedor unemployed people to potential employ-ment opportunities.

Many researchers who have sought to usethe concept of employability as a means ofanalysing barriers to work amongst the unem-ployed have themselves stressed the need toavoid an approach that involves ‘blaming thevictim’, or policies that offer solely supply-side solutions (see Hillage and Pollard,1998; Kleinman et al., 1998; Evans et al.,1999). Kleinman and West (1998) acceptthat attempts to address employability withreference to supply-side measures alone riskbeing ‘swamped’ by rising levels of generalunemployment in times of economic reces-sion. The ‘lack of employability’ is thus

viewed as a complex problem, rather than asimple failure with a simple remedy

It is the outcome of a complex of differentfactors, located in the labour market, inschools, in the recruitment procedures ofbusinesses and in the economic policiesimplemented by government (Kleinmanand West, 1998, p. 174).

The argument that long-term unemployedpeople face an ‘employability gap’ involvinga complex combination of barriers to workhas been used to advocate innovativesupply-side solutions tailored to local labourdemand (McQuaid and Lindsay, 2002) butalso deployed to inform critiques of current,work-first labour market policies (Lindsay,2002). Furthermore, the same analytical fra-mework has been used to examine the barriersto work faced by job seekers in rural areas,with the effect of drawing attention todemand-side issues and problems of geo-graphical remoteness (Lindsay et al., 2003).Employability, it is argued, should be under-stood as being derived from, and affectedby, individual characteristics and circum-stances and broader, external (social, insti-tutional and economic) factors that influencea person’s ability to get a job. The nextsection discusses a broad model of employ-ability and the implications for policy.

5.2 Broad Approaches to Employability

Labour market and policy analysts concernedwith arriving at an understanding of employ-ability that is holistic, and so offers a realisticdescription of the factors affecting individ-uals’ journeys in the labour market, havetherefore sought to define the concept in aformat that accounts for the full range of per-sonal and external barriers impacting on theemployability of workers and job seekers.

To take an example, a person may not beable to get or take a job due to: personalfactors such as a lack of suitable skills; and/or the lack of institutional infrastructure suchas suitable childcare or transport in theirarea; and/or labour demand factors involvingemployer preferences (such as only shift


work being available, or discrimination).Hence, each of these, and other, factors mayhave singly or jointly a profound impact on aperson’s employability—i.e. their ability togain employment or move to a more suitablejob. Such a broad approach to employability(of unemployed people or those in work)allows us to identify the real key interrelatedbarriers that actually prevent someonegetting a new job, rather than merely identi-fying a subset, such as their ‘employabilityskills’ which may or may not be the actualmain barrier. To elaborate one example, ifemployers in an area practise discrimination(based, for instance, on area of residence,gender, ethnicity or age), then a person whomay have all the required employabilityskills and attributes will still not get employ-ment if they belong to the discriminatedgroup.

Given the increasing acceptance that dis-cussions of employability cannot be limitedto the orthodoxies of solely supply-side anddemand-side economic theory, recent effortsto arrive at a clearer definition of theconcept have emphasised the need to under-stand the interaction of individual and externalfactors affecting the individual’s ability tooperate effectively within the labour market.The focus of such analyses is on ‘interactive’employability in its truest sense—the dynamicinteraction of individual attributes, personalcircumstances, labour market conditions andother ‘context’ factors.

To this end, Evans et al. (1999) suggest adivision of employability into supply-sideand demand-side elements (described as‘employability components’ and ‘externalfactors’). Employability components areidentified as including

– the extent of the individual’s transferableskills;

– the level of personal motivation to seekwork;

– the extent of the individual’s ‘mobility’ inseeking work;

– access to information and support networks;– and the extent and nature of other personal

barriers to work.

External factors include

– the attitudes of employers towards theunemployed;

– the supply and quality of training and edu-cation;

– the availability of other assistance for disad-vantaged job seekers;

– the extent to which the tax-benefits systemsuccessfully eliminates benefit traps;

– and (most importantly) the supply of appro-priate jobs in the local economy.

Similarly, Kleinman et al. (1998) discuss arange of ‘micro’ and ‘macro’ factors thatdefine the detail of each side of the supply-side–demand-side equation. In an attempt toarrive at a definition of employability thatwould provide a ‘framework for policy analy-sis’ and a means of understanding the com-plexities of the barriers to work faced byindividuals, Hillage and Pollard (1998) havedrawn upon many themes from the existingliterature. Their framework for employabilityseeks to highlight a complex interaction ofdifferent components, namely

–Employability assets: including baselineassets, such as basic skills and essentialpersonal attributes (for example, reliabilityand honesty); intermediate assets, such asjob-specific, generic and ‘key’ skills (e.g. com-munication and problem solving); and high-level assets, such as those skills that contributeto organisational performance (for example,team work and commercial awareness).

–Presentation: defined as the ability to securean appointment to an appropriate positionthrough the demonstration of employabilityassets (for example, through the competentcompletion of a curriculum vitae or appli-cation form, or participation in an interview).

–Deployment: referring to a range of abilitiesincluding career management skills (forexample, awareness of one’s own abilitiesand limitations, awareness of opportunitiesin the labour market, and decision-makingand transitional skills) and job-search skills.

–Context factors, or the interaction ofpersonal circumstances and the labourmarket: Hillage and Pollard accept that the


individual’s ability to realise the assets andskills discussed above will to some extentdepend upon external socioeconomicfactors, personal circumstances and therelationship between the two. External con-ditions such as local labour market demandand employer attitudes will impact uponthe availability of suitable opportunities,while personal circumstances will affectthe ability of individuals to seek andbenefit from opportunities.

The Hillage–Pollard employability frame-work, although perhaps the most thorough todate, hints at a continued emphasis on thesupply side, at least in its organisation(Lindsay et al., 2003). Three of Hillageand Pollard’s key components of employabil-ity (assets, deployment and presentation)operate at the individual level, while virtuallyeverything outside the individual’s immediatecontrol is collapsed into a single category of‘context factors’. While there is clearlyvalue in acknowledging that context doesnot merely refer to labour market conditions,but also involves a range of other externalfactors, there may be more effective ways ofconceptualising and differentiating betweenpersonal circumstances and institutional,infrastructural and labour market barriers.The next section builds upon this to providea broad employability framework.

6. Towards a Broad Model ofEmployability

Following from the above section, Table 1illustrates our own re-ordered ‘holistic’ frame-work of employability. It has three main inter-related components, or sets of factors, thatinfluence a person’s employability: individualfactors; personal circumstances; and externalfactors. The examples here and in Table 1are not exhaustive. Some examples of policiesrelated to each component are brieflydiscussed in this section. Of fundamentalimportance are the interactions between eachof the components. For instance, employersmay be willing to accept someone under oneset of circumstances (for example, during alabour shortage), but may not consider the

same individual to have the minimum necess-ary skills, etc. under different circumstances(for example, when there is a large supply oflabour or when the firm does not have anypressing orders to fulfil). Even at a specifictime and place, if demand changes (forexample, an employer changes their childcareor job advertising policies) then this mayresult in new people seeking and gettingemployment with them. In this case, the indi-vidual has not changed their ‘narrow’ employ-ability in terms of employability skills andattitudes, but their ability to take up workwith the employer (and their ‘broad’ employ-ability) has.

6.1 Individual Factors

The component covering ‘Individual factors’involves, first, a person’s ‘employabilityskills and attributes’. Employability skillsand attributes can be seen as broadly coveringthe overlapping: essential attributes (basicsocial skills, reliability, etc.); personal compe-tencies (diligence, motivation, confidence,etc.); basic transferable skills (includingliteracy and numeracy); key transferableskills (problem-solving, communication,adaptability, work-process management,team-working skills); high-level transferableskills (including self-management, commer-cial awareness, possession of highly transfer-able skills); qualifications and educationalattainment; work knowledge-base (includingwork experience and occupational skills);and labour market attachment (current unem-ployment/employment duration, work history,etc.).

These ‘employability skills and attributes’cover many of the main aspects of the‘narrow’ concept of employability. Also,there are some parallels between the categor-isation of skills and attributes suggested hereand human capital theory (see Becker, 1975)and wider discussions of skills acquisitionand intelligence (see Gardner, 1999).1 Thesefactors should not be considered as forminga hierarchy, as the nature and importance ofdifferent factors will change with circum-stances and in many cases these factors


Table 1. An employability framework (with examples)

Individual factors Personal circumstances External factors

† Employability skills andattributesEssential attributesBasic social skills; honestyand integrity; basic personalpresentation; reliability;willingness to work;understanding of actions andconsequences; positiveattitude to work;responsibility; self-disciplinePersonal competenciesProactivity; diligence; self-motivation; judgement;initiative; assertiveness;confidence; actautonomouslyBasic transferable skillsProse and document literacy;writing; numeracy; verbalpresentationKey transferable skillsReasoning; problem-solving; adaptability;work-process management;team working; personal taskand time management;functional mobility; basicICT skills; basicinterpersonal andcommunication skills;emotional and aestheticcustomer service skillsHigh level transferable skillsTeam working; businessthinking; commercialawareness; continuouslearning; vision; job-specificskills; enterprise skillsQualificationsFormal academic andvocational qualifications;job-specific qualificationsWork knowledge baseWork experience; generalwork skills and personalaptitudes; commonly valuedtransferable skills (such asdriving); occupationalspecific skillsLabour market attachmentCurrent unemployment/employment duration;

† Household circumstancesDirect caringresponsibilitiesCaring for children, elderlyrelatives, etc.Other family and caringresponsibilitiesFinancial commitments tochildren or other familymembers outside theindividual’s household;emotional and/or timecommitments to familymembers or othersOther householdcircumstancesThe ability to access safe,secure, affordable andappropriate housing

† Work cultureThe existence of a culture inwhich work is encouragedand supported within thefamily, among peers or otherpersonal relationships andthe wider community

† Access to resourcesAccess to transportAccess to own or readilyavailable private transport;ability to walk appropriatedistancesAccess to financial capitalLevel of household income;extent and duration of anyfinancial hardship; access toformal and informal sourcesof financial support;management of income anddebtAccess to social capitalAccess to personal andfamily support networks;access to formal andinformal community supportnetworks; number, range andstatus of informal socialnetwork contacts

† Demand factorsLabour market factorsLevel of local and regionalor other demand; natureand changes of local andregional demand (requiredskill levels; occupationalstructure of vacancies;sectors where demand isconcentrated); location,centrality/remoteness oflocal labour markets inrelation to centres ofindustry/employment; levelof competition for jobs;actions of employers’competitors; changingcustomer preferences, etc.Macroeconomic factorsMacroeconomic stability;medium- to long-termbusiness confidence; leveland nature of labour demandwithin the national economyVacancy characteristicsRemuneration; conditionsof work; working hours andprevalence of shift work;opportunities forprogression; extent ofpart-time, temporary andcasual work; availabilityof ‘entry-level’ positionsRecruitment factorsEmployers’ formalrecruitment and selectionprocedures; employers’general selection preferences(for example, for recentexperience); employers’search channels (methodsof searching for staff whenrecruiting); discrimination(for example, on the basisof age, gender, race, areaof residence, disability,unemployment duration);form and extent ofemployers’ use of informalnetworks; demanding onlyappropriate qualifications orcredentials

(Table continued)


interact—for instance, a qualification such asa degree usually needs to be supplementedby transferable skills or social skills in orderto gain employment (Holmes, 2001). Simi-larly, interpersonal, ‘emotional’ and ‘aes-thetic’ skills are increasingly demanded bymany employers, particularly where there isa direct interface with customers (Witzet al., 2003; Glomb and Tews, 2004). Enter-prise skills (such as the ability to searchsystematically for and take opportunities,creativity, negotiating skills, etc.) have alsoemerged as of greater importance in recentyears, as the adaptability of organisations,

and their employees, has become more signifi-cant (see—for example, Drucker, 1985; Gibb,1993; McQuaid, 2002; Hartshorn and Sear,2005).

Recent employability-raising policies in theUK (with the New Deal at their centre) haveadopted fairly ‘standard’ labour marketapproaches, based around training and basicskills assistance, although work placementand intermediate labour market programmeshave gradually grown in importance (Finn,2003; Fletcher, 2004). The emphasis here ison addressing basic gaps in the skills-setsand attributes listed above, while particularly

Table 1. Continued

Individual factors Personal circumstances External factors

number and length of spells ofunemployment/inactivity;‘balance’ of work history

† Demographic characteristicsAge, gender, etc.

† Health and well-beingHealthCurrent physical health;current mental health; medicalhistory; psychological well-beingDisabilityNature and extent of: physicaldisability; mental disability;learning disability

† Job seekingEffective use of formal searchservices/information resources(including ICT); awarenessand effective use of informalsocial networks; ability tocomplete CVs/applicationforms; interview skills/presentation; access toreferences; awareness ofstrengths and weaknesses;awareness of location and typeof opportunities in the labourmarket; realistic approach tojob targeting

† Adaptability and mobilityGeographical mobility; wageflexibility and reservationwage; occupational flexibility(working hours, occupations,sectors)

† Enabling support factorsEmployment policy factorsAccessibility of publicservices and job-matchingtechnology (such as jobsearch/counselling);penetration of publicservices (for example, useand credibility amongemployers/job seekers);incentives within tax-benefits system; existence of‘welfare to work’/activationand pressure to accept jobs;accessibility and limitationson training; extent of local/regional developmentpolicies; measures to easethe school–work transitionand address employabilityissues at school anduniversityOther enabling policyfactorsAccessibility andaffordability of publictransport, child care andother support services


emphasising labour market attachment. Thetargeting of these interventions on long-termunemployed people reflects the manner inwhich UK government policy has beeninformed by the argument that the durationstructure of unemployment is the main deter-minant of the competitiveness of unemployedjob seekers (see above, and Boeri et al., 2000;Robson, 2001).

‘Demographic characteristics’ include fac-tors such as: age, gender, ethnicity etc. Thesemay influence individuals’ motivations orability to carry out certain jobs.

‘Health and well-being’ factors include:health (physical and mental health, medicalhistory, and physical ability to do differentjobs, some of which may be age-related) anddisability (including: the nature and extentof: physical disability; mental disability;learning disability). Within the UK policycontext, dealing with long-term sicknessamong working-age men has become animportant priority, although the extent towhich rising levels of incapacity reflect dete-riorating health, rather than ‘hidden unem-ployment’ remains a matter of debate(Nickell and Quintini, 2002). Policies suchas the New Deal for Disabled People havesought to provide targeted job-matchingsupport for those facing severe physical andother disabilities. While concerns have beenraised regarding the policy’s potential toforce vulnerable groups into unsuitable work(Roulstone, 2000), there is also some evidenceof positive outcomes for disabled participantswho have been benefited from a return towork in environments providing ‘supportedemployment’ (Heenan, 2002).

‘Job seeking’ refers to how well a personidentifies and searches for a job, including:the effective use of formal search services/information resources; the use of appropriatetechnologies; awareness and effective use ofinformal social networks; ability to completecurriculum vitae and application forms, inter-view skills/presentation; labour market aware-ness including the appropriateness of the typesof jobs sought; and the amount, efficiency andeffectiveness of job-search effort. There is aconsiderable body of literature on job-search

strategies, and the importance of whichsearch channels are used, with what intensityand with what effectiveness (Holzer, 1988;Budd et al., 1998; Wanberg et al., 1999;Boheim and Taylor, 2001).

Job-search support is a major component ofnational employment policies (through Job-centre Plus and Careers Service provision)and local policies, including ICT-based ser-vices (McQuaid et al., 2003). Again, the pro-motion of effective job seeking provides animportant focus for national welfare to workprogrammes such as the New Deal. Whilethe efficiency of formal services provided bystate agencies has been questioned (Osberg,1993), it has been demonstrated that the struc-tured job-search assistance provided via theUK Jobcentre network can positively impacton job entry rates (Gregg and Wandsworth,1996; Thomas, 1997). As with the otherpolicy mechanisms discussed above, thereremain concerns that a ‘work first’ approachwill see job seekers pushed into work thatcannot be sustained in the longer term(Daguerre, 2004). Nevertheless, the selectionof effective job-search channels remains akey individual factor impacting on employabil-ity and therefore an appropriate priority forlabour market policy (McQuaid et al., 2004).

Finally, ‘adaptability and mobility’ refers to:the job seeker’s awareness of his or her ownstrengths and weaknesses; a realistic approachto job targeting; geographical mobility; wageflexibility and reservation wage; and occu-pational flexibility, including willingness todo shift work or flexible hours and to considerjobs across a range of sectors. There is a wealthof research pointing to the importance ofwage flexibility to individuals’ employability(see for example, Layard et al., 1994; Aberg,2001; Bloeman and Stancanelli, 2001). How-ever, there has been an increasing emphasison broader measures of adaptability in therecent employability literature. In particular,the difficulties faced by older workers in adapt-ing to the decline of ‘traditional’ sectors hasbeen noted. Many older, male job seekers con-tinue to look for work in these declining sectors(McQuaid and Lindsay, 2002) and are reluc-tant even to consider occupations in rapidly


expanding areas of the service economy(Lindsay and McQuaid, 2004).

The adaptability of people to take up joboffers or search more widely can be influencedby deterrent or ‘push’ policies. These seek tomake life on benefits less attractive for theunemployed and encourage them to find workwhere it is available (Nickell, 1998; Layard,2000). However, a number of alternative‘pull’ mechanisms can also be deployed bygovernment. In the UK, recent Tax Creditreforms and the establishment of a NationalMinimum Wage have enabled job seekers todemonstrate greater flexibility in their wagedemands (McLaughlin et al., 2001; Adam-Smith et al., 2003). Furthermore, while regis-tered job seekers are required to demonstratethat they are ‘actively seeking work’ across arange of sectors, innovative local initiativeshave been developed to assist older workersin the transition to work in unfamiliar sectorssuch as retail (Nickson et al., 2003).

6.2 Personal Circumstances

The second component, ‘Personal circum-stances’, includes a range of socioeconomiccontextual factors related to individuals’social and household circumstances. Thesemay affect the ability, willingness or socialpressure for someone to take up an employ-ment opportunity. Household circumstancescan be divided into: direct caring responsibil-ities (for example, for children or elderly rela-tives); other family and caring responsibilities(including financial commitments to children,emotional and/or time commitments to familymembers); and other household circumstances(such as the ability to access appropriatehousing). An additional element of personalcircumstances, ‘work culture’, refers to thewider social influences impacting on the indi-vidual’s attitudes and aspirations, such as theexistence of a culture in which work is encour-aged and supported within the family, amongpeers and the wider community.

In terms of recent policy, the introductionof the Childcare Tax Credit in the UK marksa clear attempt to address the barriers towork faced by job seekers with caring

responsibilities. The development of socialhousing policies in areas where home-owner-ship is unaffordable for many low-paidworkers represents a similar attempt torespond to personal, household circumstancesthat can act as a barrier to work. More contro-versial is the continued emphasis in thecurrent government statements on promotinga strong ‘work culture’ and challenging theperceived ‘culture of worklessness’ in somedisadvantaged areas (DWP, 2003). The ideaof an unemployed ‘underclass’ refusing workin favour of life on benefits was popularamong some social theorists during the 1980sand 1990s (see above). However, the declinein unemployment among even the most disad-vantaged groups as a result of sustained econ-omic recovery after the mid 1990s in theUK and elsewhere undermined the argumentthat there is a large identifiable underclass(Freeman, 2000). Nevertheless, the targetingof additional job-search and training supporton local authority wards with particularlyhigh long-term unemployment (piloted fromApril 2004 in the UK as ‘Working Neighbour-hoods’) may at least represent a concentrationof resources in those local labour marketsmost in need of assistance.

Next, there are factors related to ‘access toresources’ including: transport/mobility issues(such as access private transport, ability towalk appropriate distances to work); accessto financial capital (such as the level of house-hold income and access to formal and infor-mal sources of financial support); and accessto social capital (such as personal and familysupport networks, formal and informalcommunity support networks especiallythose relevant to job seeking). The latterconcept—social capital—has become thefocus of considerable interest in the job-search literature (Stoloff et al., 1999; Brownand Konrad, 2001; Chapple, 2002). Incertain local economies (such as rural areas),social networks can be particularly important(Hofferth and Iceland, 1998; Monk et al.,1999). In more general terms, holding alarge number of social ties (even if relativelyweak) to higher-status workers has beenshown to be associated with progression in


the labour market (Granovetter, 1974, 1982)and, in some cases, exits from unemployment(Levesque and White, 2001).

6.3 External Factors

Thirdly, ‘External factors’ include those influ-encing a person’s employability, such aslabour demand conditions and enablingsupport of employment-related public ser-vices. As discussed earlier, ‘demand factors’include: local labour market factors (such asthe level and nature of local and regional orother labour demand, location issues, centra-lity/remoteness of local labour markets inrelation to centres of industry/employment,levels of competition for jobs); macroeco-nomic factors (macroeconomic stability,level and nature of labour demand within thenational economy, etc.); vacancy character-istic factors (remuneration, conditions ofwork, working hours and prevalence of shiftwork, opportunities for progression, extentof part-time, temporary and casual work,availability of ‘entry-level’ positions if appro-priate, etc.); and recruitment factors (inclu-ding employers’ formal recruitment andselection procedure and general selection pre-ferences, employer discrimination, form andextent of employers’ use of informal net-works) (see Adams et al., 2000, for a widerdiscussion).

‘Enabling support factors’ for matchinglabour demand and supply include: employ-ment policy factors (accessibility of publicservices and job-matching technologies,including information and communicationtechnologies, information and job search/counselling, use and credibility amongemployers and job seekers of public services,incentives within tax-benefits system,measures to ease the school–work transition);and other policy factors that help enablepeople to get a job (such as the accessibilityand affordability of public transport or child-care). One example of local childcaresupport is the ‘Working for Families’ policyin Scotland which has a £20 million fund tohelp improve disadvantaged parents’ employ-ability through providing flexible childcare

and other assistance to those moving fromunemployment towards work.

Clearly, demand factors and enablingsupport factors are linked—labour marketdemand may be influenced by national pol-icies concerning macro-economic growthand stability, anti-discrimination legislationand regional and local strategies to stimulatedemand via support for inward investmentand new firm development. Campbell (2000)also stresses the role that local labour marketpolicies can have in reducing long-term unem-ployment. Similarly, many of these policyresponses have been discussed above, high-lighting the extent to which individualfactors, personal circumstances and external(labour market and policy) factors are inher-ently linked. For example, the efficiency ofindividuals’ job-search strategies can only beunderstood with reference to employers’recruitment preferences and channels. Thisrelationship in turn operates within a set ofspecific labour market and policy contexts.

The framework discussed above sharessimilarities with those that have gone before.Perhaps its defining feature is the manner inwhich it seeks to clarify and acknowledgethe status of individual factors, which can beaddressed through standard supply-side pol-icies targeted at job seekers, from personal cir-cumstances that may require different policyinterventions or may inherently limit indivi-duals’ labour market participation. Both ofthese groups of factors are in turn distin-guished from employer-related, economic,institutional and labour market factors thatare clearly external to the individual. By re-ordering employability in this way the frame-work restates that it is not just individual,supply-side factors that require detaileddescription and analysis, but all aspects of theemployability equation, including demand.

7. Conclusions

This paper has analysed the concept ofemployability by discussing its importanceto local, national and international labourmarket policy, considering working definitionsof employability, tracing the historical


development of the concept and examininghow the concept is currently applied in UKlabour market policy.

It is important to recognise that employabil-ity implicitly assumes specific types ofdemand that may vary across space, timeand employers. Also, employers, potentialemployees and wider society can and dohave fundamentally different perspectives onemployability. Employability can be seen asreferring to the individual’s relationship witha single job (or ‘class of jobs’), so thatsomeone considered ‘employable’ for onejob might not be considered so for a differ-ent job. From an employer’s perspective,someone with appropriate employabilityskills and attributes may be ‘employable’,but this may be only the minimum criterionwhen considering candidates and no joboffer may be made. From the job seeker’s per-spective, a lack of availability of enablingsupport (such as transport to work) or contractterms (such as the requirement for shift work)may mean that a specific job is not acceptable.From a policy-maker’s perspective, the factthat the person does not take the job andremains unemployed suggests that (withinthe context of a specific vacancy or job role)the person is not ‘employable’.

In recent years, many, but not all, research-ers and policy-makers have used a ‘narrow’concept of employability focusing upon‘employability skills and attributes’, oftenresulting in purely supply-side ‘employability’policies. This paper presents a ‘broad’ frame-work of employability, which takes accountnot only of ‘individual factors’ (includingemployability skills and attributes and jobsearch), but also ‘personal circumstances’ and‘external factors’. Clearly, these factors havea close two-way interaction with each other.

Although the two perspectives are notmutually exclusive, there are at least twoways in which a ‘broad’ perspective can addto a ‘narrow’ concept of employability. First,the employability skills and attributes that anemployer may demand depend upon the chan-ging environment in which they operate, suchas changing customer preferences, the actionsof competitors and the state of the labour

market. In a ‘tight’ labour market, anemployer may accept (or find employable)someone whom they would not considerin a ‘looser’ labour market. Secondly, the‘narrow’ view focusing on an individual’sskills and attributes identifies importantaspects of the employability equation, butomits other important aspects. For instance,there may be circumstances where jobseekers with strong transferable skills andstrategic job seeking will still struggle tofind work—their actual ‘employability’limited by—for example, family and caringresponsibilities (which may also be a functionof a lack of appropriate childcare provisionand some employers’ reluctance to developfamily-friendly policies); problems in acces-sing transport and/or geographical remote-ness; the numbers and/or type of vacancieswithin local labour markets; and the attitudesor recruiting methods of employers.

All of these factors should be incorporatedwithin the concept of ‘employability’, if itrelates to the ability of an (employed or unem-ployed) individual to move into or withinemployment rather than primarily to theminimum skills and attitudes that an employerrequires of a job candidate.

A broad approach can help to move analysisand policy towards the identification of thefull range of factors affecting a person’s like-lihood of getting a new job and so provide aframework for richer labour market models.It may also assist analysts and policy-makersto move towards more sustainable, long-termlabour market strategies, by helping to ident-ify the range of labour market factors thatare, for example, stopping people movinginto suitable work, the necessary interventionsand their interconnections.

Furthermore, the long-term employabilityof job seekers and labour market programmeparticipants is unlikely to be improved bytraining schemes that only consider employ-ers’ demands for competencies specific totheir own immediate-term needs. Investmentin skills that are genuinely transferable andof long-term value to employers, employeesand other job seekers requires a substantialcommitment to training within and beyond


the workplace, and to the overcoming of themany other barriers to an individual’s employ-ability. Employers have a crucial role to playin the design and delivery of provision—demand-responsive employability program-mes and intermediate labour market pro-jects have proved highly effective, both inoffering training that is relevant and inproviding participants with positive andsustainable outcomes. However, there remainsa need for local and national policy-makersto ensure that the interests of all the keyinterest-groups—employers, job seekers andworkers—are addressed and that the fullrange of barriers to work and progressionis addressed in an integrated manner. Careneeds to be taken to distinguish the manydifferent causal implications of the manydifferent elements contained in a ‘broad’ (orindeed a ‘narrow’) approach to employability.

Returning, finally, to the theoretical debatesurrounding employability, there is a continu-ing need for researchers and policy analysts toinvestigate the full range of factors affectingthe ability of individuals to attain ‘the charac-ter or quality of being employable’. Employ-ability used as a buzzword for welfare towork strategies adds little to our understand-ing of the existing debate on supply-side anddemand-side explanations of labour marketdisadvantage. Employability deployed as abroad concept, enabling us to analyse anddescribe the multidimensional barriers towork or progression faced by many unem-ployed and employed people, offers an oppor-tunity to transcend the orthodoxies of thesupply-side versus demand-side debate, andarrive at explanations and policy solutionsthat reflect the multifaceted and complex com-bination of factors affecting the labour marketinteractions of those in and out of work.

Note

1. For instance, Gardner (1999) argues that thereare eight forms of intelligence (i.e. thecapacity to solve problems or to fashion pro-ducts that are valued in one or more culturalsetting) that are used concurrently and nor-mally complement each other as an individualsolves problems or develops a set of skills.

These are linguistic, logical-mathematicalintelligence, musical intelligence, bodily-kinesthetic (which may be of particular usefor some physically demanding jobs),spatial, interpersonal (for example, workingeffectively with others), intrapersonal (thecapacity to understand oneself, to appreciateone’s feelings, fears and motivations) and nat-uralist intelligence (the ability to discriminateamong living things as well as sensitivity toother features of the natural world).

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