“Sustaining Employability: the role of identity in understanding later-career learning”

This Advanced-Work-in-Progress paper investigates the learning of later-career managerial employees, employees who as knowledge workers are pivotal to organisational change. The paper has two aims. The first aim is to critically examine the potential of certain strands of identity theorising for better understanding learning among later-career managerial workers. Various strands of identity theorising are critically reviewed and a hybrid theoretical model developed from situated learning theory is proposed for understanding workplace learning and the obstacles to learning and organisational change. The second aim is to outline an empirical methodology and detail certain innovative research methods to be used in a forthcoming case-study inquiry in an economic sector exemplifying contemporary pressures for achieving change with an ageing workforce. It is concluded that better understanding the realities of later-career managers’ learning using close empirical investigation and carefully theorised interpretations are urgently required to support policy and action for sustaining employability and ensuring human capital formation.