The computer-based development of training manuals takes up most of their time. Both women feel they would be better employed working to support the training buddies and new starters on the shop floor:

I think we should be based on the shop floor, for easy access for the training buddies and anyone else. …I think it’s daunting that if you can’t do a job you don’t know who to ask about it.…I don’t think the operative would know where to work in a training manual, if they wanted to look anything up. And it’s a lot easier for me to go out on the line and show somebody how to do something then find it on a piece of paper, and say read through it.

The job description did not mention computer skills. Maureen has taught herself well to use the computer, and, through the union, enrolls in a funded computer course at a local college. She creates Power Point presentations ridiculing management actions and disseminates these to trusted co-workers; she changes files of instructions which she thinks are counter to the effective running of the shop floor; and she teaches her co-worker the computer skills she needs to keep her job.

Conclusion

This story is a story of training that could have benefited the whole company, including workers and management, going wrong because in the end, it was just “something to hang your coat on,” window dressing for the customers.

The boards were inaccessible to workers in terms of time and space, but also in terms of the way information was presented. Workers had issues with quality and training, but these issues were not rewarded, and so few made suggestions. While workers managed the paperwork, there were several instances of workers choosing not to complete or to complete differently from expectations in order to protect themselves or co-workers, or to make work more efficient. People were disillusioned with management doublespeak around quality and training, but didn’t speak up for fear of job loss. Mostly they supported each other to find other ways to get the job done and to maintain or improve their positions and training.

Workers in charge of training demonstrated that literacy is a social practice, but found their ability to use and develop literacies on the factory floor were limited by supervisors and line managers focused on production targets.

This research has important implications for literacy practitioners working in companies with shop floor workers. At face value, the fact that people could not/did not read graphs, did not complete forms or completed them “wrongly,” and didn’t use manuals, for instance, could lead a practitioner to believe that these people had literacy skills deficits. This research shows that it is essential that practitioners spend time talking with workers about their work (and what they can do), not just about their “literacy skills needs.” Without some picture of the issues on the factory floor for workers practising literacy, practitioners will at least get the “needs” wrong, and will at worst alienate the very people they are wanting to assist.