Roots of Vocational Development

This chapter refers to the formation of training occupations and the methods of occupational analysis and development that have found their way into the established procedures as prescribed by the German Vocational Training Act. Two very different orientations have shaped occupational research and development over the last 100 years. On the one hand, the development of industrial occupations on the basis of empirical occupational research is considered a foundation for occupational development and thus a prerequisite for the development of a vocational training system. On the other hand, skilled workers, who are to be qualified in the tradition of master craftsmanship, are seen as an obstacle to the introduction of scientific management, since Taylor’s decisive principle is: “The workshop is to be freed from all conceivable intellectual work. All work is to be united in one planning and work office” (Taylor, Die Betriebsleitung insbesondere der Werkstätten. Julius Springer, Berlin, 1914, 47). In the last three decades, the scientific occupational discussion has produced occupational research that has given occupational development a new quality. Guiding ideas and concepts such as design competence, open dynamic core occupation, exemplariness instead of specialization as well as domain-specific work process knowledge have triggered innovations in occupational development. Nevertheless, occupational research has only had a marginal impact on vocational education and training systems. Among other things, this has led to a recommendation by the labor ministers of the G20 countries to implement the quality of dual vocational education and training more intensively internationally.