Health Care and Higher Education The Diary Approach forManagement Development

A project to determine employee development needs of Plymouth Polytechnic and Derriford Hospital NHS senior technicians revealed employer and employee variance in opinions over desired managerial competences. Job analysis through the use of time diaries permitted construction of a detailed description of current job roles for both organizations. This information was then used to research the views of senior technicians on how their performance could be enhanced through provision of an employee development programme. The study validated the capability of the time diary technique to generate detailed, quantitative information on job role activities. Variance in the training needs for the two organizations was identified. In the case of NHS technicians it was possible to define areas where provision of a new training scheme would be beneficial. Their counterparts in higher education revealed a much lower degree of interest in the provision of external assistance to develop further their managerial skills. Concludes that the Polytechnic would need to implement structural changes to the work environment before introducing any new training schemes for technical staff.