Partnership‐based approaches to learning in the context of restructuring: Case studies from the European steel and metal sectors

The European steel and metal sectors have experienced processes of radical restructuring. Employers within the sector increasingly require employees to have a broader and deeper range of skills, although restructuring has also highlighted the need for workers to gain transferable skills in order to increase their employability. This paper, which draws on research conducted in seven European nations, describes how partnership‐based approaches to learning involving public, private and voluntary sector organisations have emerged in order to meet these needs. It argues that whileit may not be possible to develop a European model for partnership‐based approaches to learning, an examination of a number of particularly innovative and successful partnerships nevertheless facilitates the identification of the constituent elements of good practice with respect to partnership‐based approaches to learning, which may themselves have wider applications.