Walker, Steve

Internet training in context

Abstract

Training can play an important role in influencing patterns of technology use, contributing to users' construction of understanding of the technology. The spread of the Internet has also seen a growth in training programmes, frequently aimed explicitly at broadening access and participation among populations who might otherwise be less likely to become Internet users. However, the nature of Internet training itself is rarely problematised. This paper draws on the evaluation of an EU-supported project (ETUE-net II) which promoted the use the Internet among European trade unionists. We compare the varying ways in which Internet training has been conceived and implemented by training managers in response to local contingencies. Case studies are presented, illustrating how the project training was conceived and implemented in trade union confederations in four countries. Structuration theory (Orlikowski xxxx; De Sanctis & Poole) is used to analyse the ways in which trainers have drawn on their existing understandings and shared norms, both of technology and its potential implications for trade unions, as well as available technological and organisational resources, to generate rather diverse patterns of training within the project. The paper concludes by identifying elements of wider social structure (for example, national levels of Internet use, organisational factors and approaches to trade union education) which have contributed to trainers' design of the training. Some potential implications for the design of Internet training programmes are considered.