IER's Professor Anne Green and Dr Paul Sissons from Coventry University spoke at the Employability and Skills Wales Convention in Cardiff on 'Linking growth sectors and sustainable labour market outcomes: designing policy for progression'. Their presentation included data analysis from an ESRC-funded project with colleague Neil Lee (LSE) on 'Harnessing Growth Sectors for Poverty Reduction' and findings from an international literature review focusing on initiatives to foster progression in selected sectors, with a particular emphasis on promising approaches from the US.

Sissons, P., Green, A. and Lee, N. (2016). Supporting progression in growth sectors: A review of the international evidence. Cardiff: Public Policy Institute for Wales.

Professor Anne Green talks about the importance of in-work progression in a recent Manchester Policy Blog. Anne draws on evidence from her IER work to highlight the importance of employment initiatives to help people in-work move out of poverty. To conclude, Anne draws out a number of policy challenges for city-regions to consider.

An interim report on decent work has been published by Oxfam and the University of Scotland in collaboration with Warwick Institute for Employment Research. The report, co-authored by Sally Wright of IER, examines what low paid, low skilled workers in Scotland want from jobs. The report, What Makes For Decent Work?, can be freely downloaded.

IER is hosting an EPSRC funded Balance Network seminar on'Prolonging working life through ICT: the role of crowdsourcing'. The one day seminar will explore how crowdsourcing has changed the boundary between work and home, enabling older people to remain part of the labour force and perhaps achieve a new work-life balance. The interactive seminar will be held on 3 March at the University of Warwick. Click here to register your interest.

Key professions such as nursing, teaching and social work are losing thousands of potential recruits as student mothers drop out of higher education due to a lack of support from universities. New research led by IER's Dr Clare Lyonette is published today. The research, funded by the Nuffield Foundation, highlights the true scale of the pressures placed upon mothers who go to university and calls for more to be done to assist them. Read more about the project and download the reports here.