ReWAGE is fortunate in having some of the UK’s foremost thinkers on its Expert Group, drawn from leading universities and research organisations from across the UK. Between them they have a huge breadth of knowledge, covering such subjects as the labour market, job quality, employment relations and the changing nature of work.

Today we are turning the spotlight onto ReWAGE expert Ewart Keep, emeritus chair in Education, Training and Skills at the Department of Education, University of Oxford.

Background:

Ewart has been at Oxford since 2013 and was one of the founders and a director of the Centre on Skills, Knowledge and Organisational Performance (SKOPE). Before working at Oxford, he spent 21 years in Warwick Business School, and then at the School of Social Sciences, Cardiff University.

Ewart has served on major committees of the Scottish Funding Council, Higher Education Funding Council for England, and the Higher Education Funding Council for Wales, as well as advising HM Treasury, DBIS, DfE, the No.10 Policy Unit, the Cabinet Office, the UK Commission on Employment and Skills, the Scottish, Welsh, New South Wales, Queensland and New Zealand governments, the NAO, the OECD, and various professional bodies and think tanks (including Demos and IPPR). He also acted as an advisor to a Government Office for Science (Foresight) project on adult learning and the changing labour market and was a member of the Greater London Authority’s task and finish group on the skills strategy for London and also the UK Government’s Skills and Productivity Board.

Area of expertise:

Ewart’s research interests include the links between skills demand, supply and utilisation, how work organisation and job design impact on skills utilisation, and how artificial intelligence and digitalisation is changing demand for skills.

Why Ewart became a ReWAGE expert:

Ewart joined ReWAGE because he wanted to try and persuade policy makers and other stakeholders that the UK needs a joined-up set of policies concerning the employment relationship and the workplace, such as are found in most other developed countries. Without this, the goals of improving productivity and skills utilisation will continue to fail.

What achievement makes Ewart most proud:

He is pleased to have fostered debate about the nature, shape and objectives of skills policy in the UK and elsewhere, and to have reminded policy makers that problems with the demand for and utilisation of skills are every bit as daunting as those concerning skills supply.

Current projects:

Ewart is currently part of a large Cardiff University project on the impact of digitalisation on employment, jobs and skills which is being conducted for the Singapore Government. He is also involved in a Nuffield Foundation-funded SKOPE Project on the evolution of tertiary education across the four UK nations. Much of the rest of his time is spent as a board member of the Scottish Funding Council, a board member of City of Glasgow College, a member of Oxfordshire Local Enterprise Partnership’s Skills Board and chairing a committee for the Education and Training Foundation. He has recently completed a project for the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development on ‘an industrial strategy for the everyday economy’.

Other interests: Gardening, DIY, reading ‘Golden Age’ detective fiction, volunteering for the National Trust and visiting preserved railways, historic houses, gardens and museums.

Recent journal articles

• Employers, the ghost at the feast
• Parallel lines or divergent trajectories? A response to the other contributions
• The case against education: why the education system is a waste of time and money
• Rethinking the race between education and technology

ReWAGE’s Expert Group is uniquely placed to offer the government informed practical advice and policy recommendations to support its strategic response to the recovery and renewal of work and employment in the UK as it tackles current challenges facing its productivity and prosperity.