Institute for Employment Research » IER News & blogs (tag [future of work])

IER: still doing a good job in 2025

Fri, 19 Dec 2025 09:00:00 GMT

It’s been a good year for good jobs policy

IER was established 45 years ago with funding from the UK Government and what is now the European Commission. Its task then was to provide labour market forecasts to support policymaking. Although government emphasis on skills has remained constant, government interest in employment policy more broadly has waxed and waned over the years.

APPG on the Future of Work: AI, good jobs and regional growth

Tue, 16 Dec 2025 12:00:00 GMT

Professor Chris Warhurst, Director of IER, was invited to speak at the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on the Future of Work: AI, good jobs and regional growth. Along with a panel consisting of tech trade bodies, trade unions and community activists, he outlined the opportunities and challenges for employers and English Metropolitan Combined Authorities in boosting productivity through good work and digital technology in regional economies.

The Future of Work

Mon, 15 Dec 2025 12:00:00 GMT

As part of the ESRC Festival of Social Sciences, a panel of experts, including IER’s Prof Gill Dix, Dr Emily Erickson, Prof Trine Pernille Larsen and Dr Katharina Sarter, discussed the future of work. The panel shared thoughts on the present and potential futures of work in the face of digital technologies and AI, which have the potential to create and reinforce inequalities or reduce them. Creating and maintaining good, secure, and healthy work will remain a priority, given the rapidly changing context and the inevitable uncertainty that the future holds.

Image Credit: Social Sciences Connect Programme

Question Time: The Future of Work

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 10:30:00 GMT

Join us for a Question Time-style in-person event on 5 November to explore the future of work. Our experts from the Faculty of Social Sciences, including the IER, will answer your questions on all things work: What will be the impact of AI and digitalisation on the future of work? Will that future be one of good and healthy jobs for everyone? And will the future of work deliver greater productivity? The event is part of the ESRC Festival of Social Science 2025.

Please register here for the-in person event at the University of Warwick.

IER contributes to Bridges 5.0 conference on the future of work

Tue, 24 Jun 2025 11:00:00 GMT

Four colleagues from Warwick’s Institute for Employment Research (IER) attended the Bridges 5.0 “Advancing Industry 5.0” conference at the Irish College, Leuven, on 16–17 June 2025. The two-day event brought together researchers, policy makers and practitioners to explore the skills, voice and innovation challenges raised by Industry 5.0.

New blogs available at LMI for All

Thu, 27 Feb 2025 10:10:00 GMT

Dr Sangwoo Lee explores Understanding Society data to measure the multi-dimensional concept of job quality, and Graham Atwell revisits the implications of AI for the future of jobs.

The Future of Work and Industry 5.0

Wed, 29 Mar 2023 08:10:00 GMT

Director of IER, Chris Warhurst, chaired a panel in Brussels on 28 March to discuss the future of work. The panel was part of the end of project conference for Beyond 4.0.

The discussion focused on the limitations of Industry 4.0 and the opportunities for promoting Industry 5.0.

Second Beyond 4.0 Summer School

Mon, 21 Jun 2021 12:10:00 GMT

IER staff and PhD students participated virtually in Beyond 4.0’s second summer school, held again in San Sebastian in Spain. Beyond 4.0 is a Horizon 2020 funded project that examines the future of work and welfare in the digital age.

The summer school offered a mixture of themes: careers guidance for PhD students, plus research on the digital transformation of workplaces; regional responses to digitalisation; historical analysis of industrial transformations; and social policy contexts.

Among the 22 speakers, Professor Chris Warhurst and Dr Sally-Anne Barnes presented sessions during the Summer School. Two of IER’s PhD students Wafaa Elmezraoui and Gianni Anelli Lopez were among the 21 PhD students who participated in the event. Congratulations to Wafaa. Having ‘pitched’ her PhD topic in a poster session during the event she was awarded first prize.

Watch a short explanation of the summer school in this video.

Joanna Octavia awarded third place at the 2021 CERIC Doctoral Conference

Tue, 01 Jun 2021 07:56:00 GMT

IER Doctoral Researcher Joanna Octavia was awarded third place at the 2021 CERIC Doctoral Conference at the Leeds University Business School on Friday, 21 May 2021. Joanna presented the preliminary findings of her PhD fieldwork, which focuses on the internet organising and mobilising efforts on platform-based motorcycle taxi drivers in Jakarta, Indonesia.

Held at Leeds' Centre for Employment Relations, Innovation and Change (CERIC), the theme for this year's doctoral conference was 'The Future of Work in a Post-Covid World'. A total of 28 papers presented at the conference covered a broad spectrum of disciplines related to: the impact of digitalisation on work and employment; inequalities in race, gender, class, (dis)ability in a post-Covid world; and the role of human resources management in a changing environment.

Future of work in the UK

Mon, 29 Mar 2021 08:45:00 GMT

In March, IER Director Chris Warhurst was invited to give a talk to the ACAS East Midlands Conference on the role of good work in the future of work in the UK.

The focus was on the role of good work in post Covid economic recovery and renewal.