Social innovation and sustainable employability

The Bachelor Course Social Innovation and Sustainable Employability, abbreviated SISE, provides an appealing study of contemporary debates on themes such as social innovation and sustainable employability in relation to modern business enterprise and its changing institutional and technological setting.

Modern workplaces are rapidly changing, which leads to debates on new professionalism, changing institutional settings, new technologies, remote working (e.g., due to pandemic crises such as COVID-19), and the development of new competencies for work (i.e., 'the new way of working'). This implies that employees should undertake lifelong learning to adapt to changes in order to ensure their sustained employability in the new knowledge, mid- and post-pandemic economy. Put differently, employees have to share knowledge and skills to enhance productivity and effectiveness in a diverse, high-tech, workplace. They also have to deal with a revisited work-home balance and recovery opportunities due to these changes.

It is essential to understand trends and debates in the light of organizational, technological, and societal transformations. Central to these transformations is the focus on various forms of innovation, more in particular social and sustainable innovation.

This course has a multidisciplinary character, but has its origin in the field of Work and Organizational (W/O) Psychology. It can merely be considered a 'journey of discovery', leading to interaction and debate. Nevertheless, the course will also attempt to transfer a well-defined body of knowledge. This implies students have to get some knowledge, background and opinions about basic terms and theories as well as past, present, and future trends.

With this course we try to prepare Bachelor students for the fuzzy reality of ongoing technological and institutional changes in organizations, making use of insights from W/O-Psychology. The ultimate pedagogical aim is teaching Bachelor students to position themselves in SISE topics in the light of organizational, technological, and societal transformations.

Additional lecture information:
Based on a series of 9 lectures combined with 3 team debates (5 students per team maximum) in which teams will fullfill 3 roles as defense, opponent, and chair, students will write an academic group paper (5 students per group at maximum) which will be part of the exam.

After this course, students should be able:

1. To know something about past, present, and future of work;
2. To discuss key changes in workplaces and organizational settings (also due to COVID-19);
3. To discuss current issues regarding the new way of working (also due to COVID-19);
4. To know what Social Innovation (SI) means (in society as well as in business);
5. To know what Sustainable Employability (SE) means;
6. To have insight into the role of organizations and business in SI and SE;
7. To have insight into the role of Human Resources Management in SI and SE;
8. To think critically about how SI and SE can be achieved, and how they can be (re-)designed and/or implemented in real practice;
9. To have specific knowledge of the course literature (i.e., lecture slides, lecture papers, reports, and book chapters);
10. To transfer specific knowledge of the course literature to real practice;
11. To have knowledge about particular topics, such as change management, job crafting, learning organizations, social intrapreneurship, employee well-being, and employee sustainable performance;
12. To debate actively about SI and SE topics in the light of organizational, technological, and societal transformations;
13. To position themselves in these debates;
14. To create effective multiple choice questions about a journal paper/report/book chapter conform scientific standards;
15. To write an adequate academic paper based on the outcomes of the group debates and relevant literature.

You must meet the following requirements

• Registered for a degree programme other than
• HBO-TOP Applied Physics, Pre-Master
• In Block 1 you may not be part of one of the following target groups
• Uitgesloten studentgroepen

• To be announced Selection of academic journal papers