1 Old dogs, new tricks: Training mature-aged manufacturing workers Erica Smith, Andrew Smith and Chris Selby Smith [1] 1. Introduction Mature-aged workers are becoming increasingly important in Australian workplaces, as in many other countries. Australia has a tight labour market with unemployment in January 2009 standing at 5.3 per cent and declining, despite the impact of the Global Financial Crisis (Australian Bureau of Statistics [ABS], 2009). Employers report difficulty in filling even jobs that do not require qualifications. Thus organisations need to retain workers well past the age at which in previous decades many workers began to think of retiring. Therefore, it is imperative that issues associated with the training of mature-aged workers are examined closely. This paper reports on a project commissioned in 2007 by Manufacturing Skills Australia, the Australian Skills Council for the manufacturing industry. The study was about the employment and training of mature-aged workers, with fieldwork concentrated in the manufacturing sector. For the research, ‘mature-aged’ was taken as 45 years and above, as this was the definition used in Australian vocational education and training (VET) policy documents; 45 years is also used in OECD documents (Tikkanen & Nyhan, 2006). The focus of the study was on operational-level (‘factory-floor’) employees rather than on managerial or professional staff. Mature-aged workers are, of course, present in all walks of life, but the research did not look at the training and learning of those in managerial or professional occupations. This paper reports some of the findings of the study, addressing three main research questions. These are: 1. What are the views of the strengths and weaknesses of mature-aged workers, as a group, that are held by employers, in-company trainers, mature-aged workers themselves and experts from stakeholder groups? 2. How do mature-aged workers respond to training opportunities? 3. How do (and can) companies organise training processes to make them suited to mature-aged workers? The title of the paper refers to an English saying “You can’t teach an old dog new tricks”. The findings of the study indicate that, in fact, mature-aged workers are generally keen to learn ‘new tricks’ and suggests some ways to assist them to learn more effectively. 2. Background The following section summarises the key points from the most relevant bodies of literature and explains the contribution of the current study. 1 We would like to acknowledge the contribution to this research study, and the life work, of Chris Selby Smith, who died suddenly in 2007 and who is sorely missed for both his work and his gentle personality by all in Australian research in vocational education and training.