Digitalized vocational training facing its discontinuities
In a context characterized by the desire to increase the individual responsibility of employees in the acquisition and maintenance of their professional skills, the use of digital devices appears to some decision-makers as a relevant solution to train their employees more quickly and in a more direct link with business strategy. But beyond these attractive principles, what do the current experiments show? To provide some answers, in this article, we rely on a qualitative survey of learners and trainers who have followed - or, for some, implemented - fully digitized distance learning (Corporate Online Open Courses), within a big company. After having indicated the importance of the dropout rate among learners and the difficulties of trainers in exercising their new role of facilitator, we highlight the discontinuities that the digitalization of training induces in terms of working time-space and professional interknowledge networks. We also show that these discontinuities have differentiated effects on the learning abilities of employees. Based on Amartya Sen's capacity approach, we interpret these findings in terms of conversion factors (environmental, social, individual). This allows us to argue that it is the absence of these three categories of factors which explains, for both learners and trainers, the discontinuities encountered and the inequalities in the mastery of the new training devices. Finally, the same framework of analysis allows us to sketch out ways to rethink the digitalization of professional training in order to reduce the risks of social inequalities crystallized around this type of technical-educational devices.