What is a classification of occupations?

25. What is a classification of occupations?

It is a system of data and information about occupations that provides a framework for analysing, adding and describing the contents of work as well as a system of levels and areas to organise occupations in the labour market.

SENAI (Brazil) defines the National Classification of Occupations as a system which classifies the usual occupations of the economically active population of a country. In Brazil, it is called the Brazilian Classification of Occupations (CBO).

According to SENA (Colombia), the National Classification of Occupations is a systematic organisation of occupations that occur within the Colombian labour market, taking into account some classification principles or criteria.(1)

The International Standard Classification of Occupations (ISCO) defines an occupation as a set of jobs in which similar tasks are carried out. At the same time, a job is defined as a set of tasks assigned to only one person.(2)

ISCO, 1988, introduces the concept of competency within its criteria of organisation. The previous version, 1968, dealt mainly with statistic disaggregation concepts, ordered in the following way: group, sub group, primary group and occupational category. In fact, it defined occupation as “the most reduced group of work that can be found in the classification system” that covers several “jobs” or “posts” carried out by workers. Occupations were described by ISCO-68 according to general functions and the assigned tasks.

Labour competency is defined by ISCO-88 as the “ability to perform tasks inherent in a particular job” and these have different levels and degrees of specialisation.

The “level of competency” is connected to the degree of complexity and diversity of tasks. Specialisation of competencies “is related to a wide range of knowledge required, the tools and machines used, the material which is used to work with as well as with the nature of the goods and services that are produced”.

According to ISCO-88 four levels of competency were defined and although they were linked to educational levels, it was still considered that they could be acquired by means of “informal training” and experience. These four levels are:

1. First grade education (according to the International Standard Classification of Education), which is usually started at the age of 5 to 7 and lasts five years.

2. The first and second cycles of secondary education. The first cycle lasts around three years and is started around the age of twelve and thirteen; the second cycle covers the following three years. Sometimes, this level includes occupations that require specific theoretical and practice training as a way of learning.

3. The education of category 5 in ISCED covers four years and it does not involve university studies.

4. It covers the education that is usually started at the age of 17 or 18; it lasts four or more years and it involves university or higher education.

Notice that in level 2, vocational training is included for new workers, even the learning contract mode. Level 3 corresponds to technical and technological higher education.

The so-called “major groups” make up the most general level of aggregation. Those groups are:

1. Members of the Executive and Legislative Power, State Senior Officials and Managers of companies

2. Scientific and intellectual professionals

3. Technicians and associate professionals

4. Clerks

5. Service workers and shop and market sales workers

6. Skilled agricultural and fishery workers

7. Officers, operators and craftsmen of mechanical arts and other crafts

8. Plant and machine operators and assemblers

9. Elementary workers

10. Armed forces

This classification, as well as that of 1968, keeps combining two different concepts in the major groups: educational levels and areas of performance.The major groups 2 and 3 are thus more related to professional classification categories which are very much associated to the training received. Groups 1 and 0 seem to be exceptions to the specific characteristics of occupations (ones regarding management and others within the armed forces). Nowadays occupational analyses usually consider two dimensions: the area in which the work is carried out and the level of preparation (training or competency) required for such performance.

The possibility of combining a criterion of level of competency with that of a large occupational group has enabled some countries, such as Canada, Spain, United States of America and Colombia to develop their own national classifications of occupations keeping this methodological aspect but also improving the concepts of a large group and level of competency.

Within these occupational classifications, it is possible to find large groups defined as areas of performance; this means the connotations regarding the level of education found in the definition of area of competency disappear. Furthermore, the level of competency is defined associated with: the degree of complexity of labour performance, the knowledge required by the occupation, the required occupational level, the autonomy, the degree of received supervision, the responsibility of verifying others’ work, the ability to decide on materials and processes, among other things.

The ability of the classification of occupations has been fostered as an instrument to achieve a comprehensive framework of labour competencies in the market. In Canada, a chart of occupational classification was improved with new areas of performance and five levels of competency, which apart from enabling comparisons and statistic analyses, are of great use for the development of occupational guidance and labour market description programmes.

The experience of CONOCER in Mexico in the implementation of a standardised system of labour competency has enabled the creation of a “qualification chart” with a concept similar to that of an occupational classification chart. The basic concept is placing the areas of competency in the columns and the levels of competency in the rows. The cells in the intersection between one row and one column shall define units of basic, general and specific competency.

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1SENA, Employment Bureau, Clasificación Nacional de Ocupaciones, Bogota, 1998.
2 ILO, International Standard Classification of Occupations, CIU8-88, Geneva, 1991.