ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses the question of how people change as a consequence of occupational experience. It argues for the need to address the issues through the development of measures which are sensitive to the qualitative changes in performance which accompany job change. The chapter describes the development and use of one such technique for investigating changes in implicit knowledge. Officers are promoted to the rank of sergeant primarily on the basis of passing a written examination which assesses their knowledge of police regulations and procedure, not their managerial potential. Applying the scenario technique yielded quite clear differences between experienced and novice sergeants. The implications for the analysis of transitions are less equivocal. The results identify a major lacunae in the literature, and illustrate its accessibility to systematic study. To date, theory and research has tended to concentrate on the effective dimensions of experience and outcomes.
