General Probing.
Question 6 asked respondents whether they had to learn how to use new software (programmes and
applications) in the last 12 months. Respondents could choose between the answer categories “Yes”
and “No.” All categories were exclusive categories and, therefore, percentages add up to 100 percent.
In total, 42.62 percent of the British respondents and 36.21 of the German respondents selected “Yes”
whereas 57.38 of the British respondents and 63.79 of the German respondents selected “No.”
Only respondents that selected the response “Yes” at question 3 received question 6. As a consequence,
26 respondents (14 English speaking respondents and 12 German speaking respondents) did
not receive this question due to the filter in question 3. For question 6, we asked a general probe
(Probe 7) that all respondents received who chose the answer category “Yes” at question 6, which
means that 25 British respondents and 21 German respondents provided an answer to this probe.
The intention of Probe 7 was to understand the changes related to ICT usage at the workplace and to
assess whether the phrasing of question 6 is unambiguous enough. Therefore, Probe 7 asked the
respondents to describe the new software (programmes and applications) they had to learn. In this
context, respondents in both countries most frequently mentioned business software (British respondents:
36.00 percent, German respondents: 28.57 percent). In particular, respondents mentioned software
that address a variety of different business aspects, such as marketing, customer relationship
management, sales accounting, human resource solutions, and tax programmes. Besides specific software
programmes such as SAP, some respondents described the software they had to learn.
- “Credit check for new customers. The software allows you to find the credit rating on new
customers.” (British respondent, ID 362)
- “I had to learn a lot about new invoicing and staff management software packages and I also
had to learn a lot about various advertising packages.” (British respondent, ID 377)
- “It is a payment software in which payment requests are entered and approved, enabling the
finance department to settle the corresponding invoices.” (German respondent, ID 112)
Instead of using general business solutions, several respondents also reported that they had to learn
company specific software which is software that was specifically developed for the company or organization
for which respondents are working. Respondents in both countries referred to company
specific software (British respondents: 12.00 percent, German respondents: 23.81 percent). In addition,
some respondents in both countries had to learn office software, such as Microsoft Office, Excel,
Sharepoint, and Open Office (British respondents: 5.56 percent, German respondents: 14.29 percent).
Besides business and office related software, British and German respondents also had to learn programming
software and languages, such as Angular 2, Node js, SQL, C++ (British respondents: 12.00
percent, German respondents: 4.76 percent) and attended courses to learn about current versions of
operating systems, such as Windows 10 (British respondents: 4.00 percent, German respondents: 9.52
percent). Finally, British respondents also reported that they received training with regard to editing
and visual design software, such as Camtasia and New Adobe Creative suite (InDesign, Photoshop, and
Illustrator) (British respondents: 8 percent) and that they attended courses to learn about software to
create online courses, such as Teachable or Tapestry (British respondents: 8 percent).
Overall, the respondents seem to have understood the question correctly. Nearly all respondents mentioned
specific software (programmes and applications) and, therefore, the phrasing of the question is
unambiguous enough.
For a more detailed breakdown of the respondents‘ answers please refer to the tables in the attached PDF document.
