Although in-company trainers are regarded as key figures in vocational training and its development, not many research findings about them are available. One reason for this is the lack of a self consciousness as trainer in many European countries (Eurotrainer Consortium 2008, p. 4 f.). This leads to a black-box-phenomenon, for example when the quality of pedagogical acting or usability and acceptance of innovations in vocational training are discussed.

In my doctoral thesis, the pedagogical self-concepts of in-company trainers were evaluated with the so called dilemma interview, an interpretative method deriving from developmental psychology. A dilemma puts the acting person in a situation to decide between two or more options, which all are adequate and promising, but imply certain disadvantages. In a dilemma interview such problematic situations – each representing a class of problems – were discussed, so the basic ideas and the logic of decision making become manifest. While Lawrence Kohlberg (2007), surely the most popular user of the dilemma method, formulated hypothetical situations to study moral development, my approach includes concrete situations of the trainer’s everyday-working-life. This is done because work-related, professional attitudes are examined, and it is probable that the same concepts and (defence) strategies, on which acting in work is based, will become manifest in the answers.

Several interviews with trainers have already been conducted and the analysis shows a fascinating range of conceptual emanations. In my presentation, the pedagogical self-concepts of young German in-company trainers will be presented following three statements: 1) In contrast to teachers, in-company trainers have already a professional self-concept, which is the one of a craftsman (Facharbeiter). This self-concept is influencing the work as a trainer. 2) The attitude towards the trainees must be well reflected, because too much as well as not enough identification would impede the teaching process. 3) The trainer’s self concept relies on their working conditions.