This issues paper reports on the findings from the first year of a three-year program of research by the University of Sydney's Workplace Research Centre. The overarching aim of the research is to investigate how, if at all, vocational education and training can make a difference in improving productivity and workforce participation. The authors describe four domains of social and economic practice in which to frame the second and third year's research, and the key challenges for workforce development in two particular industries: meat processing, and early education and care. The four domains described herein are: (1) the core service and/or product of interest; (2) the context of labour's deployment and development in production/service provision; (3) the pools and flows of potential workers and learners; (4) the formal system of vocational education and training. In understanding each of these different domains, researchers will be better able to map the interdependencies between employers, workers, potential workers and VET. This paper has three parts: first, it summarises categories crucial for untangling the complexities of "workforce development" to allow informed and clear analysis of the key issues; secondly, this report uses those categories to outline the primary workforce development issues as described by key informants expert in the two industries and contained in relevant literature; and, finally, a fieldwork research strategy is proposed that includes work site studies, local labour market studies and further analysis of the literature. (Contains 5 tables.)