10. Stay focused on adding value
• Need to lift the integrity of our industry and
get back to our core business.
• Need for quality benchmark standards that
can be easily recognized by the market.
11. How does VET add Value?
Solutions that offer value they must be REAL* and
deliver at least one of three things:
• Improve value proposition
– “Sell more than you charge for!”
• Improve value delivery method
– Solutions align with the clients
business model and will save the
client effort.
• Extended accountability spread
– Take ownership of the outcomes
to build relationships.
*Relevant
Empowering
Accurate
Logical
12. How do we deliver this Value
Move from being just a “Doer” to being a
problem solver and solutions provider.
Align our solutions to the clients business model
in a way that builds real value.
13. What is the enabler? = VET Alliance
Advantages of an Association
+
Power of a Conglomerate
VET
Alliance
14. Why Pool VET provider resources
VET Alliance = Increased value
15. Many hands make light work
Help each other achieve higher standards
through:
• Strategic alliances – enabling us to offer more
complex solution offerings.
• broadening our networks both within our
industry and potential clients
• Establishing quality
benchmarks for delivery
• Sharing stories and
learning from each other.
16. Where can Alliances take us?
Beyond what is currently possible and enable us
to stand out in the crowd.
17. What are the challenges of Alliances?
• Maintaining integrity
– The focus always remains on what is best for the client.
Trust, open and clear lines of communication
• Maintaining identity
– Longer term relationships with the member or the
alliance?
• Accountability Spread
• You can spread the risk but not transfer it!
• $ Distribution
– Ensuring all parties are
adequately rewarded
for their contributions.
18. Managing Challenges
• Make sure alliance members compliment each
other and identify where the synergies are
going to be realised.
• Clear understanding of the purpose of the
alliance and the expected outcomes
• What are the opportunities for the alliance
after the solution has been delivered to the
client?
21. In Summary
• Look at your current challenges and see how
they could be addressed with the help of an
alliance partner.
Editor's Notes
Thank for the introduction and a special thank you to Criterion Conferences for the invitation to speak here today. This morning I am going to ask you to consider pooling your resources with other complimentary VET providers to enable you to deliver higher quality outcomes for VET. Just to make sure my presentation is going to have some relevance to all of you, can I just get an indication of what are major challenges you are facing at the moment, and what challenges you believe VET is facing. Make sure you capture issues with how VET is represented in the Market and how industry and students perceive us. - Inconsistency in course durations, costs and experienced trainers- Training is too generic and not contextualized for site requirements (training not relevant)- No outcomes from the training - employmentQuality of training resources and presentation material (or lack of) Flexible with training needs Night shifts, day shifts Industry currency (example of the 12 months on site experience within the last 3 years for the RII training package.Confidence in the assessment process?- How to best utilising newly available technology.What do you think is causing all of these challenges?We have a lot of things there to work on don’t we? Why do you think that is?
Can you see yourself in this picture: “A lone VET provider, pitted against the odds of maintaining compliance in a hostile marketplace where he must rely on his elite VET training to help him walk the knife edge between costs and quality. Now that is a movie worth paying your $20 for. Do we have anyone here how would like to take on the lead role?I believe that if Robinson Crusoe had the opportunity to form an alliance with other astronauts with complimentary skills in the areas of bioscience, astrophysics, non-linear quantum electronics and a sheet metal worker, He would have been in a much better position to fight off those pesky Aliens from the Orion Star system and get back to earth in no time. Luckily for us we are not Robinson Crusoe ON mars – back here on earth, we have all of the support we need to resolve any challenge and be proactive in our quest for achieving excellent outcomes for students and Industry. So what is all of the fuss, why do we have so many challenges to deal with on a daily basis? I am pretty sure it could be something to do with the marketplace.
Everything in the marketis going through rapid transformation…. Stuff is happening…..Old industries are either take their labor requirements off shore due to high wages, or simply, their traditional workforce and or product or service offering has been made redundant by technology, or modernized business practices. New industries are emerging demanding that its workforce obtains higher skill levels and experience. I’ll just like to give you an example of what I am talking about: you might of heard something on the news a couple of years back about the skills shortage for the mining industry… Not sure what channel it was on, but anyway, RTO’s spent millions setting themselves up to service the mining industry and provide trained people who knew how to operate trucks shovels, drill rigs etc. The thing is, to train people in these skills takes a little more time and a significant amount of infrastructure.Next Slide
It is not like not like you can just go out and buy a vehicle and get going…. You need a operational Mine site, Mobile equipment, policies and procedures specific to the work environment. By the way the fuel economy on a haul truck is a bit different to a Hyundai Getz. Anyway,One particular RTO spent $3M setting up their mine training business, and by the time they were ready to take students on, the boom was finished and I don’t think they have put even one student through. The thing is, I am not sure what they are going to do now because by the time the next boom comes around a lot of the equipment is going to be automated meaning they wont have a need to train anywhere near as many new entrants – and there are stillgoing to be a load of experienced operators out there waiting to get back in the door. What do you do with an asset like a mining school when you don’t have any students?
The demographic of our students is changing.I was talking to the training manager of Bechtel in Gladstone they have a 54 year old second year apprentice boiler maker on site of the other 399 apprentices they have the youngest one is 16. We need to cater for an increasing variety of students and adjust our delivery methods accordingly. Just out of interest did you know:- 65% of kids starting their first year of school next year will end up working in jobs that don’t even exist yet? The pace of business and how we do business is changing so fast that more than half of what a business student learns in their first year of their degree is out of date by the time they finish their studies?
Technology is significantly impacting on how we train…. It takes time to learn how to best utilise new technology and by the time you do it is out of date or considered old hat. Have you all heard the story of assessing people in CPR using the space bar on your keyboard?Another flop was an organization in my industry, spent millions on this flop called Project Canary, other than some bird brain thinking behind it the initiaisive was based on Bells and whistles on the project canary (Gaming) and Mining simulators Miskills. Some of the problems with elearning - I admit we are not immune to exploring new ways of doing things, but on refection it is really quite comical to see how some of our competitors blew Millions of dollars creating things that were just simply never going to work, or allocating 93% of the budget to the bells and streamers and spokie-dokies, the other 7% on the bike. When in reality they could of gotten away with 99.9% on the bike and a peg clipping some cardboard onto the back wheel would have been much more effective and practical. I could rattle off some real doozies that would almost make laugh it it wasn’t real - simulating CPR using the spacebar as an example. $850,000 simulators for earthmoving equipment that have clocked up less operating hours than a $5 Rolex. But don’t stress people, things are only going to get more crazy for us……..
The need for training, re-training, refresher training, gap-training is going to increase. Do you notice any difference in the two images – the number of people in the room and fluro lights.Look at what is happening today, how many people see an institution looking like this in 10 years time?
However if we want to ensure we continue providing quality outcomes for VET we need to innovative and stay one step ahead of the market.Unfortunately for us however, we tend to trip over our own feet a bit, making it hard to keep our eyes on the road ahead and what is coming toward us.
The VET industry would have to be one of the most complex industries there is I reckon. You have to learn a whole new language when you enter this business, Just quickly, how many people can tell me the difference between between RPL, RCC and a VOC? Think about how much things chop and change:BSZ to TAA to TAE to the new TAE that incorporates the LLN unit in a period of a couple of years…Trying to cater for the various interpretations around compliance issues when even Auditors find it sometimes difficult to make the same call. I wonder how many of these challenges are our own growing pains?I appreciate that the majority of the changes we are making are certainly in the right direction and necessary, I am just trying to put it out there that if we could just put a bit more effort into learning more about what the market needs as opposed to learning how to satisfy an auditor, that would be good.
The other main point I would like to identify is how we are cannibalizing ourselves. You can get you can get a Cert IV TAE now online for $499? How is this possible and how much integrity in VET do you think industry sees us having when we are perceived to be handing out our premier qualification for less than the cost of a washing machine?I believe that you are all here today as you share a common passion for adult education, and the desire to do things right. This sense of purpose combined with the radically changing market environment is why I believe alliance/ collaborative business relationships are particularly suited to the VET sector. Just before we go on I would just like to make sure everyone is in the same headspace when I am talking about what I believe VET is in the business of. Any takers????
Providing Solutions that add REAL value. For a VET Solution to add value it MUST deliver at least one of three things:1. Improve value proposition - e.g. do more for less or sell more than you charge for,is everyone comfortable with this saying?“Use the restaurant example if time is okay pay for the meal but they sold the experience. “In the instance of VET the client pays for a qualification but you sell awesome training. 2. Improve value delivery method - improve the efficiencies in the clients business to save them effort. - e.g. integrating the training with their induction and Professional development initiatives. Contextualizing training to mitigate the need for VOC’s. 3. Extend accountability spread - taking ownership of the outcomes so there is mutual skin in the game - building trust and sharing the outcomes e.g. demonstrating integrity in the solutions and services provided for example guaranteed applicants will pass the VOC or challenge test first time every time improving safety statistics might be another one. By adding this kind of value we forge relationships with the market, moving from being just a “doer” – i.e. issuing qualifications, to a problem solver and solution provider. When we empower ourselves to do this a whole new world of opportunities opens its doors to us. So, I would like you to just take a second now to reflect on how the solutions you are offering are adding REAL value and if that value is going to be relevant in the changing market conditions ahead?
I think that if we are to add value, we need to be innovative. Not only with what our products look like and how we deliver them, we have to think about how our products and services can take on a bigger piece, or multiple pieces of the clients puzzle.
Essentially an alliance takes on all of the advantages of being in an association without the membership fees:Sharing stories and learning from each otherRunning Professional development sessionsModeration and validation workshops to help establish quality benchmark standardsNetworking and potentially helping each other gain entry into new marketplacesBrand recognition and helping to set quality benchmark standards Alliances also can capture the Power of a conglomerate. With responsible relationships in place between complimentary members, the alliance also takes on the capacity to bid for tenders in the market, and approaching industry with solutions that would have previously been impossible. Structures within the alliance can include: partnerships, MOU’s Contracts and can comprise whatever skills and knowledge is best suited to successfully delivering and maintaining the solution .
Just take a moment to think about what solution you may be able to design and build if you had a responsible and reliable relationship with suppliers such as:Other RTO’s with complimentary qualifications on ScopeSpecialist VET legal representation and accountantsSkilled trainers and assessors with expertise in subject matter specific to your clientA reliable IT system that could not only be used for your students but designed to be integrated into your clients business and automate many of the traditional functions of a training officer/manager.Safety experts Instructional designers and Technical authorsWebsite designers, graphic artists and desktop publishersMultimedia and video production specialistsInduction and workforce development expertsAnd the list goes on. The successful VET organisation of the future is going to be those who can establish longer term mutually beneficial relationships with the market and play a bigger part of the clients solution to their problem. In addition to the changing market we need to consider how we can maintain our competitiveness and make ourselves a more attractive proposition to the market. Go to whiteboard and draw the circle of the market and dots around it. Show how pooling the light of some of these providers can make a star that can encapsulate a larger portion of the market.
As solutions become more complex additional expertise is required to successfully design, build, deliver and maintain them. Having accountability is also key to help building that relationship and other people to share the risk with makes it all the more achievable. We need to capitalise on each others complimentary strengths to design, generate and deliver innovative solutions that will add real value. E need to work together so we can achieve more! So how far do I think we can go with alliances?
I imaging designing the matrix required more than just an RTO with an IT guy and a Kung Fu subject matter expert. Can you imagine the size of the IT department behind the Matrix mainframe? I wonder if the IT is going to be made up out of those Kung FU experts who made themselves redundant after they helped build the thing.My apologies who have not see the movie. Returen to the whiteboard and highlight how we stand out in the crowd. Who knows perhaps this new star you created can be on-sold multiple times to other galaxies??
Now I am not going to stand up here and proclaim that alliances are all rainbows and sunshine. When entering into any kind of relationship there are always issues and challenges that need to be identified and resolved to mutual satisfaction in immediately. Like any relationship it is important to be clear with communications and what the purpose of the relationship / partnership is.
Make sure alliance members compliment each other and identify where the synergies are going to be realised. Clear understanding of the purpose of the alliance and the expected outcomes What is the clients problem and how the alliance is going to provide the solution.Detailed outline of what the solution looks likeDelivery methodology and milestonesShared understanding of the roles and responsibilities and clarity IP rights and access to support mechanisms for each otherRespect for the expertise each member brings offers the alliance and how to best utilise it to add value.Clear communication channels with each other and the clientAgreed methodology for managing contingencies.Commitment levels are there with balanced accountability spread.What are the opportunities for the alliance after the solution has been delivered to the client?Back to the whiteboard with the circle and the star. Each member of the alliance is only contributing to the solution where they can add most value, this allows them to focus on what they are best at which in turn optimizes resources and improves quality and delivery times.
Expect teething problems., even with all of the template and tools to facilitate establishing an alliance you are still going to have to learn about each other and their limitations, boundaries – don’t expect a home run on the first date…By documenting everything you will build better foundations from which to build future alliances and partnerships, it also helps communications and provides clarity for people to build constructively on.
How far has Performance training progressed with its alliances.Pertrain / Performance Training, U2, Face to face – Contractor – Cient. Pertrain PTPL Birla, and other RTO’s (First aid as the example).
Go back to the whiteboard and look at each one of these challenges to find out how alliances could help them resolve their issues. I am confident that there are at least xx people in this room that are very well positioned to help you out. Have a chat to the person sitting next to you, I am confident that there is just a synergy waiting to be realized if you had a closer working relationship with each other – ask them during morning tea. Thank you for your time this morning.