Manufacturing Industry making the Skills Pledge
Conveyor belt manufacturers, Veyance Belting, recently signed the Victorian Skills Pledge, a public declaration by businesses of their commitment to skills development. And by all accounts, there are few businesses more committed to staff training than they are.
Veyance Belting has developed an internal training culture of traineeships and apprenticeships, in conjunction with their Registered Training Organisation, New Futures Vocational Consulting (NFVC), over the course of a ten-year relationship. They also work closely with the National Union of Workers to encourage the up-skilling of staff, which is benchmarked against national competency standards and based on both company and employeeneeds. To date, 66 of its 172 employees have completed Australian Apprenticeship programs.
“Veyance is absolutely streets ahead of everyone,” says Krys Graves, one of two trainers from NFVC working closely with the company. “In terms of the time it puts into working with trainers to develop customised training materials, and in ensuring that every employee in the factory does training, regardless of whether or not their place is funded, they are outstanding” she says.
“The guys simply need to know what they are doing,” Georges Wilmann, the company’s Environmental, Safety and Training Manager says simply. “It is critical to our success that the operators are competent. And unless they do their Certificate III in Process Manufacturing they won’t be able to progress through the place.”
Designed mainly for the mining industry, Veyance Belting’s conveyor belts can weigh 35 tonnes, are up to 400 metres long, almost two metres wide and up to 40 millimetres thick. Each belt takes about two days to produce and will sell for up to $400,000. Well trained staff are essential in creating belts that meet their exacting standards and will withstand the tough conditions in Australian mines.
The Victorian Skills Pledge is part of the Victorian Government’s major package of reforms to the Victorian training system. These reforms mean Veyance Belting will be paying for fewer of their employees’ training places in future.
The Victorian Training Guarantee makes government subsidised training places available to all eligible Victorians, at all levels of skills development, at any stage of their lives, subject to eligibility requirements that encourage enrolments at higher skill levels.
For people aged up to 20, government subsidised places will be available for any qualification level. For people aged 20 and over, government subsidised training will be available for all training at the foundation skills level, including literacy and numeracy courses, and for any qualification higher than those already held.
The Brumby Government has established the Victorian Training Guarantee, which came into effect on July 1, 2009, and is now available for Diploma and Advanced Diploma courses, all those up to 24 years of age, and retrenched workers and job seekers. The guarantee will be extended to everyone seeking to use the training system by January 2011.
Another component of the reforms, Skills for Growth: the Workforce Development Program, provides eligible businesses with independent specialists to work with them – free of charge – to identify their strategic business aims and objectives, assess staff skills, and place staff into accredited training.
Skills for Growth is open to all Victorian-based small and medium sized businesses in the private, public and community sectors. To be eligible, your business must employ between 1 to 200 staff, have been in operation for at least 12 months and be financially viable. Your business also needs to have signed the Victorian Skills Pledge.
Taking the Victorian Skills Pledge gives your business a range of marketing opportunities to show potential customers you are dedicated to up-skilling your staff to best-practice standards. For businesses like Veyance Belting, the reforms to Victoria’s training system can only make it easier to develop the skilled workforce they need for continued success.
Other companies in the industry who have made the pledge include AME Systems of Ararat and Kilsyth, CNC Design in Abbotsford and Form 2000 Sheetmetal P/L in Mordialloc.
For more information about changes to the TAFE and training system, including Skills for Growth, the Victorian Training Guarantee and the Victorian Skills Pledge, visit www.skills.vic.gov.au or contact Alex Bernhardt at MESAB on 9889 0966.