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Sharpening skills

22 March 2012

Access to the right workforce with the right skills is essential to increase the productivity of the building and construction sector. On 22 March the Partnership lanuched its Skills Strategy, the product of nearly two years work and extensive consultation with the education and training sector, the industry and the government agencies that interact with it.

"This process validated that we can do a lot as a sector to lift both skills development and utilisation," says Skills Workstream leader Ruma Karaitiana.

Skills utilisation is a key issue which is linked to the industry's distinct shortage of supervisors andmanagers, particularly in the residential sector.

"For generations we've seen many people gaining technical trade level skills but few progressing to management training," says Ruma. "As a consequence, we're not only short on skills but we're not managing what we've got well. If people were better supervised their skills would be better used."

The Skills Strategy identifies four key action areas - the short-term skills challenge, firms, culture, and education and training - the key responses required for each area and the key groups that need to be involved in actioning those responses.

"This is not just about skills, it's about creating environments where skills can be used productively, for instance, how businesses are structured and managed," says Ruma.

He sees the launch of the strategy as the rallying point for further positive action.

"There is a need for the sector to broadly commit to this and be willing to contribute and work on implementing it," he says.

Download Workstreams Skills Launch (Pdf, 3.28Mb)