Chris Donkin Facilitator for the Derbyshire PS Compact

1. Aligning Supply and Demand – A report from the WBL provider network and a survey of the public sector organisations Chris Donkin Facilitator for the Derbyshire PS Compact

2. The offer from the WBL provider network The WBL provider network supply: Apprenticeships in a wide variety of vocational disciplines Vocational training (including mandatory training) Functional Skills training Popular generic training (e.g. Bus Admin, IT, Customer Service etc) Support for unemployed people Leadership and management training Full cost training Plus … almost any training that employers require

3. Demand from the public sector for training Late in 2011, the Compact carried out a TNA survey of public sector organisations. At that time IT / Business Admin, Leadership & Management, Mandatory Vocational Training and to a lesser extent Customer Service and Coaching & Mentoring were found to be the most prolifically sought after training. (see attached summary) An attempt to re-fresh the survey found that Leadership & Management, Mandatory Vocational Training and Coaching & Mentoring were still sought after and that Project Management was now also on the radar

4. Demand from the public sector for training In addition to the survey re-fresh, four public service sector organisations (North East Derbyshire District Council, NHS Workforce Development Team, Derbyshire County Council and Amber Valley Borough Council) were also prepared to discuss some of the issues around sourcing and providing training. The questions they were asked were (i) what are the challenges you face? (ii) how do you source training? and (iii) does the current offer of training impact on what you provide? Their responses are included in the delegate pack and also summarised in the following slides.

5. PS Orgs – What are the challenges you face in offering WBL training ? Our main challenge at the moment are budgets which I am sure everyone is struggling with. (North East Derbyshire District Council) The challenge has been sustaining ongoing generic training and professional development when budget constraints have become more of an issue. One way of overcoming the ‘challenge’ has been to ‘deliver’ much of the ongoing training via an IT solution provided by ‘mycourses’. (Amber Valley Borough Council) The WDT have offered training in terms of sourcing opportunities and commissioning funding for WBL. The team are promoting Apprenticeships and one challenge we currently face is increasing the number of Apprentices employed in health organisations. Another challenge will be trying to ensure that training to meet the needs of the Cavendish Report is available. (Derbyshire Workforce Development Team) The big challenge for the County Council is that the implications of the organisational review are not yet clear. Once the direction is more clear then the Council will be in a better position to decide what training to focus on and what to provide. Another challenge is sustaining the provision of generic training within the constraints of new budgetary arrangements (Derbyshire County Council)

6. PS Orgs – How do you source WBL training ? We have requests for service specific training and also training that we can provide in-house. If employees request a one off or team event we use recommendations/suggestions.  For longer e.g. mgmt dev courses we conduct a tender exercise with presentations.  (North East Derbyshire District Council) We have recently sourced support for 6 Apprenticeships – attending the Compact Apprenticeship Workshops helped us to assess our options (Amber Valley Borough Council) In the NHS arrangements where a health organisation has an established working relationship with a specific learning provider work well - e.g. DCHS with Derby College There are advantages to this but it doesn’t mean that other training providers would be dismissed and some trusts have used independent providers for certain provision as they were more cost effective but also ensured quality (Derbyshire Workforce Development Team) Some training is provided within the Council’s own resources. Training provision that is being sustained (e.g. mandatory training for those who work in adult care and in child care) is being provided via established arrangements. Generally, once a need for training has been identified, the a tender document is published and providers are invited to bid to acquire the contract (Derbyshire County Council)

7. PS Orgs – Does the current offer of WBL training impact on what training you provide? Not really ! We tend to offer training identified by ‘business need’ and this is not influenced by the offer of WBL training available from the provider network. Business need is identified by department and if possible the training arranged will be accredited (Amber Valley Borough Council) The ‘fit’ between the training offered by the training provider network and the training required by health service organisations is not a bad fit. Most generic training programmes (e.g. Business Admin, IT, Functional Skills, Customer Care etc) are widely available from a number of different training providers. (Derbyshire Workforce Development Team) No … the current offer does not impact – the staff training provided is driven by need not what is available (Derbyshire County Council)

8. So … is the demand and supply for training currently aligned ? The WBL provider network supply what they believe the sector wants and in general terms this seems like a ‘reasonable fit’. In addition, the provider network (both individually and through The Derbyshire Network) is committed to providing responsive solutions to requests for training The sector organisations have a variety of ways of sourcing training and the commissioning / procuring arrangements are key in ensuring that appropriate and cost effective training is supplied to public service employees. In this short survey there were no reported instances of PS organisations being unable to source required training

9. Over to you ! …… After coffee … An opportunity to discuss with colleagues how the alignment of supply and demand could promote collaborative solutions to the procurement of training – delegates will be invited to consider any procurement barriers and issues involved in choosing the right provider to deliver