Everything You Need to Know About Workplace Skills Planning

Over the past few months, several companies have made the responsible choice to work remotely. This was done as a means of protecting staff and reducing the spread of the virus. While this was a wonderful initiative in 2020, and for the past few months this year, it has also made the transition from virtual to back-to-the-office more complicated. In cases such as these, it is best to avail the assistance of a company that offers training on office preparation and staff induction, especially post remote working. If you are trying to get your team back into the office, and excited to do so, consider taking one of these courses, where you will be assisted in creating a workplace skills plan.

If you are unfamiliar with a workplace skills plan, it essentially documents the skills needs of a business, and describes the skills development interventions the organisation will use to address said needs. In fact, companies are meant to develop and submit their workplace skills plan every year to comply with South Africa’s current Skills Development legislation. To ensure compliance, a registered Skills Development Facilitator or another qualified person will compile said plan and submit it to the SETA. This is why it is recommended that you seek assistance when it comes to developing your workplace skills plan, as the provider will be far more clued up on remaining compliant.

At this point, you are most likely wondering why these plans are so important. Well, they essentially outline how the organisation will address the training and development needs in the workplace. This is especially important when staff have been working remotely for such a long time. Certain skills may have been lost, and others developed. Therefore, in order for an organisation to identify any skills gap, a workplace skills plan is needed. Once any gaps have been identified, the relevant training will be provided to ensure a holistic and sustainable approach to skills development.

Now that you have a better understanding of what a workplace skills plan is, and why it is deemed important, let us touch on the process of developing such a plan. As previously stated, it is recommended that you seek the assistance of a qualified facilitator or do a course that allows you to develop such a plan. Should you choose to complete training, and develop the plan yourself, below are a few tips you can keep in mind.

• Step 1: Identify existing skills in your organisation

By conducting a skills audit, you can identify the skills your organisation already has, as well as investigate the competencies of your employees against the skills they require for their roles.

• Step 2: Identify any skills gaps in your organisation

Once you have identified the skills that are present, you can then easily identify the skills that are missing, or that need to be developed further.

• Step 3: Identify ways you can develop those skills that are lacking in your organisation

Finally, you can identify how to best go about developing said skills, whether by online training, in-house training, learnerships, etc.

For more information, please go visit: https://www.dynamicdna.co.za/transitioning-from-virtual-to-office-training/