Shorten saluted

Service to Youth Council chief Paul Edginton has praised Opposition Leader Bill Shorten’s youth unemployment policy.

Hays regional director Adam Shapley says some building firms are increasing salaries and offering bonuses to prevent quality staff from leaving.

Service to Youth Council chief executive Paul Edginton has praised Bill Shorten’s youth unemployment policy, launched last week, which is aimed at tackling unemployment.

He says Labor’s $21 million Youth Jobs Connect program recognises that improving employment outcomes for young Australians will require a community-wide effort.

Edginton says that if a young person’s first experience of the world is unemployment, his organisation has failed.

Youth Jobs Connect is similar to SYC’s own youth employment program My First Job, which targets the 18 to 24-year-old group, and prepares them for the workforce.

Edginton hopes the programs will continue to enhance employment for young people throughout Australia.

He says youth unemployment cannot be solved by government alone but it can create a framework bringing together interested parties to lift youth participation.

“There’s no doubt that reducing a stubbornly high youth unemployment rate in Australia will lead to positive economic and social outcomes and I commend anyone who wants to be a part of solving this issue,” Edginton says.

Skills in demand

Hays Construction says that as construction across Australia is ramping up and building companies are becoming busier, firms are doing all they can to hold on to highly valued staff.

Project and site managers, estimators and residential foremen are atop the list of skills in demand in the April to June Hays Quarterly Report.

Hays Construction regional director Adam Shapley says companies are winning several projects at a time and recruiting key permanent staff to assist with growth and management of newly awarded projects.

He says growth does not come without issues, as some building firms are increasing salaries and offering bonuses to prevent quality staff from being poached by competitors.

Shapley says it is not just more money that employers are offering their staff.

Employers are searching for employees with potential to progress through the company and ultimately to become site or project managers.

“By recruiting key people now, they are hoping that new hires can be promoted to management teams in two to three years,” Shapley says.

As the volume of work increases, building firms are becoming reliant on a contracting workforce to assist them in meeting the demands of the heavier workloads.

Pure approach

Australia’s fastest growing technology adoption consultancy, Future Knowledge, has launched a new dedicated e-learning business, Pure Learning.

Pure Learning says its point of difference lies in its capability to create visually stunning e-learning and communication that connects employees in a cost-effective way.

Its goal is to make businesses smarter through learning, with each e-learning design crafted to the specific business outcomes the clients are seeking.

Pure Learning chief executive Matt Smith says there is an opportunity for the company to use multimedia and interactive technology to its full potential.

“The standard approach is to digitise a traditional training method,” Smith says.

Rather than have people sit through a training video, e-learning aims to create a workplace training model focused on business outcomes.

“We start by understanding our clients, their business goals and the strategy behind the training,” Smith says.

“We look at the employees — what motivates them, what they already know and what they care about.”