The South Australian Government are investing in new technology to improve organisational capability to drive workforce development and create opportunities for those who live in our State.
Skills SA within the Department of State Development in collaboration with the South Australian Skills Commission will enable and sustain a well-designed landscape of technology solutions to administer:
- funding for skills in South Australia
- SA Training Authority responsibilities and grow our state’s vocational education and training capability
- traineeship and apprenticeship regulatory responsibilities.
The digital transformation program will underpin our organisation-wide capability to better manage relationships and interactions with those supporting involved in the skills system or training delivery. It will enable us to continually evolve business processes, empower our customers and enable data insights.
Improved data analytics, reporting and policy insight
Improved customer experience
Increased business process efficiency
Reduced operational risk from reduction in system complexity
Phase 0 - Explore the opportunity
The goal
Seek to understand pain points with current systems and explore the opportunity using emerging, innovative and customer-first solutions.
Status: Completed
What we did
- Created a clear picture of who the customer is and developed personas to support personalised experiences.
- Spoke to employers, training providers, trainees and apprentices to understand current pain points of existing platforms to identify opportunities for improvement.
- Explored and analysed cloud-based platforms that would provide a connected solution for the skills ecosystem.
- Set up a project team and purchased modern cloud-based infrastructure, creating a great foundation to get started.
Several pain points identified
- Employers currently find it difficult to understand their responsibilities and obligations as an employer of trainees or apprentices.
- Application processes are lengthy.
- Students currently find:
- vocational education and training unclear
- don’t understand the training contract process
- they don’t know much about subsidised training
- it overwhelming choosing a course and finding the right training provider
- (if at school) it difficult to balance school, work and vocational education and training.
- Parents or guardians shared there are too many forms and it’s not clear who is responsible (School? Training provider?).
- Training providers said there were too many manual processes and poor integration
- between systems, resulting in duplicate processing and administrative burden.
- Accessibility of help guides and troubleshooting is poor.
Phase 1 - Transform traineeship and apprenticeship management
The goal
Launch mySkillsSA, replacing ATLAS and delivering an improved customer experience and 360-view of traineeships or apprenticeships. Improved self-service and a digital first approach will simplify becoming a registered employer and will allow making changes to traineeships or apprenticeships more accessible.
ATLAS is the current system used in South Australia to manage training contracts.
Status: In progress
What we're doing
Improved customer experience
We’ve taken a customer-first approach to designing mySkillsSA. Launching in 2025, the new integrated skills solution will replace ATLAS, a system over 12 years old.
Utilising cloud-based software, mySkillsSA will have a new look and feel to support businesses looking to:
- register to employ trainees or apprentices
- modify or renew an existing registration
- make changes to traineeships or apprenticeships
- complete or terminate a traineeship or apprenticeship.
360-view of traineeships or apprenticeships
Vocational education and training in South Australia is supported by a training community made up of registered employers, training providers and Apprentice Connect Australia Providers, along with many other key organisations.
mySkillSA aims to provide an integrated skills solution that will connect all those who support the traineeship or apprenticeship.
The new system provides a 360-view of a traineeship or apprenticeship, keeping everyone on the same page with what training is being completed.
Employers, trainees and apprentices will be able to make changes, terminate or complete a traineeship or apprenticeship, ensuring their training contract is easily kept up-to-date.
Improved self-service capability
mySkillSA seeks to empower employers, trainees or apprentices to easily make changes, terminate or complete a traineeship or apprenticeship.
The system takes on a digital-first approach to completing an application and supports the user throughout the process.
As mySkillSA continues to expand, self-service capability will improve, making it easier to keep training information up-to-date and compliant.
Increased business process efficiency
By moving to a simplified digital-first approach, improving business processes becomes possible. As part of the program, we’ve looked for ways to improve the processing of applications.
We’ll also be able to continue to explore opportunities to improve process as new capabilities are added to the system.
Phase 2 - Enhance the skills lifecycle and become better connected
The goal
Replace multiple technologies to expand the 360-view of vocational education and training in mySkillsSA, enhancing the wrap-around support provided by training organisations and providers. This includes exploring the skills lifecycle, investment planning, VET completions, claims and payments, replacing external forms and the Skills and Employment portal.
Training organisations and providers will be able to manage their business with Skills SA through one integrated skills solution.
Status: Foundational work started
What we plan to do
- Replace over 40 systems and processes that support the skills lifecycle.
- Build upon the 360-view of traineeship and apprenticeship management.
- Provide one integrated skills solution for South Australia where all training organisations and providers supporting the skills lifecycle can connect to and manage accredited, non-accredited training and other courses.
- Access to applying for grants, allowances and incentives.
- Improved wrap-around support for students completing vocational and education training.
Phase 3 - Develop an intelligent skills ecosystem
The goal
Explore advanced data and analytics functionality, further replacing current technologies and improve process efficiency. This work supports the Australian Government’s Vet Data Streamlining program, exploring integration and enhancement opportunities.
Status: Foundational work started
What we plan to do
- Develop mySkillsDataHub, using data assets including business models, AI, analytics and reporting.
- Move from legacy on-premises systems to modern cloud-based infrastructure.
- Improve data quality and seek enhancements during collection points to ensure high-quality data standards are maintained.
- Develop a holistic enterprise performance management tool that will provide end-to-end administration to support South Australia’s skills priorities and financial management.
- Connect with VET Data Streamlining program and seek improvements to support national skills and training reporting, looking for improved outcomes and efficiencies.
- Identify, document and implement improvements to mySkillsSA based on what was learned during Phase 1 and 2.