New views on competency – comment by CEO Craig Robertson

What happens when you mix competency with budget rules in the so called Canberra Bubble?

For competency, it depends whether you are an economist, efficiency expert or educationalist.

The economist only cares about the outcome because competitive self-serving producers will organise the inputs. The efficiency guru will look at the quickest and cheapest way to get to that competency, and prides himself (because it usually is) on stripping out elements of the process. The educationalist views the competency as the target they are aiming for and she (because it usually is) puts her effort into constructing an engaging and enlightened pathway for a learner to reach it.

Budget rules? Any new expenditure must be offset by savings elsewhere.

To answer my own question, let me tell a story, fictional of course, and pretend it’s about me.

In 2012, a sharp young man told me that I was an Adonis-in-waiting and I just needed six months at the gym to realise my true potential! I was offered a free iPad to sign on the spot – to track my progress, he told me. “Here’s a loan to pay the six-month membership upfront,” he offered. “Once you get those modelling contracts it’ll be easy to pay it off.” I signed. Who wouldn’t?

The lender didn’t seem to mind. They only warned about the ‘twenty per cent rule’. “Once you’re past twenty per cent of your membership period there’s no money back”. They had endorsed the gym, so I saw it as trustworthy. If the gym folded during the six-months, there was insurance, I was told, to forgive any unused loan or to transfer me to another gym to finish my Adonis transformation!

That was five years ago. The good life intervened. My Adonis six-pack is more like a keg and the gym has just closed.

I’m still paying off the loan, slowly, mind you, as those modelling jobs didn’t come my way.

Am I at fault? The economist tells me I knowingly entered into the arrangement, didn’t use the gym services that were on offer for the six months, so view it as sunk costs. The efficiency expert left town some time ago because a project he advised on went off the rails – I hear he’s now on the circuit as a motivational speaker. The educationalist took me in at her gym, even though she didn’t need to, and is giving me free sessions to help me realise my dream.

It seems I’m not the only aspiring Adonis. I’m told lots of loans went through that gym – over one billion dollars!

The lender is mighty annoyed, I hear. Well at least they are fearing where the offsets are coming from.

They’re blaming the insurer, I’ve heard. “The six-months is open ended,” they’ve said “except for calculating the no money back point,” they add. “That’s how the competency system works, so you owe for the unused loans,” I’ve heard they demand.

And what about the gym? They loved the twenty per cent rule. I hear the owner skipped the country with the cash and is sunning himself on the Seychelles on his pat-malone.

This ends the fictional story.

The answer: Competency is a fungible term to fight back against inconvenient truths, especially where cash is involved! Little wonder VET is in a mess.

I’ll see some of you at the training awards this Thursday evening, keg in tow.