Business North September 2020

20 | Volume 19 | Issue 3 businessnorth DEVELOPMENT - AUCKLAND » Wynyard Edge Alliance / America’s Cup Programme helps workers gain skills, confidence Tina Rose, director of Education Unlimited, front left, and graduates of the My Edge ESOL and Literacy Programme. Karen Phelps I dentifying a gap in Wynyard Edge Alliance (WEA) team members’ understanding of health and safe- ty led to the development of a successful adult education and training programme that has seen 11 people learn valuable new skills. “International research shows that around 40% of adult New Zealanders do not have the commu- nication skills they need to perform their jobs well,” says Tina Rose, director of Education Unlimited, the company that delivered the programme. “These working people have limited numeracy and literacy skills, which is a major stumbling block for a large proportion of the population.” The My Edge ESOL and Literacy programme aimed to address language gaps for one ESOL group and for the other group included Write Up, Speak Up, Be Safe – a fit for purpose micro- credential. The programme focused on improving confidence and building critical communication skills that empowered team members to speak up and communicate at pre-starts, toolbox health and safety gatherings as well as in their daily work and personal lives. “These scenarios involve complex language you don’t hear every day. A barrier or perception is that workers feel that if they admit they don’t know something, they will be at risk of losing their job. “If a person doesn’t understand something but doesn’t have the confidence to speak up this cre- ates health and safety issues. So it’s important to address confidence and communication skills as well,” says Tina. • to page 22 Quality | Performance | Reliability