If you’re from a Registered Training Organisation (RTO), you’ll know how challenging it can be to find amazing industry-experienced trainers who also hold a TAE40116 or TAE40122 Certificate IV in Training and Assessment.

RTOs recruiting trainers often struggle to find the person in the centre of the diagram below.

A key feature of the Australian Vocational Education and Training (VET) system is that the teaching and assessing is done by highly experienced industry professionals. Teaching skills and quality are important, but so too is the knowledge and experience of the teacher in the industry they teach.

A challenge lies in the fact that these individuals are typically fully occupied in their respective industries. The idea of pursuing a Certificate IV in Training and Assessment, with the hope of securing a position as a trainer/assessor, may seem daunting.

Having no prior teaching experience, they may not know if they will even enjoy being a trainer.

One solution is to hire a trainer without a Certificate IV in Training and Assessment and supervise them as they work towards completing it.

While a good solution, there a specific requirements the RTO must follow.

Requirements in the Standards for RTOs mean supervised trainers must either:

• Be actively working towards a TAE40122 Certificate IV in Training and Assessment (or TAE Diploma)
• Hold one of the relevant skill sets such as the TAESS00028 Work Skill Instructor Skill Set.

What must an RTO do to supervise a trainer without a TAE?

As a TAE provider, we often hear about the challenges RTOs face in finding exceptional trainer talent.

So how can you bring a stellar industry champion in as a trainer?

Once the RTO is satisfied that the new trainer holds one of the relevant skill sets or is actively working towards their Certificate IV, a supervision plan must be put in place and monitored.

Don’t have a plan? We’ve got you covered – see below.

Free Policy + Supervision Plan Template Pack

If, as an RTO employer, you want an out of the box trainer supervision policy, procedure and plan template, here’s one you can use for free:

Trainer Supervision Policy

Trainer Supervision Plan Template

Feel free to borrow this!

Use it, adapt it, integrate it with your existing systems – no permission needed.

If you find it useful, please keep Accellier Education in mind for your TAE Trainer qualifications.

How to use

Great care has been taken to ensure this tool will help RTOs comply nicely with the requirements of clauses 1.17 – 1.20 of the Standards for RTOs 2015. It has been painstakingly mapped to these requirements. Please note however, it comes with no guarantee of any kind. There is no magic bullet for compliance. It’s just a helpful tool that when used/adapted properly, may help you comply.

This tool assumes your RTO already has a robust process in place to manage trainer compliance (i.e. meeting your obligations under Clauses 1.13 to 1.16 – “Employ skilled trainers and assessors.”)

1. Download the documents and edit to fit with your RTO’s style-guide. To make it easier, simply do a ‘find-and-replace’ for [RTO Name] including the brackets, substituting with your RTO’s name.
2. Identify your industry professional who you want to be supervised. They are referred to in the documents as the supervised trainer, or trainer.
3. Make sure they hold at least the TAESS00028 Work Skill Instructor Skill Set or are actively working towards their Certificate IV in Training and Assessment
4. Identify your supervisor, ensuring they are appropriately qualified to do so (i.e., they will need their TAE40116/TAE40122 Certificate IV in Training and Assessment along with the other requirements of the standards).
5. Complete the plan template, in consultation with all relevant parties, ensuring all are in agreement with the implications of such a plan.
6. Obtain signatures showing agreement and save a copy, along with all relevant evidence in the usual place that you store all of your trainer files.

Don’t ‘set-and-forget!’

This is a way to get an great industry person in front of your students. It is not a permanent trainer arrangement.

If the supervised trainer is going to stick around for a while and provide ongoing training, they should be working toward their full TAE40122 Certificate IV in Training and Assessment as soon as possible.

Don’t be in a situation where, after 18 months, you have someone who is enrolled in their Cert IV but has barely completed a unit!

Once working under supervision at an RTO, the Certificate IV in Training and Assessment becomes a much easier qualification to complete.

Get your industry trainers qualified

If you’d like us to help your industry experienced people work towards getting the Certificate IV in Training and Assessment or one of the TAE skill sets, let us know below.