Planning for austerity in FE

Times are tough and getting tougher.

At such times some businesses stop trading. Some retrench. Some cut back. Some take stock and reinvent themselves.

Guess which ones are best placed to make the most of the current situation and to respond to new situations as they arise?

Of course, it’s the businesses that reinvent themselves.

Reinvention is just another way of talking about aligning yourself with your market.

In business, when the market changes, the rest of us have to change, too.

As colleges and other providers look to reinvent themselves, there's a very important question to ask.

What exactly does the market want?

Most organisations out there want, first, to survive and second to be ready to take advantage of opportunities as they appear.

This means your organisation needs a value proposition that is built around two themes.

• How will working with your organisation help an employer to be more likely to be around in two years’ time?
• How will working with your organisation help an employer to be well placed to seize opportunities in the coming months?

The answer is no longer built around training, qualifications or even skills. Neither is it a response built around helping employers to meet legislative requirements. Today, the answer to the question has to be about helping the employer directly.

Most people in business know that there are three things their customers will buy.

These are:

• Guidance and support on how to make more money.
• Guidance and support on how to keep more of the money they make.
• Guidance and support on developing their capacity to do the two activities above.

Now’s the time to re-examine your key message to employers.

Does our key message address all three of these issues?

If it does, you can expect your business to grow even in difficult times. If it doesn’t, then promoting your products and services is going to be an uphill struggle at any time, even when you’re “selling” free programmes. It will just be more difficult now.

Two action points come out of this.

The first is to make sure you are offering to deliver real value to employers. The second is to make sure that employers recognise the value you are offering.

So check out how you promote your organisation to employers and if they see things in the same way that you do.

Do this quickly, because it's part of your process of planning for austerity, and today no one in FE has any time to waste.

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