The Inspector-General for Emergency Management recommends that Emergency Management Victoria streamlines the existing suite of work underway to identify gaps in the sector's capability and capacity to deliver a comprehensive sector-wide capability development strategy for operational and strategic personnel – including volunteers – that considers:
a) all capabilities identified through the Victorian Preparedness Framework and additional strategic emergency management capabilities
b) all capability development mechanisms (including accreditation, work-based learning, training and exercising).
EMV will review the current training and accreditation program for incident management personnel, to inform an action plan that enables the building and sustainment of the sectors capability requirements into the future.
To deliver 10YOR Action 4.4 and 10YOR Action 4.5, EMV engaged consultants to:
- review the state’s Incident Management Team (IMT) training and accreditation system and produce a report with findings and recommendations (August 2021)
- develop a Training and Development Masterplan that provides a strategic and consistent approach to training and professional development for emergency management personnel (November 2021).
Both the IMT review and the Training and Development Masterplan draw on consultation conducted with agencies during 2021. The Emergency Management Capability and Capacity Steering Committee (EMCCSC) provides oversight of the project.
During 2022 EMV consolidated the IMT review and the Training and Development Masterplan into a Learning Reform Action Plan (LRAP). To develop the LRAP, in March 2022 EMV held workshops with subject matter experts to identify and prioritise training deliverables. Further workshops were held in May 2022 to align training courses with emergency management roles.
The LRAP aims to increase skills and build capability across the emergency management sector, focusing on five key areas:
- course development
- data sharing
- exercise and simulation delivery
- leadership, coaching and mentoring development
- Victorian Emergency Management Institute enhancements.
EMCCSC members provided feedback on the LRAP and its accompanying communications and engagement plan in June 2022. Following the consideration of this feedback, the LRAP and communications and engagement plan were both endorsed by EMCCSC at its September 2022 meeting. EMV plans to coordinate monthly updates to the EMCCSC on the progress of work completed under the LRAP.
IMT resourcing is being considered as part of the Emergency Management Operating Model Review led by EMV. Refer to 10YOR Action 4.3 for more information.