Stand Up And Be Counted – Prove We Exist

Following on from the creative industries report, it’s become clear that the ‘computer games’ industry in Scotland needs to take itself more seriously, make itself more visible and ensure we are included in any research.

Here’s your first chance.  Creative Skillset has commissioned a survey looking at the skills and experience required specifically within the games market.  As it grows and evolves and the skills needed change.  If this is to mean anything beyond programmer / artist, they need your input.

If you’ve ever complained about the difficulty of finding graduates with appropriate skills, or had trouble sourcing employees, then you should contribute to this.  In addition to the survey, the organisation is planning a focus group in Glasgow on October 4th.  They’ll even pay your travel and feed you.

Here’s a brief description from the survey team…

Are you having trouble recruiting people with the right skills and experience?

Creative Skillset is working on a project affecting the future training in Interactive Media and are very keen that you are invited to take part – your expertise would be invaluable in ensuring that we raise the skills levels of new recruits.

Creative Skillset are reviewing National Occupational Standards for Interactive Media. These set the Standards for related training and qualifications throughout the UK. The better the standards, the more relevant and flexible the qualifications we can develop to ensure people are trained up with the right skills that meet the needs of the employers in the sector. Ultimately they could become the building blocks of an Apprenticeship for the industry.

Working together to achieve the best results

To make sure we are creating the best possible standards we are speaking with industry professionals to identify how your industry and working practices have changed in the last five years. Would you be willing to join this? We are organising a meeting that we hope will see interactive media professionals sharing best practice and discussing their roles and experiences with their peers. Critically, it will enable us to get the views of people from across the industry on how they do their jobs. We realise this is a busy period for you but would really appreciate you giving your time to come together to discuss best practice in your industry. We are planning a focus group on Thursday October 4th from 11-1pm at the Creative Skillset office in Glasgow. We will of course reimburse your standards travel expense and lunch will be included.

If you would like to contribute by attending the focus group, by telephone interview or by taking part in an online consultation, please contact Mike Shillabeer.

I hope you see the value in getting these Standards right and hope you will join us to improve prospects for the industry.

We did blog this before, however after talking to the team behind the survey is would seem, staggeringly, that no one bothered.

We need to bother.  Otherwise as far as the wider world is concerned, we don’t exist, have no real recruitment requirements and we’re once again working from a position of absolutely no relevance.

You can find the survey here.  Can we ask you really nicely to take ten minutes to contribute?  Please?