Skills for Good - November 2025: Setting Careerforce up for success, Community at the heart, and more

Tēnā koutou

After just over three years, we are now into our penultimate month as a business division of Te Pūkenga. A key focus currently is preparing for our transition into the yet-to-be established Industry Skills Board (ISB) on 1 January, just the next stage in our RoVE (Reform of Vocational Education) journey that began in 2019. In anticipation of this transition, we are making some changes to our organisational structure that we believe will set us up for longer term success, both within the ISB and beyond. You can read more about these changes in the story that follows. While this transition and our organisational changes have some impact upon our Careerforce whānau, we do not expect any disruption for our employers and learners as we close out 2025 and look forwards with optimism into 2026.

As also detailed below, we are in the unfortunate position of increasing the enrolment fees across our programmes, the first increase since at least 2016. We understand the persistent cost pressures that face our sectors and have endeavoured to keep these increases to a minimum. We are also providing notification to allow you the opportunity to get new enrolments in before the increases take effect on 22 December.

Over the last month, you will have received an invite to participate in our ninth annual employer survey – this survey closes off this coming Sunday, and if you haven’t done so already, I encourage you to take a few minutes to complete the survey. I can assure you that we take on and act upon your feedback, and I firmly believe that the consistent improvement in overall satisfaction across the years that the survey has been running can be attributed to this.

For us right now, it feels like the year is ramping up, but I sincerely hope that you and your kaimahi are able to ease into the festive period that we are all now so eagerly awaiting.

Ngā mihi nui

Rod Bentham
Executive Director, Careerforce

Careerforce is making changes to its organisational structure to ensure we remain sustainable and future-ready as we transition into the Health and Community Industry Skills Board (ISB) on 1 January 2026. These changes follow extensive consultation and reflect our commitment to supporting better outcomes for employers and learners.

Why the changes?

Financial sustainability: Lower enrolments and reduced TEC funding from 2026 mean we must realign our structure, including a small net reduction in staffing.
Operational effectiveness: A new organisational structure that will improve role clarity, collaboration, and efficiency.
Future readiness: Post our transition into the ISB, we then expect to transition to an industry-governed Private Training Establishment (PTE), continuing to deliver high-quality, workplace-based training.

What this means for you:

Employers: A dedicated Employer Partnerships team, clearer support pathways, and a focus on building employer capability.
Learners: A dedicated Learner Success team, expanded support roles, equity-focused initiatives, and improved pastoral care through regionally based advisors.

These changes will position Careerforce to better serve Aotearoa’s health and community sectors, now and into the future. If you have any questions about these changes, please contact your Careerforce Advisor.

Thank you to those of you who have completed this year’s survey. For those who haven’t, you still have time, as it remains open until this Sunday, 30 November 2025.

There are two ways to complete the survey:

1. Find the personalised survey invite that was sent to your email address, or the subsequent reminders (sent from survey.admin@carteblanche.co.nz). Please also check your spam/junk folders.

2. We have also created a generic survey link (non-personalised), which saves you having to find the personalised email invite. Click here to complete the survey now, and please share this link with relevant colleagues who also work with Careerforce to support your workforce development.

The survey should only take you 10-15 minutes to complete (depending on how much you want to say!).

As a reminder, the survey is conducted by an external research company, Carte Blanche, and all responses are completely anonymous.

Each 20th survey completion receives a $50 Prezzy Card voucher.

Fresh from completing her Diploma in Leadership and Management with Careerforce, Katene Morris is already putting her learning into action.

The Community Coordinator at a kaupapa Māori health provider in Ōtaki says she’s found new confidence and practical tools to support her community mahi.

For Katene, no two days are ever the same. As part of Te Puna Oranga o Ōtaki’s ‘Special Projects’ team – affectionately known as the “pick and mix team,” her role spans everything from housing and education to food support, community events, and kaumātua wellbeing.

Katene’s journey into leadership came with encouragement from her manager, who saw her potential early on.

“My manager brought the Careerforce Diploma in Leadership and Management to my attention,” she says. “At first, I thought, ‘I’m not good enough for that, I’m not a manager.’ But she kept saying, ‘you never know where you’ll be in a few years, and I see you as a manager here.”

“I’d be learning about compliance or leadership styles, and then the next day I’d be applying it at work. It also helped me understand our organisation better – things like why certain decisions are made by our operations manager or CEO. It really opened my eyes.”

Now that she’s completed her diploma, Katene says her focus is on applying what she’s learned. “For now, I just want to put everything I learned into practice. There’s so much that will benefit me in my role,” she says.

We are making changes to Careerforce enrolment fees, effective from Monday, 22 December 2025. These changes reflect a combination of increasing operational costs and reduced funding levels for work-based learning in 2026.

Key Changes (all fees incl GST)

Level 2 Health & Wellbeing, and Cleaning programme enrolment fees will increase to $150*, remaining significantly lower than fee levels in 2017 ($200).
Level 3 Health & Wellbeing, and Cleaning programme enrolment fees will increase to $220*, remaining lower than fee levels in 2017 ($230).
Level 4 Apprenticeship and Level 5 Diploma programme enrolment fees will increase to $2,250 (from $2,000), the first increase since their introduction across 2016 and 2017 respectively.
Short/Specialised Courses: Programmes with 20 credits or fewer (including Dementia Care LCP) will be $150*, and those with more than 20 credits will be $220*.

*Employer-led pricing
The full domestic price list, effective 22 December 2025, can be found here.

We are providing advance notice to allow an opportunity for you to enrol learners before the fee increases take effect. To be eligible, Careerforce must receive training agreements by Friday, 19 December 2025. This allows us time to process these enrolments before the Christmas shutdown.

If you have any queries, please contact your Careerforce Workplace Advisor.

Remember - we're currently offering 50% off enrolment fees for selected apprenticeship programmes
For a few more days, enrolments are now priced at just $1,000 (incl. GST). That's a saving of $1,000 for the following programmes until 30 November 2025. Plus, beat the 2026 fee increase.

We occasionally receive feedback about learners enrolling in other provider programmes on the misnomer that they offer shorter durations and that learners can be awarded their qualifications faster.

One of the greatest strengths of work-based learning programmes is their inherent flexibility, and the recognition that the learner is a staff member first and foremost. While all Careerforce programmes have expected durations (based on a TEC formula), they are ultimately competency based, and the sooner the learner can demonstrate the required competencies to the expected standard in the workplace, the sooner they can be awarded their qualification.

Some learners will finish faster than the expected duration, and some will finish slower – it comes down to their prior experience, their available study time, and their levels of motivation to complete.

Our encouragement is that if you or a learner is considering an alternative programme on the basis of shorter completion duration, question if the mode of training (e.g, online) will provide the training outcomes you require at your workplace, and/or the impacts on the staff member’s actual work role.

For more reasons on why Careerforce continues to support over 2000 employers, and over 15,000 learners annually, check out The Careerforce Difference.

Don't forget that new learners can kickstart their learning by enrolling in a 'Good To Go' online onboarding session. These one-hour sessions give learners an introduction to Careerforce, work-based learning, and how to get started. We ask that you encourage your learners to attend. Evening sessions are also available. The next Good to Go sessions will be on 28 January 2026.

For any new learners that missed the last onboarding sessions, please encourage them to catch up by watching this short video that highlights what was covered.

Whangārei’s Northland Events Centre was buzzing with excitement as 70 ākonga (learners) gathered with over 200 whānau, colleagues, employers and assessors to recognise their achievement of NZQA qualifications. Hosted by Careerforce, the event marked Careerforce’s first regional graduation and acknowledged the resilience shown following Cyclone Gabrielle.

Graduates completed programmes from Level 2 Certificates to Level 4 Apprenticeships across sectors such as Cleaning, Youth Work, Mental Health, Whānau and Community, and Aged Care. Apprenticeship Advisor Deb White said it was a privilege to celebrate with learners she had supported for more than two years.

Careerforce helped ākonga succeed through a range of supports including Achieve Study Hubs, Pacific Talanoa, Dementia workshops, Noho Marae and Wānanga. Many travelled long distances to attend these sessions and credited them as key to their success. Northern Employer Services Manager Laloifi Ripley said these initiatives built strong connections and a sense of belonging.

Graduates were welcomed on stage to receive their certificates and a native plant symbolising growth and resilience. A roaming microphone allowed attendees to share reflections, with many speaking about increased confidence and pride. General Manager Stephanie Clark encouraged graduates to continue learning and leading wellbeing in their workplaces.

Click on the image to the left to hear Danny Fearon and Avril Hunt introduce themselves.

As Wellbeing Advisors at Careerforce, their role is to walk alongside learners who may be finding things tough, whether that’s with study, work, or life outside of learning that might be impacting their learning.

Support is flexible: by phone, text, email, Microsoft Teams, or face to face (depending on location).

Learners can complete the self-referral form here or can email us with any questions at wellbeingsupport@careerforce.org.nz

(*Excluding Gateway learners)

Learners can also access free confidential counselling through Vitae, a professional employee assistance provider, available 24/7 https://vitae.co.nz/Te-Pukenga-wbl/

The Careerforce offices will be closed for the traditional holiday period. Offices close from 25 December and re-open on Monday 5 January 2026.

For those of you with learners using Aka Toi, our online learning and assessment platform, this will be available for them to continue their learning during the holiday period. Learners can still work on their assessments over the holidays and submit them to their assessor for marking. Careerforce support won’t however be available from 25 December 2025 until Monday 5 January 2026.