Skills Show Australia
Collaboration for innovation
WorldSkills Australia are on a mission to break the stigma around skill-based careers. Believing that ‘skills drive the future’, WorldSkills know that choosing careers is one of the most important decisions a young person will make.
So where do young Australians go to get hands-on experience and learn about skills-based careers? Introducing Skills Show Australia.
Client
WorldSkills Australia
Sector
VET
Services
Brand Strategy
Campaign Visual Identity
Wayfinding
The situation
Not your typical Olympics
WorldSkills Australia hold a bi-annual trade industry event titled the ‘National Championships’—a kind of trade Olympics celebrating excellence in skilled trades.
A valuable event in promoting excellence, the National Championships is limited in its appeal and relevance to audiences outside of the actual competitors and their supporter network.
A hidden gem
Mixed in with the event is a ‘come-and-try’ programme where visiting students can gain valuable experience in what it is like to work in a skills based career, with the opportunity to get hands on – literally – and test drive dozens of different trades and skills through interactive events, workshops and activities, and network with hundreds of industry and educational experts.
Our challenge? To increase the appeal of the event to students.
The challenge
Helping young Australians make informed career choices through Skills Show Australia
Young people have a lot of negative emotions surrounding employment and career choices – anxiety, confusion, stress, frustration etc. Along with the cultural bias against Vocational Education often held by their parents’ generation, young people are not being properly educated on all the options available to them.
To make an informed choice on their career and future, young people need access to industry professionals who actually work in the field. Even better, they need access to an event where they can roll up their sleeves and get hands-on experience to help them discover and understand what a career in skills can provide. Skills Show Australia presents just the right opportunity to do so.
Our job – to flip the negative emotions that young people have surrounding their career choices and turn it into excitement and inspiration. What better way to learn about a career than to test-drive it yourself, and see the best-of-the-best in action?
The solution
More than spectator sport
During a series of product-focused workshops with the WorldSkills Brand and Marketing team, we identified that shifting the focus away from the spectator event, and on to the hands-on nature of learning via discovery, would offer a broader appeal to the target audience – students, their parents and educators.
It’s showtime!
To increase opportunities to market to a much wider audience, while also providing the perfect platform to showcase potential career choices, and support WorldSkills’ goal of shifting common misconceptions around skilled careers – Skills Show Australia was born!
“I’m fortunate to have realised my dream of working in the industry I love but never realised I could also compete nationally and actually represent Australia. It’s an amazing experience.”
Gaby Ware, 2017 Skillaroo, Hairdressing
