This page provides information and data on the Community Sector and Development sector, which is one component of the Community Services industry.
This sector has six components:
The workforce encompasses a diverse range of job roles and functions. The job roles can involve undertaking operational, service-based and/or supervisory and management activities. This sector often overlaps with other sectors such as Health Services and Disability.
Nationally recognised training for Community Sector and Development occupations is delivered under the CHC – Community Services Training Package.
For more information on Children's Education and Care and Direct Client Care and Support please visit the respective pages.
Information sourced from the most recently available Skills Forecast, the Community Sector and Development IRC’s 2019 Skills Forecast.
All data sources are available at the end of the page.
The Community Sector and Development IRC was not required to submit an annual update to their 2019 Skills Forecast during 2020. As such, the version published in 2019 remains the most recently published Skills Forecast for this industry.
Community Sector and Development IRC
Please note: any employment projections outlined below were calculated by the Australian Bureau of Statistics prior to COVID-19.
The Health Care and Social Assistance industry is the largest employing industry in Australia. In 2020 there were approximately 1.7 million people employed in this industry, which is projected to increase to more than 1.9 million by 2024. Community Sector and Development occupations and job roles form a small part of the overall Health Care and Social Assistance industry.
Within this broader industry, employment levels for the occupations of Welfare Support Workers and Health and Welfare Service Managers have been variable over the past decade. Both of these occupations have a projected increase in employment numbers between 2020 and 2024. There are also a small number of Indigenous Health Workers within this industry. In 2020 there were 1,700 but this is projected to fall to 1,300 by 2024.
There were almost 81,360 program enrolments in Community Sector and Development-related qualifications in 2019 and approximately 21,110 program completions. Both enrolments and completions have risen between 2017 and 2019.
Around 31% of enrolments were at the diploma or higher level, followed by 28% at the certificate III level and 26% at the certificate IV level. About 74% of the qualifications were in Community Services and Coordination, with a further 10% in Youth Work and Youth Justice. The main intended occupation was Welfare Support Workers, followed by Community Worker and Youth worker.
About 45% of the training was delivered by private training providers, with 38% being delivered by TAFE institutes and a further 9% by community education providers. The majority of subjects were funded by Commonwealth and state funding (65%) and domestic fee for service (32%). Close to three-quarters of all training was for students from the three eastern states: Victoria (28%), New South Wales (26%) and Queensland (20%).
The majority of training was delivered in Victoria (37%), New South Wales (28%), and Queensland (18%).
In 2019, there were approximately 740 apprenticeship and traineeship commencements and 310 completions. After a steep decline post 2012, commencements started to rise again in 2016. The main intended occupations for apprentices and trainees were Welfare Support Workers and Community Worker. The largest proportion of apprenticeships and traineeships were reported by the Northern Territory with 23%, followed by Tasmania with 18%, Victoria with 17% and New South Wales with 17%.
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The Community Sector and Development IRC's 2019 Skills Forecast suggests the top priority skills for the sector are all soft skills, ranging from teamwork and communication through to flexibility and self management. The top five identified generic skills are:
According to the job vacancy data, the top requested skills by employers in the sector were communication skills and planning. The most advertised occupations were Health and Welfare Services Managers followed by Enrolled and Mothercraft Nurses. The top employers were the New South Wales Government and the Government of Victoria. The top locations for job advertisements were New South Wales and Victoria.
The Community Sector and Development IRC's 2019 Skills Forecast highlights several challenges the sector has been experiencing which are impacting workforce skills requirements, including:
The above Skills Forecast also reveals that employers have indicated that for occupations in this sector, they are looking for workers with skills so they can care for, empathise and communicate with a range of audiences.
Key findings in the South Australian Community Services Workforce Insights report include:
In the article Environmental Health in Australia: Overlooked and Underrated, the authors remind us that improvements in environmental health have had the most significant impact on health status. In Australia, life expectancy has significantly increased through provision of vaccination, safe food and drinking water, appropriate sewage disposal and other environmental health measures. Yet the profession that is instrumental in delivering environmental health services at the local community level is overlooked. Rarely featuring in mainstream media, the successes of Environmental Health Officers (EHOs) are invisible to the general public. As a consequence, students entering tertiary education are unaware of the profession and its significant role in society. This has resulted in there being too few EHOs to meet the current regulatory requirements, much less deal with the emerging environmental health issues arising from changing global conditions including climate change. To futureproof Australian society and public health this workforce issue, and the associated oversight of environmental health, must be addressed now.
Workforce strengths and gaps, workers' skills and skill development needs, and perceptions of service capacity and sustainability challenges are explored in the National Survey of Workers in the Domestic, Family and Sexual Violence Sectors report. Key findings include:
Volunteering and Settlement in Australia: a Snapshot states that volunteering is critical to delivering the Australian Government's priorities of building strong and resilient communities, by encouraging economic participation, mitigating isolation and loneliness, and increasing social inclusion, community resilience, participation and social cohesion. Volunteering has woven itself into the fabric of everyday life, and Australian society increasingly depends on volunteering activities and programs. This report is based on a National Survey on Volunteering and Settlement in Australia and key findings include:
The Handbook for Grassroots Organisations Helping People Experiencing Homelessness recommends training volunteers in understanding homelessness, working with vulnerable people, first aid and mental health first aid, and understanding complex trauma. The need to provide information on self-care so volunteers will be able to process and cope with difficult situations they may experience is also critical. The handbook includes a list of relevant training courses.
Emergency Volunteering 2030: Views from Managers in Volunteerism identifies a range of issues impacting volunteer sustainability, including:
To re-engage volunteers as part of retention strategies, different approaches to restructuring and tailoring training of ongoing volunteers include: consolidating training; developing online training modules; introducing more accredited training; and making diverse and interesting training opportunities available to volunteers.
The Digital Mentoring in Australian Communities report focuses on the important role of digital mentors who help others acquire digital ability, facilitating learning between end users and digital technologies. Digital mentoring takes many forms. It may involve people volunteering time and skills to help others, or community-based workers going 'above and beyond' to help customers in libraries and post offices, for example. Digital mentoring ranges from more formal and structured programs to less formal and everyday activities.
There is a growing sentiment in the community sector that mentors play a vital role in improving digital ability, and therefore contribute significantly to the broader digital inclusion effort. There is also recognition that while digital mentoring can be rewarding, it can also be challenging for both the mentor and the mentee. Mentors need specific skills to deal with the technical, social, cultural and ethical issues that can arise during digital mentoring interactions. Many of these skills can be acquired organically over time through experience. However, having a holistic approach to supporting mentors could enable mentees to reach their goals and learn digital skills more quickly, and improve overall outcomes for the community.
The article Transcending the Professional-Client Divide: Supporting Young People with Complex Support Needs Through Transitions, highlights the importance of human-centric skills for youth workers to connect with young people and bring about positive outcomes. Key skills include:
The Understanding the Experience of Social Housing Pathways report explores the ways households experience pathways into, within and out of the Australian social housing system. An increasing body of research locates the successful delivery of human services in the quality of the relationships that are formed between workers and clients. Service users stress the importance of finding the 'right' worker to achieving meaningful outcomes, while inconsistency in workers or high turnover in staff are identified as destructive. Implicit in the provision of housing assistance are ideas of support and care. Being 'care-full' is intrinsic to good practice, while poor practice is often 'care-less'. This research found that although housing and related services might be provided to tenants, these services were not necessarily provided with care. Tenants shared many examples of care-less practice that was disrespectful, alienating and hurtful. Examples of care-full practice, where they did exist, were mostly related to the establishment and preservation of good relationships between tenants and individual workers. Such relationships were vital for tenants but could be undermined by a lack of resources and burnout amongst workers.
The Experience of Volunteers During the Early Stages of the COVID-19 Pandemic provides data on the experience of Australian volunteers during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, including the effect on changes in volunteering and the wellbeing and mental health of volunteers using data collected in the April 2020 ANUPoll using the Life in Australia probability online panel. The economic downturn and increased social isolation being experienced by many increased the demand for certain forms of volunteering. If the level of volunteering in Australia declines substantially during the spread of COVID-19 and does not pick up as physical distancing restrictions are eased, then there are likely to be large flow-on effects for Australians that rely on volunteers, for the organisations that are supported by volunteering, and for the volunteers themselves.
In their media release Community Visitors Volunteers Must Receive Dementia-Specific Training, Dementia Australia called on the federal government to provide dementia-specific education to staff and volunteers as part of the announcement of $10 million to the Community Visitors Scheme. The funding, part of a $1.1 billion package to assist the devastating impacts of COVID-19, will help to ensure that older Australians in aged care are not socially isolated despite visiting restrictions. It is critical that staff and volunteer visitors, who will connect with older people online and by phone, are trained and well-equipped to provide the best possible care for the 459,000 Australians living with dementia.
Below is a list of industry-relevant research, organisations and associations. Hyperlinks have been included where available.
Community Services Workforce Insights – South Australian Training and Skills Commission (TASC)
Community Visitors Volunteers Must Receive Dementia-Specific Training [media release] – Dementia Australia
Digital Mentoring in Australian Communities – Michael Dezuanni, Amber Marshall, Amy Cross, Jean Burgess and Peta Mitchell
Emergency Volunteering 2030: Views from Managers in Volunteerism – Blythe McLennan and Tarn Kruger
Emergency Volunteering 2030: Views from the Community Sector – Tarn Kruger and Blythe McLennan
Environmental Health in Australia: Overlooked and Underrated – H. Whiley, E. Willis, J. Smith and K. Ross
Gippsland's Future Health and Community Services Workforce – Latrobe City
Handbook for Grassroots Organisations Helping People Experiencing Homelessness – City of Melbourne
National Survey of Workers in the Domestic, Family and Sexual Violence Sectors – Natasha Cortis, Megan Blaxland, Jan Breckenridge, Kylie Valentine, Natasha Mahoney, Donna Chung, Reinie Cordier, Yu-wei Chen and Damian Green
The Experience of Volunteers During the Early Stages of the COVID-19 Pandemic – Nicholas Biddle and Matthew Gray
The Social and Economic Sustainability of WA's Rural Volunteer Workforce – Kirsten Holmes, Amanda Davies, Leonie Lockstone-Binney, Mary O'Halloran and Faith Ong
Transcending the Professional-Client Divide: Supporting Young People with Complex Support Needs Through Transitions – Kathy Ellem, Louisa Smith, Susan Baidawi, Adrienne McGhee and Leanne Dowse
Understanding the Experience of Social Housing Pathways – Kathleen Flanagan, Iris Levin, Selina Tually, Meera Varadharajan, Julia Verdouw, Debbie Faulkner, Ariella Meltzer and Anthea Vreugdenhil
Volunteering and Settlement in Australia: a Snapshot – Volunteering Australia and the Settlement Council of Australia (SCoA)
Aged and Community Services Australia (ACSA)
Australian Childhood Foundation
Australian Community Workers Association (ACWA)
Australian Council of Social Service (ACOSS)
Centre for Excellence in Child and Family Welfare
Council to Homeless Persons (CHP)
Environmental Health Australia (EHA)
Spiritual Care Australia (SCA)
Australasian Youth Justice Administrators (AYJA)
Australian Services Union (ASU)
Department of Employment 2020, Employment Projections, available from the Labour Market Information Portal
Australian Bureau of Statistics 2020, Employed persons by Industry group of main job (ANZSIC), Sex, State and Territory, November 1984 onwards, 6291.0.55.003 - EQ06, viewed 1 August 2020 https://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/DetailsPage/6291.0.55.003May%202020?OpenDocument
Australian Bureau of Statistics 2020, Employed persons by Occupation unit group of main job (ANZSCO), Sex, State and Territory, August 1986 onwards, 6291.0.55.003 - EQ08, viewed 1 August 2020 https://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/DetailsPage/6291.0.55.003May%202020?OpenDocument
Australian Bureau of Statistics 2017, 2016 Census – employment, income and unpaid work, TableBuilder. Findings based on use of ABS TableBuilder data.
Training data has been extracted from the National VET Provider Collection, Total VET Students and Courses from the following training packages or qualifications:
This includes superseded qualifications and training packages.
Data covers a range of selected student and training characteristics in the following categories and years:
Total VET students and courses data is reported for the calendar year. Program enrolments are the qualifications, courses and skill-sets in which students are enrolled in a given period. For students enrolled in multiple programs, all programs are counted. Program completion indicates that a student has completed a structured and integrated program of education or training. Location data uses student residence. Subject enrolment is registration of a student at a training delivery location for the purpose of undertaking a module, unit of competency or subject. For more information on the terms and definitions, please refer to the Total VET students and courses: terms and definitions document.
Low counts (less than 5) are not reported to protect client confidentiality.
Percentages are rounded to one decimal place. This can lead to situations where the total sum of proportions in a chart may not add up to exactly 100%.
CHC Community Services Training Package apprentice and trainee data has been extracted from the National Apprentice and Trainee Collection, including:
Priority skills data have been extracted from the Community Sector and Development IRC’s 2019 Skills Forecast.
Job vacancy data have been extracted from Burning Glass Technologies 2020, Labor Insight Real-time Labor Market Information Tool, Burning Glass Technologies, Boston, viewed July 2020, https://www.burning-glass.com.
Data shown represent most requested generic skills, occupations and employers according to internet job postings in Australia between July 2017 and June 2020 filtered by ANZSIC and ANZSCO classification levels listed below.
