The Development of Strategic Information And Communications Technology Skills
Project Proposal

A STRATEGIC CONTRIBUTION TO THE COMMUNICATIONS SECTOR FOR ECONOMIC GROWTH AND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT

Prepared for submission to the National Skills Authority for consideration as a strategic skills development project in the

National Skills Fund

September 2001

Version 7.3

Table of Contents

Executive Summary

Introduction

Anticipated benefits

Black Economic Empowerment______

Empowerment of SMMEs______

Research and Development______

Objectives

Strategic Objectives______

Specific Outcomes______

Stakeholder Analysis

Cape IT Initiative (CITI)______

Bandwidth Barn______

Department of Communications (DoC)______

Gauteng Innovation Hub______

ISSA______

Tactics for Project Operation, Methodology

Products (deliverables), product flow and stage structuring of project

Major milestones and dates

Detailed stage activity

Organisational information

Risk Mitigation Strategy

Budget and cash flow

Controls

Reporting

Quality Assurance______

Document and Object Management

Quality

References______

Appendix A Background on the ISSA Facility______Appendix A,

Definition and Output of Courses______Appendix A,

History, track record and achievements______Appendix A,

Appendix B Composition of the Project Consultative Committee (PCC)______Appendix B,

Appendix C Financial Management of the Project______Appendix C,

Accounting System______Appendix C,

Financial Reports______Appendix C,

Purchasing______Appendix C,

Payments______Appendix C,

Cash Management______Appendix C,

Audit Trail______Appendix C,

Asset Management______Appendix C,

Table of Contents (Continued)

Appendix D Project Office Procurement Procedures______Appendix D,

Contract procurement procedures______Appendix D,

Supplemental Procedures______Appendix D,

Specifications and Terms of References______Appendix D,

Sourcing Process______Appendix D,

Tendering______Appendix D,

Tender Evaluation______Appendix D,

Contract Process______Appendix D,

Quality Assurance and Inspection______Appendix D,

Transportation______Appendix D,

Hand-over______Appendix D,

Appendix E A Communications Plan for the Project______Appendix E,

Introduction______Appendix E,

Project Environment______Appendix E,

Historical Context and Current Environment______Appendix E,

Issue Analysis______Appendix E,

Goal of the Communications Plan______Appendix E,

Purpose of the Communications Plan______Appendix E,

Target Audience of the Communications Plan______Appendix E,

Project Delivery Partners______Appendix E,

Project Stakeholders______Appendix E,

The Beneficiaries______Appendix E,

Messages of the Communications Plan______Appendix E,

Two-way Communications Fostered______Appendix E,

Messages for the Project Delivery Partners______Appendix E,

Messages for the Project Stakeholders______Appendix E,

Messages for the Beneficiaries______Appendix E,

Communications Matrix______Appendix E,

Tactics Of The Communications Plan______Appendix E,

Strategic Considerations______Appendix E,

Tactical Plan______Appendix E,

Implementation Plan______Appendix E,

Production of Communication Products______Appendix E,

Schedule______Appendix E,

CONCLUSION______Appendix E,

Appendix F Project E-mail Policy______Appendix F,

Appendix G Documentation Deliverables______Appendix G,

Appendix H Detailed Project Plan______Appendix H,

Table of Contents (Continued)

Appendix J Documentation Standards and Change Control Procedure______Appendix J,

Scope______Appendix J,

File Names______Appendix J,

Generic Description of File______Appendix J,

Additional Descriptor______Appendix J,

Date of Creation/Update______Appendix J,

Version______Appendix J,

Examples______Appendix J,

Word Documents______Appendix J,

“Normal” Paragraphs______Appendix J,

Footer______Appendix J,

Header______Appendix J,

Headings______Appendix J,

Excel Spreadsheets______Appendix J,

PowerPoint Presentations______Appendix J,

Change Control (Change Management)______Appendix J,

What Constitutes a Document______Appendix J,

Document Storage______Appendix J,

Document, Spreadsheet, Database and Presentation Initiation Form______Appendix J,

ISETT SETA ISSA Skill Development ProposalPage 1
Version 7.3 September 2001

Project Proposal

Executive Summary

This project stands at the forefront of providing major economic spin-offs in positioning the ISSA as one of the major players in the supply of ICT skills particularly at a higher level. The project has the capability of developing into the proposed ICT Institute given sound medium term resources and project management.

The ISETT SETA vision is to develop strategic quality human capital in relation to the needs of the South African ICT Sector that will contribute to social upliftment and the stimulation of economic growth. ICT Technology innovation in social and industrial applications will grow through the SMME development and learnership development that the project seeks to establish. This project then sits at the helm of a challenge to be one of the major public-private initiatives that the country has ever envisaged. Funding and programme relevance can only be realised in partnerships such as this one.

This project seeks to implement a strategic scarce skills programme in Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) Human Resource Development (HRD). This will be achieved by transforming a number of academic courses and modules at the Institute for Space and Software Applications (ISSA) into learnerships. The project cost totals to about R34.7m per annum for the years 2002, 2003 and 2004.

It is the intention to convert a number of the courses offered at ISSA into the following learnerships:

  • Computer Networking Learnership
  • Electronics Engineering Bridging Learnership
  • Telecommunications Learnership
  • Software Engineering Learnership
  • Java-Based System Development Learnership
  • Internet Broadcasting Learnership
  • Smart Card Technology Learnership
  • Computer Virus Monitoring Learnership

Note that, due to resource constraints, the following courses will not be transformed into learnerships at this stage:

  • Remote Sensing
  • Virtual Reality Applied Research.

Introduction

This project seeks implement a strategic scarce skills programme in Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) Human Resource Development (HRD). This will be achieved by transforming a number of academic courses and modules at the Institute for Space and Software Applications (ISSA) into learnerships. The project cost totals to about R34.7m per annum for the years 2002, 2003 and 2004.

The information and communications technology society has emerged as one of the fastest growing areas of the economy, cutting across a wide range of sector domains, as a successor to the industrialisation era. Inherent in this growth is the sudden realisation that strategic skills in the information sector are one of the main drivers of economic and social development. Such are these factors, given the globalisation of economies and growth of information skill applications. These factors are increasingly revealing themselves as tools for competitiveness.

The awakening to this trend by the South African society is largely reflected by the extent of investment made in skills development regarding the domains of information systems, electronics and telecommunications technologies.

This project proposal seeks to address a strategic outcome that can leapfrog South Africa into being a global information economy player, through human development. South Africa boasts of a latent talent in human ICT resources, accumulated out of years of apartheid neglect. The project infrastructure was set up in the Western Cape at the Institute for Satellite and Software Applications (ISSA). ISSA was started by government seed fund through the Department of Communications’ Human Resource Fund, in terms of the Telecommunications Act (Act no. 103 of 1996). The 1998-2000 ISSA activities were in key domains such as:

  • Telecommunications engineering science
  • Software Engineering
  • Networking and systems engineering
  • Satellite Engineering- Remote sensing

The intended links with ISSA in this project’s activities are:

  • the development of learnerships in ICTs,
  • research and innovation in Information and Communications Technologies,
  • ICT SMME incubation and development.

The process of development of these learnerships will be supplemented by a dedicated SMME drive, involving incubator students, through the players in the Western Cape Bandwidth Barn (Cape IT Initiative) and the Gauteng Innovation Hub. Mentorships will be employed as a means of inducing some of these outputs (graduates) into entrepreneurial businesses. This will by design establish an SMME framework to streamline and support the SMME learners with business capabilities on a needs based platform.

Running parallel with, but separate to, this project will be research undertaken by the ISETT SETA (funded by the Department of Labour (DoL)) to determine the industry and sector needs for the outputs, as well as provide insight to the supply base from schools and tertiary institutions. These outcomes will be utilised in planning and reviewing ISSA programmes in the subsequent years.

The funding as proposed in this project will focus on skills development expenditure, whilst the ISSA infrastructure, personnel expenditure and other overheads will be borne by the Department of Communications (DoC), as is the current situation. Furthermore, the management of the institution will continue within its current frame as managed and regulated by the DoC.

It is the intention to convert a number of the courses offered at ISSA into the following learnerships:

  • Computer Networking Learnership
  • Electronics Engineering Bridging Learnership
  • Telecommunications Learnership
  • Software Engineering Learnership
  • Java-Based System Development Learnership
  • Internet Broadcasting Learnership
  • Smart Card Technology Learnership
  • Computer Virus Monitoring Learnership

Note that, due to resource constraints, the following courses will not be transformed into learnerships at this stage:

  • Remote Sensing
  • Virtual Reality Applied Research.

Anticipated benefits

Black Economic Empowerment

One of the main objectives of the project is the empowerment of women and people from the historically disadvantaged communities. Students from this background would first be recruited into the ISSA and thereafter the project will link and induce them to SMMEs, providing them with entrepreneur skills, motivation and opportunities. The Mentorship programme will function centrally to this initiative. This will be undertaken in partnership with the CITI and other role-players. The Gauteng Innovation Hub is perceived to be another of the role players in this domain.

Empowerment of SMMEs

The impetus within the project outcomes will have a tendency of aligning scarce skills in strategic Research and Development to the SMMEs, inducing growth in the process. The SMME will at last find a vehicle for skills injection. This has the potential of capacity enhancement. The ultimate result will be an empowerment to undertake more business initiatives and deliver better, growing their revenue as a spin-off.

Research and Development

A critical feature of the growth of the ICT domain is research and development of new products and applications. This will be achieved through the generation and development of SMMEs, organisations recognised to play an important role in the development and growth of the South African economy. The larger organisations in the private sector will also benefit through this injection of strategic skills. The ISSA has potential to feature quite prominently in this area of generating new skills and applications in South Africa, especially focussing on rural development initiatives using Hi-Technology solutions as well as high-level innovations. An integrated link with the industry, through players such as CITI and the Gauteng Innovation Hub and the broader industry, will serve a great deal in changing the future of ICTs in the country. It is important to note that developed countries spent 3.3% of GDP on and around research and development activities. South Africa at the moment spends 0.8%. An increase in this figure would yield a positive impact on our GDP. It would also help towards the design of new products that are unique to the South African condition.

Objectives

The overall purpose of this project is to produce strategic human resource capabilities for the South African ICT Sector, through the transferable means of learnerships. This will be achieved through transforming existing and new programmes at the ISSA into learnerhips, thereby introducing the workplace component into the educational process.

Strategic Objectives

The following is a breakdown of strategic requirements to which this project is aligned:

Table 1: Strategic Objectives that the Project must be Aligned to

STRATEGIC AREA AND OBJECTIVE
  • Human Resources Development (HRD) Strategy:
  • improving the foundations for human development.
  • improving the supply of high quality (scarce skills) which are responsive to societal and economic needs.
/ ALIGNMENT, RESPONSE AND ACTIVITY
  • The ISSA establishment infrastructure supports the learning environment technically.
  • State-of-the-art Internet and computer laboratories offer a wide range of workplace based applications.
  • Programmes offered to historically disadvantaged graduates with Mathematics, Physics and Applied Mathematics to undergo training in :
  • Computer Networking
  • Electronics Engineering Bridging
  • Telecommunications Engineering
  • Software Engineering

  • Supporting employment and growth through innovation and research
/ Relationship to other projects.
  • High-level research and innovations development
  • Java-Based System Development
  • Internet Broadcasting
  • Smart Card Technology
  • Computer Virus Monitoring
  • The ISSA establishment is capable of posing as a strategic infrastructure in software development.
  • Mentorship support and campus incubators for SMMEs linked to ISSA. Active support for SMMEs from the ISETT SETA.

  • Integrated Action Plan to Accelerate Growth, Employment and Investment:
  • Accelerated Economic growth rate
  • SMME development
  • Improved competitiveness
/
  • Focus on the Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs) as a growth point for the communications sector
  • Support for a dedicated Research and Development infrastructure for innovation in ICTs
  • Development of a robust SMME base with a mentorship supply linked to existing initiatives (CITI, Gauteng Innovation Hub)
  • Creating opportunities for the employability of historically disadvantaged individuals (HDIs) in the sector
  • Increasing competitiveness through ICT Research and innovation (See ISETT SETA SSP 2001, 7.5 Sector Development Strategy)

  • National Skills Development Strategy
  • Equity Targets
  • Stimulating and supporting skills development in small businesses.
  • Assisting new entrants into employment
/
  • The project seeks to link campus incubators to a defined SMME base at the Cape IT Initiative and the Gauteng Technology Innovation Hub respectively.

Specific Outcomes

During the course of the three-year project, an estimated 530 learners with strategic ICT skills will be placed into the ICT Sector. Three strategic learnerships will also be developed, based on the current Networking, Engineering Science and Software Engineering courses held at the ISSA. A further four R&D oriented learnerships will also be developed.

In addition, this Project seeks to achieve the following outcomes:

  • Public – private partnership in ICT skills development and growth of SMMEs. This will be achieved through the involvement of CITI’s Bandwidth Barn and the Innovation Hub, facilities tailored to the development of SMMEs. The private sector will also be involved in developing the workplace provider component of the learnerships. Learners will be placed into these establishments. The intention is to have all graduates placed in these SMME and Workplace Provider establishments over the three-year course of the project.
  • Demand-Led Learnerships. Through the consultative and participative approach employed on the project, as well as some research to be conducted in the first year, the developed learnerships will be tailored to the needs of the ICT Sector. Through the reporting mechanisms that will be designed during the first year, and later refined, the project will gather feedback as to the value of the learnerships. The intention is to achieve at least an 80% satisfaction rating from the establishments in which learners are placed.
  • Sustainability. The intention in working with the ICT Sector on this project is to also obtain buy-in from the sector players. This will encourage ICT businesses to continue sponsoring the learnerships after this project has concluded, thereby facilitating the continuation of the ISSA facility under its own means. The intention is to achieve at least a 50% learner sponsorship (while the learner is undergoing the Training Provider component) from the ICT Sector by the end of this project.
  • Learnership Transportability. One of the major strengths of a learnership is that it is transportable. At present, the learnerships will be developed using the ISSA facility, making these learnerships more easily accessible in the Western Cape. However, in year 2, through consultation with stakeholders, other academic institutions will be approached to assess the feasibility of transporting these learnerships into other provinces. The intention is to gain the interest of at least two other universities in South Africa to adopt these learnerships.
  • The establishment of an ICT Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Risk Management Culture in the graduates. This will be tested by the willingness of learners to proceed from the Training Provider (ISSA) into the R&D environment (Bandwidth Barn, Innovation Hub), rather than into a Workplace Provider environment. While it is difficult to assess this willingness at this stage, this project will strive for 10% of Training Provider graduates entering into the R&D environment.
  • Assisting new entrants (Qualified Graduates in scarce skills) into employment in the ICT Sector. All Training Provider graduates requiring placement into the ICT Sector will be placed. In addition, a tracking process will be established to track the movement of graduates, as well as to gain feedback on the value of the learnership.
  • Contribute to scarce skills needed to underpin the growth of the ICT Sector in South Africa. As indicated above, an estimated 530 learners with strategic ICT skills will be placed into the ICT Sector.

Stakeholder Analysis

In order to successfully deliver on this project and on all the objectives that have been outlined, the ISETT SETA recognises that collaboration with multiple partners is important. In this regard, several stakeholders have been identified with relevance to one or more of the outlined aspects. The partners that have been identified are:

  • Cape IT initiative (CITI)
  • Department of Communications
  • Gauteng Innovation hub
  • ISSA
  • Department of Trade and Industry (SMME development)

Cape IT Initiative (CITI)

CITI is a not-for-profit company that promotes the development of the IT cluster in the Western Cape. They are building a database of the makers and shakers of the IT industry in the Western Cape, throughout South Africa and abroad.

CITI has close links with Wesgro, a company that conducts research in ICT in the Western Cape. With their up-to-date database and statistics, CITI is an ideal partner in this process.

Bandwidth Barn

This is the home of the CITI’s SMMEs where a number of IT players share infrastructure and support.

This project will take special interest in the development of SMMEs formed by former students of ISSA. It is expected that 10 SMMEs will be incubated at the CITI. This will be supported with the following:

  • Technology infrastructure
  • Rental and telephone subsidy
  • Roving mentors
  • Help desk
  • Workshops

This initiative will support the SMMEs at the beginning stages.

Department of Communications (DoC)

This is the founding organisation of the ISSA. The staffing costs of the project will be borne by the DoC, as is the case at present. Conceptual and guidance issues will be provided in partnership with this Department. The project initiation and support base was obtained from this government department.

Gauteng Innovation Hub

The most critical aspect for the growth of innovation and research will be obtained by establishing a link and partnership with the Gauteng Innovation Hub. As such, the project proposes that most research projects conducted at the ISSA could be incubated at the Hub and implemented through this innovation vehicle.