Skills Development and Research
Sector Skills Planning
The Skills Planning and Research Unit is responsible for:
- Identify skills needs for the sector
- Assess and approve WSP-ATR
- Compile a sector skills plan
- Support sector research
Learning Programmes
Strategic Projects
The Strategic Projects Unit is responsible for:
- Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) Lecturer Support
- Internship Support
- Management Development Support
- Technical, Vocational, Education and Training (TVET) Colleges Lecturer Support
- National Certificate Vocational (NCV) Level 4 Support
- Work Experience
- Workplace Coaches Development
Operational Projects
The Operational Projects Unit is responsible for:
- Adult Education and Training (AET)
- Artisan Aides
- Artisan Learnerships
- Foundation Learning Competency (FLC)
- Non-artisan Learnerships (RPL)
- Occupational Health and Safety (OHS)
- Workplace Coaches Development
- Representative Development
Occupational Qualification and Quality Assurance
Occupational Qualifications Development
- As a Development Quality Partner (DQP) develops learning programmes and materials
- As an Assessment Quality Partner (AQP) develops assessment tools and assessment centres including conducting the moderation process
Quality Assurance
- As a Quality Assessment Partner (QAP) conducts Skills Development Provider (SDP) such as in TVET colleges accreditations, including Assessment Centres
- Approves Workplace Based Learning and linked practitioners
Quality Assurance Learner Achievements
Support Services
Corporate Services
The Corporate Services Department plays a key role within the MQA by providing strategic leadership and oversight on roles that include corporate governance, legal services and governance, marketing and communication, human resources, and facilities and office management services. It is through these functions that Corporate Services supports the MQA Board and its committees, management, employees and stakeholders in the process of fulfilling its legislative mandate, while ensuring effective engagement with all relevant stakeholders.
Human resources is a strategic function of the organisation and contributes immensely to the creation, enforcement and inculcation of a high-performance culture. The employee life cycle, from entry to exit, is managed by Human Resources (HR). The HR Unit offered services to the MQA, guided by six strategic objectives: workforce planning, organisational development, employee remuneration and retention, governance, HR administration and employee relations.
- Drafting, monitoring and training on all MQA agreements
- Ensuring that the MQA complies with all relevant legislation
- Identification, management and mitigation of all legal and governance risks
- Development and maintenance of all stakeholder and customer relationships
- Tracking and monitoring of service provider performance against agreed obligations
- Professional legal service to the organisation
- Provide effective, accurate and reliable communication to the MQA’s stakeholders by implementing structured activities in a planned and structured manner
- Position the MQA as a recognisable brand among its existing and potential stakeholders in the mining and minerals sector, as well as among its peers, government, other SETAs and the public at large
- Promote the MQA as a credible brand among its stakeholders
- Guard the reputation of the MQA by managing the perceptions of stakeholders, guided by informed research
- Maintain and implement good governance practices in the implementation of the unit’s roles and duties
The Facilities and Office Management Unit’s role is to operate buildings as effectively and efficiently as possible, while maintaining their appearance, and to provide a clean, safe and healthy work environment, while planning the efficient use of space.
Services performed by the Facilities Department include, but are not limited to full preventative maintenance programmes, routine and emergency repairs, OHS Act and Building Code compliances, electrical, plumbing, refrigeration, heating, ventilation and air-conditioning (HVAC) installation and repair, the management and maintenance of the security system, camera and hardware maintenance, running of the electronic security systems, including card access, and key inventory. The Facilities and Office Management unit also manages and maintains the fleet of MQA pool vehicles.
Financial Management
- Supports the organisation to meet it’s financial commitments in compliance with National Treasury Guidelines, the Public Finance Management Act (PFMA) and other related financial legislation;
- Ensure effective Information Technology Systems to meet the goals of the organisation;
- Ensures compliance in its Supply Chain Management processes including, tender processes, support for small and medium enterprises and;
- Supporting the objectives of Broad Based Black Economic Empowerment (BBBEE).
- Finance Feedback
The Finance Unit of the MQA is designed to ensure an environment of fiscal prudence managed in a manner that is both transparent and promotes accountability. The Finance Unit has policies, processes and procedures in place that are designed to provide reasonable assurance that the MQA’s broad objectives relating to the management of finance are met. These broad objectives include
- Operations: the effective and efficient use of the entity’s resources
- Financial reporting: Annual financial statements that are prepared in accordance with GRAP and fairly present the state of affairs of the MQA, its business, its financial results and financial position of the MQA as at the end of a financial year as prescribed in section 55(2)(a) of the PFMA
- To ensure compliance with acceptable practices, applicable laws and regulations.
Supply Chain Management (SCM) is an integral part of financial management that seeks to introduce internally accepted best practice principles, whilst at the same time addressing Government’s preferential procurement policy objectives. The MQA has an established SCM function that ensures that goods, works or services are delivered to the right place, in the right quantity, with the right quality, at the right cost and at the right time.
The MQA’s SCM function comprises the following elements:
- Demand management
- Acquisition management (Procurement)
- Logistic management
- Disposal management
- Aligns the ICT strategy to the organisational strategy
- Leverage economies of scale to provide for cost-effective ICT services
- Ensure the interoperability of the organisation’s information systems with information systems of other institutions to enhance service delivery
- Ensure security of MQA information systems
- Utilises ICT to develop and enhance the delivery of services at the MQA
- Aligns the use of ICT by staff to achieve optimal service delivery
The Corporate Services Department plays a key role within the MQA by providing strategic leadership and oversight on roles that include corporate governance, legal services and governance, marketing and communication, human resources, and facilities and office management services. It is through these functions that Corporate Services supports the MQA Board and its committees, management, employees and stakeholders in the process of fulfilling its legislative mandate, while ensuring effective engagement with all relevant stakeholders.
Human resources is a strategic function of the organisation and contributes immensely to the creation, enforcement and inculcation of a high-performance culture. The employee life cycle, from entry to exit, is managed by Human Resources (HR). The HR Unit offered services to the MQA, guided by six strategic objectives: workforce planning, organisational development, employee remuneration and retention, governance, HR administration and employee relations.
- Drafting, monitoring and training on all MQA agreements
- Ensuring that the MQA complies with all relevant legislation
- Identification, management and mitigation of all legal and governance risks
- Development and maintenance of all stakeholder and customer relationships
- Tracking and monitoring of service provider performance against agreed obligations
- Professional legal service to the organisation
- Provide effective, accurate and reliable communication to the MQA’s stakeholders by implementing structured activities in a planned and structured manner
- Position the MQA as a recognisable brand among its existing and potential stakeholders in the mining and minerals sector, as well as among its peers, government, other SETAs and the public at large
- Promote the MQA as a credible brand among its stakeholders
- Guard the reputation of the MQA by managing the perceptions of stakeholders, guided by informed research
- Maintain and implement good governance practices in the implementation of the unit’s roles and duties
The Facilities and Office Management Unit’s role is to operate buildings as effectively and efficiently as possible, while maintaining their appearance, and to provide a clean, safe and healthy work environment, while planning the efficient use of space.
Services performed by the Facilities Department include, but are not limited to full preventative maintenance programmes, routine and emergency repairs, OHS Act and Building Code compliances, electrical, plumbing, refrigeration, heating, ventilation and air-conditioning (HVAC) installation and repair, the management and maintenance of the security system, camera and hardware maintenance, running of the electronic security systems, including card access, and key inventory. The Facilities and Office Management unit also manages and maintains the fleet of MQA pool vehicles.
The Finance Unit of the MQA is designed to ensure an environment of fiscal prudence managed in a manner that is both transparent and promotes accountability. The Finance Unit has policies, processes and procedures in place that are designed to provide reasonable assurance that the MQA’s broad objectives relating to the management of finance are met. These broad objectives include
- Operations: the effective and efficient use of the entity’s resources
- Financial reporting: Annual financial statements that are prepared in accordance with GRAP and fairly present the state of affairs of the MQA, its business, its financial results and financial position of the MQA as at the end of a financial year as prescribed in section 55(2)(a) of the PFMA
- To ensure compliance with acceptable practices, applicable laws and regulations.
Supply Chain Management (SCM) is an integral part of financial management that seeks to introduce internally accepted best practice principles, whilst at the same time addressing Government’s preferential procurement policy objectives. The MQA has an established SCM function that ensures that goods, works or services are delivered to the right place, in the right quantity, with the right quality, at the right cost and at the right time.
The MQA’s SCM function comprises the following elements:
- Demand management
- Acquisition management (Procurement)
- Logistic management
- Disposal management
- Aligns the ICT strategy to the organisational strategy
- Leverage economies of scale to provide for cost-effective ICT services
- Ensure the interoperability of the organisation’s information systems with information systems of other institutions to enhance service delivery
- Ensure security of MQA information systems
- Utilises ICT to develop and enhance the delivery of services at the MQA
- Aligns the use of ICT by staff to achieve optimal service delivery
Monitoring and Evaluation Support
Strategy is inextricably intertwined with monitoring and evaluation (M&E). In order to determine the impact of the MQA’s return on investment in the mining and minerals sector’s training programmes, against the number of people trained, the MQA Board established the Risk, Monitoring and Evaluation Unit. It is an integral part of the MQA’s value chain and its contribution towards, among other things, organisational strategy, planning, monitoring, impact assessment and evaluation, and risk management enables the organisation to track its impact on skills development in the sector.
Supply Chain Management
Current News
- 19 August 2022: Clarification on the Phase Out Date of N1 to N3 Engineering Studies Programmes
- 16 August 2022: Announcement on Artisan and Non-artisan Learners on Created Status for 12 Months or More
- 01 Aug 2022: MQA Bursary Scheme Targeting Unemployed Learners: Applications Now Open for the 2023 Academic Year
- 01 Aug 2022: MQA Bursary Scheme Targeting Persons Employed in the Mining and Minerals Sector: Applications Now Open for the 2023 Academic Year