A Woonona business with an online infection control training module is in huge national demand

Founded by Andrew and Wendy Williams I-induct provides training for the disability, aged and community services sector.

"We are normally very busy but we have seen unprecedented demand for our system over the past month or so," Mr Williams said.

"We have customers in all states and territories and provide online learning for some of the largest community service organisations in Australia.

"During the past three weeks we have been enrolling an average of 10 to 15,000 employees each week in our infection control and COVID-19 online module".

Mr Williams said most of the people I-induct works with are disability support workers and community care staff.

"We have always had a infection control module that all our customers use across Australia," Mr Williams said.

"We have added bits and pieces to it around COVID-19 on correct techniques. That is the module where the demand has been ballistic over the last two months".

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Mr Williams said the demand is being driven new people entering those industries and from others who need to learn or update skills.

"We have around 164,000 users across Australia who are support workers," he said.

"Most of our customers have put all their frontline and back office staff through mandatory training just to refresh everyone's memory about things like correct handwashing techniques and social distancing.

"We manage the enrolments for all our customers and we have seen an enormous increase in that kind of training. On top of that we are doing a project with the state government in Western Australia who are buying licenses for other smaller disability support providers who don't have an online learning system. They can now use our system to get their training out to staff".

Mr Williams said with no face-to-face training being done in many organisations since the arrival of COVID-19 I-induct is busily building and developing that training and putting it online. The business has steadily grown since 2011 but has never seen demand like it is getting now.

"Suddenly running an online learning and compliance system is incredibly popular. We have just finished doing project with Northcott in NSW and a very large provider in Western Australia where we developed a PPE module and videos on how to put on gowns and masks properly and work with them.

Mr Williams said organisations in other industries have approached i-induct about creating training for them but the business wants to make sure it can maintain what their existing customers in every state and territory need first.

Mr Williams was working as a consultant in the disability sector before starting I-induct in 2011. He saw a growing need for organisations to be able to bring staff onboard quickly and effectively.

At the time many organisations had face to face inductions "but the changing face of the sector with the NDIS meant that training dollars became less and less and I realised there needed to be new ways to onboard staff".

Mr Williams took a risk and after a very lean first year the business steadily grew to eventually become one of the largest providers in Australia of a fully managed learning and compliance system.

"Around 90 per cent of our customers are disability service providers and the rest are aged care, community mental health and home care type providers," he said.

Mr Williams said the greater demand was creating employment in the business.

"We have put on some extra resources," he said.

Being an online business means the I-induct team work from a variety of locations around Australia.

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