Rather than waiting to have training expenses approved by management, civil servants are increasingly signing up themselves, says Nathaly Pinchuk, executive director at the Institute of Professional Management.
"Even with the cutbacks, if it's not the corporates or the government that is paying to retrain, it's individuals that are playing it safe and retraining themselves," she says.
Ms. Pinchuk says individuals have the incentive to refresh their skills as cutbacks and downsizing occur, resulting in a "boom" for programs. When departmental training budgets increase, individual training numbers go down.
She says 20 per cent of the institute's clients in Ottawa are individuals taking courses on their own dime, with many being federal government retirees retraining so they can continue working as consultants in their field.
The public service represents a significant portion of Ottawa's professional training client base. As part of the Conservatives' attempt to eliminate at least $4 billion in program spending, a new agency - dubbed Shared Services Canada - is looking to consolidate government IT networks and e-mail servers, potentially reducing the diversity of software for which civil servants will require training to operate.
But instead of being an industry in panic, there is optimism that the coming changes will actually increase the need for training. As baby boomers retire, a new generation of civil servants require leadership and management training.
Travis Lindgren, president of Learning Tree International and an OBJ Forty Under 40 recipient in 2010, says that regardless of the changes made to the government's IT infrastructure, every IT professional needs the skills to be able to do their job successfully.
"At the core, your standard IT (professional) has the need for a core standard IT set," he says.
Learning Tree provides both IT and management-related courses to government and corporate clients. Of the company's course base, 65 per cent of training is related to skills set in the IT industry, according to Mr. Lindgren. IT courses teach professionals on subjects that include cloud computing, Windows, software engineering and Oracle databases.
Mr. Lindgren says his company is positioning itself to meet the evolving needs of its federal clients.
"If (the government) got more proprietary with its IT functionality, would we tailor ourselves to it? Absolutely," he says. "We change with the IT market constantly, and if that is the shift that takes place, then it is very worthwhile for Learning Tree."
John Hamilton, vice-president of Performance Management Consultants, says the volume of baby boomers poised to retire in the coming years means the government will have to train a new generation of civil servants.
"The reality is that they have a lot of people that are younger now that have to take over from people that are retiring. So there is still a steady need for training in management and leadership skills," he says.
The individuals who will be taking over these positions of responsibility will need to be trained in negotiation skills, strategic thinking and a wide variety of other skills that will help them do their jobs effectively, says Mr. Hamilton.
"If you are being strategic, training is one of the last things you should cut," he says.
"If you are cutting in other areas, be it program areas or you're cutting staff, you are asking people, in a sense, to do more with less ... you have to make sure they are equipped properly to do that."
