Manufacturing Excellence

West Regional Skills Forum

Manufacturing Excellence Steering Group Draft Terms of Reference April 2020

Membership:

• Private-sector lead – Frank Cashman, Anecto
• West Regional Skills Forum Facilitator – Denise Rocks, WRSF Manager
• One representative per education & training provider. These to be drawn from
publicly funded education and training providers in West Region (Galway, Mayo,
Roscommon) as well as relevant national Skillnets.
• A range of interested manufacturing companies from different sectors, including
indigenous SMEs

Goal:

• To collaborate in identifying and resolving skills gaps and issues and converting
knowledge into best practices, for the manufacturing sector in the West Region
(Galway, Mayo, Roscommon).

Priorities:

• Ensure all further and higher education courses related to manufacturing in the west Region are as industry relevant as possible while keeping the learner’s best interests
at heart
• Provide timely industry input into new courses being developed by education and training providers for the West Region
• Co-develop new further and higher-level courses as needed for the West Region, in particular related to
o COVID-19
o supporting the digital transformation of the manufacturing sector and its supply chain/ Industry 4.0 (for example, automation, robotics, AI, industrial IOT, lean)
o the transition to a low carbon economy
o increasing SME productivity
• Align with and feed into relevant Government strategies & initiatives such as Future Jobs 2040, Ireland’s Industry 4.0 Strategy 2020-2025 etc.

Meeting Structure:

• Max 2 hours per meeting, meetings strictly end on time
• Average 1 meeting every 2 months
• Participation is voluntary
• Quorum: 6 steering group members, of which at least half from industry
• Sub working groups may be formed to work on particular issues
• The Industry lead (Frank Cashman) reports all work up to quarterly West Regional
Skills Forum meetings