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West Midlands Local Skills Improvement Plan

Coventry & Warwickshire Chamber of Commerce in partnership with the Greater Birmingham Chambers of Commerce and the Black Country Chambers of Commerce are working with the West Midlands Combined Authority on the delivery of the West Midlands Local Skills Improvement Plan (LSIP) 2025, funded by the Department for Education (DfE).

The purpose of the West Midlands LSIP is to identify what employers across the WMCA area are already doing and where they want help to meet current and future skills needs — and to produce actionable recommendations on how stakeholders regional stakeholders, educators and employers can collaboratively close regional skills gaps.

Building on the work of the previous, West Midlands and Warwickshire LSIP, this research will help to drive change and ultimately shape the future of skills provision across the WMCA area for years to come.

As part of the research process, Chambers across the region are reaching out to local employers to get their feedback on the below questions.

Please note: All responses are confidential and will be reported only in aggregate. Responses will be used solely to inform understanding and planning, not to appraise or penalise any respondent organisation. We will not share your contact information with third parties without your explicit permission.
1.What are the main skills or recruitment challenges facing your organisation or the employers you work with right now?
Prompts: Which roles or skill levels are hardest to fill? Are these gaps new or persistent?(Required.)
2.How are these skills needs currently being addressed?
Prompts: Are you using in-house training, colleges, universities, commercial providers, Bootcamps, apprenticeships, or publicly funded skills training? What drives those choices?(Required.)
3.What influences whether an employer engages with a particular training route or provider?
Prompts: Cost, relevance, flexibility, quality, past experience, funding availability, ease of access, bureaucracy, trust?(Required.)
4.What stops you/employers from engaging more fully with training and upskilling support?
Prompts: Awareness, time, trust, capacity, funding rules, eligibility criteria, inflexible provision, administrative burden?(Required.)
5.Can you share any examples of successful employer–provider collaboration you’ve seen or been part of?
Prompts: What made it work (e.g., co-design, flexibility, shared costs, trusted relationships)? How could it be scaled or replicated across the region?(Required.)
6.What does meaningful co-design of training look like from your perspective?
Prompts: How much involvement do employers want in shaping course content, delivery modes, or assessment? What would make it easier to collaborate?(Required.)
7.In your experience, how have you used public skills investments to meet your employer needs?
Prompts: What’s working well? What could be improved (e.g., course offer, eligibility, pace of approval, communication)?(Required.)
8.How could skills funding be used more flexibly or efficiently to respond to emerging skills gaps?
Prompts: Shorter courses, modular delivery, shared funding models, pooled employer consortia, fast-response pilots?(Required.)
9.What needs to happen to scale up the most effective training models region-wide?
Prompts: What support, coordination, or incentives would make that possible? Which stakeholders should lead?(Required.)
10.If you could change one thing about how the regional skills system operates, what would it be?
Prompts: What would make the biggest difference for employers and learners in the West Midlands? What do you think should be a high priority?(Required.)
11.Would you be willing to participate in a short follow-up session to test potential solutions or pilot approaches?(Required.)
12.If yes, please provide your name, organisation and email address below