An important article crossed my path today that I wanted to share. 

Language, literacy and numeracy skills in the Australian workplace are at a “disturbing” level, impacting workplace productivity, according to new research from the Australian Industry Group.

An Ai Group survey of Australian employers found that 93% reported low level literacy and numeracy skills are impacting negatively on their businesses.  

The report, Getting it Right: Foundation Skills for the Workforce, covered companies in various industries including manufacturing, services, construction and mining.

It found that low literacy skills were significantly impacting the completion of workplace documents and reports at 21%, as well as contributing to time wasting at 17.7% and materials wastage at 11.5%.  

Ai Group reported that the results varied across different business sizes, with 15% of small businesses and 19.8% of medium businesses reporting inadequate completion of workplace documents and reports, compared to 19.8% for larger companies.

The impact on time wasting was most prominent in small businesses at 17.2%, and medium enterprises at 16.8%.

written Monday, 04 November 2013 11:17 by MELINDA OLIVER

see original article here