The Better Manufacturing Apprenticeship Outcomes Report, produced by the Manufacturing Industry Skills Alliance (MISA), was released in December 2025.
The report drew national attention again recently when it was discussed by MISA CEO, Sharon Robertson, at the 2026 annual National Apprentice Employer Network conference.
The report examines why manufacturing apprentices and trainees complete or leave their training, and what can be done to improve outcomes. It is based on NCVER and ABS data, a literature review, and consultation with a wide range of stakeholders, including apprentices, employers, unions, governments, industry bodies, Apprentice Connect providers and training organisations.
The data challenges a simple narrative that manufacturing apprenticeships are performing poorly overall. Using a custom apprenticeship-level methodology, rather than only contract-level data, the report finds that manufacturing apprentices who commenced in 2019 had an average completion rate of 60%, which was above the average for trade occupations and comparable with or better than several other industry groupings. However, this headline figure masks large variation across manufacturing training packages, with completion rates ranging from 34% to 79%. Manufacturing and Engineering accounted for the largest share of 2019 commencements, followed by Food, Beverage and Pharmaceuticals, meaning that any and all improvements in apprenticeship completions in these training packages would have a substantial impact on overall outcomes. The report also shows that priority cohorts, including women, First Nations apprentices, apprentices with disability and CALD apprentices, had lower average completion rates than the manufacturing average, indicating the need for a targeted, focussed response.
The strongest finding is that employment-related factors, rather than formal training quality, are the main reason apprentices discontinue. The report shows that 69.6% of manufacturing apprentices who discontinued gave employment-related reasons as their main reason, compared with 7.7% citing training-related reasons and 18.9% personal reasons. This places the on-the-job experience at the centre of the completion challenge. Apprentices were more likely to persist when they had good supervision, mentoring, workplace variety and a positive relationship with their boss or colleagues. Conversely, poor supervision, limited exposure to the full range of required work, repetitive tasks, and weak links between workplace duties and the learner’s training plan contributed to disengagement.
The report also notes that small and medium-sized employers often face particular challenges in providing structured supervision (and hence the suitability of the ‘Group Training Organisation’ apprenticeship model which is highly regarded in the report), although some small employers perform very well where they have strong apprentice relationships and a commitment to training
For VET educators and leaders, the report reinforces the importance of treating the employer relationship as part of training quality. RTOs cannot control every aspect of the workplace apprentices need to deal with, but they can help identify early warning signs, check whether apprentices are receiving appropriate work exposure, communicate more clearly with employers about training plan obligations, and advocate for stronger support where apprentices are at risk.
There is a lot more detail in the report, some of it specifically relevant to the manufacturing sector and some of it relevant to the broader apprenticeship sector, including wages and financial support (with low pay a key issue that manufacturing apprentices gave for discontinuing their apprenticeship).
