Skillset/UK Film Council Feature Film Production Workforce Survey 2008

Foreword

It gives me great pleasure to introduce the findings of this survey of the UK film industry workforce. Following up on the first survey carried out in 2004, this crucial piece of work builds on the results of that groundbreaking project and provides a fascinating insight into trends within the industry over the past three years.

Since the results of the first study were published, benchmarking where we were in film in relation to skills development, qualifications and employment issues, the global marketplace has continued to develop and evolve at an incredible pace. New technologies are impacting on practically every role in our industry, and people have had to continuously update their skills and experience to ensure that they can remain relevant and competitive in this ever evolving new world. This would explain why nine in ten of you predict future changes in the skills our industry needs.

The film industry, in the UK and throughout the world, is going through a period of enormous reflection and review, responding to the impact of these developments and trying to understand this new fluid environment in which we find ourselves, where old models are no longer relevant.  It is a question of innovate or perish. Never before has it been more crucial for us to invest in our skills and be prepared to meet the impact of these changes.

The results from this year’s survey do not show significant change from the results of the first survey.  Frustratingly, roughly half of the workforce still has not received any kind of training, be that self-taught, attending a taught course, on-the-job training or going on an attachment or work placement.  And roughly half of the workforce says that they need more training.

This is convincing proof of the need for training that exists, and of the demand for it.  It is essential that we continue to satisfy that need.  A project on the scale of ‘A Bigger Future’, the UK’s film skills strategy, needs time to bed in and deliver its full impact.  Many of the training initiatives that Skillset has developed with the industry and funded since the inception of ‘A Bigger Future’ only came into being around the time that this current survey took place in 2006, and it may take several years for these interventions to make a significant impact on the state of the industry.

Areas that continue to require significant improvement in the industry include:

• Creating a more diverse workforce by recruiting and retaining: more women, people from ethnic minority communities, and people with disabilities
• Reducing the amount of unpaid work that people in our industry are expected to do in order to gain experience before getting paid work
• Enabling the workforce to receive more training by supporting them through financial subsidies and more convenient delivery, ie flexible location and timing.

As an industry we need to take collective responsibility for these issues.  Skillset will continue to invest in initiatives to encourage change in these areas, but obviously this alone will not be enough.  This requires significant culture change throughout the industry.  This isn’t about change for change’s sake.  There are significant economic benefits to developments such as creating a more diverse workforce that other industries are waking up to, and now it’s time that the film industry does the same.

Reassuringly, increasing numbers of people are aware of Skillset as a source of information about skills and training, and turn to us for advice and information. There are also increasing numbers in the industry who are receiving, or aware that they are receiving, financial support from Skillset towards the costs of their training.

I am sure that in the coming years before the next survey the world will continue to change, and today’s blue sky digital thinking becomes tomorrow’s reality.  We as an industry need to make sure that we are at the forefront of this revolution, leading the global marketplace and building on the UK film industry’s reputation as being one of the most highly skilled in the world.  It is essential that we continue to invest in skills and training, and understand how to prioritise that investment. 

So thank you to everyone who took the time to complete this survey, which will help us shape the next round of investment in training.  It’s you that makes the UK film industry one of the best film industries in the world.

Stewart Till
Deputy Chairman, Skillset