Guest post by AIM Education and Training CEO, Dan Musson.

When we look at the history of AIM in its 75 year existence, it’s fair to say 2015 has once again been a year of great change but ultimately one of progress. The establishment of AIM Education and Training this year as a dedicated training organisation has happened against a backdrop of great change within the education industry itself.

As the political and economic landscape in Australia continues to shift, we’ve worked hard to ensure our education offerings remain relevant for Australian managers and leaders as well as their organisations. This has required a simultaneous focus on the needs of Australian businesses while ensuring that we pay close attention to our core competencies of strategically developing management capability at every level of an organisation and at every stage of a career.

There have been many signs this year that illustrate to me that we’re on the right track. We were the first provider in Australia to begin offering a Diploma of Leadership and Management and this program has seen a steady stream of enrolments both through organisational development programs as well as individuals looking for a qualification to get themselves ahead in their career.

Our MBA program has gone from strength to strength and hundreds of busy professionals have taken up the challenge of postgraduate study in order to differentiate themselves in an increasingly competitive business world. The feedback we’ve received reiterates to us that the AIM MBA experience is incredibly valuable for students as it offers the opportunity to leverage years of professional wisdom and expertise in a collaborative and practical environment.

We’ve continued to build partnerships with organisations and businesses of all sizes across the country and our Centre for Public Management (CPM) offering was launched nationally, enabling us to provide a specialised government and public service suite of training options that have already proved incredibly popular in Canberra.

We’ve turned our attention to assisting small businesses with the pilot of our AIM High Business Mastery program on the Gold Coast in the New Year, the implementation of new payment methods to help small business undertake the training or education they want and manage their cashflow, and in the new year we will launch a range of online short courses that will further enhance small businesses ability to access learning in a flexible and credible way.

I was pleased to be able to personally congratulate many of our VET and Postgraduate students as they graduated at events in Melbourne and Brisbane. This was perhaps the most satisfying part of the year as it’s always great to see the end results of our work towards providing Australian managers and leaders with the qualifications they need to drive their organisations forward.

Throughout all of these developments internally, we endeavour to continue the conversation with Australian businesses about the challenges they face today and in the economy of the future. Overall this year, we’ve managed to lay the frameworks for what will undoubtedly be another exciting year in 2016. We welcome the opportunity to work collaboratively with businesses, individuals and governments in providing the capability development programs that Australian managers and their organisation need to succeed in the coming year and beyond.

From all of us here at AIM, we wish you a safe and happy festive season.