By Steve Gye · Founder, American AI
A training school above a computer business
My computer centre brought several kinds of work together under one roof. The training school was upstairs. Downstairs were computer sales and, at the back, the workshop, where our technicians handled repairs, installations and technical problems. There were about five people working downstairs, including a couple of technicians, while I delivered most of the training.
People came to us to buy computers, get them working and learn how to use them. In the classroom, that might mean spreadsheets, word processing, accounting or the everyday tasks of running a small business. Many learners were using a computer for the first time.
That was the setting in which the rehabilitation contracts began. The training school was already there, but the responsibility became much more personal: helping someone acquire the skills for a different working life.
Helping people return to work
During roughly 20 years running computer businesses and teaching, I began receiving contracts from the Commonwealth Rehabilitation Service to train people who had been injured in industrial accidents and could no longer return to their previous jobs. Other clients included people with disabilities and people who were unemployed and needed help finding a way back into work.
This was a different responsibility from teaching someone how to use a computer. We were helping people change occupations and rebuild their working lives.
Someone moving from a building site into an office or customer-service role might need computer skills, business skills and confidence dealing with unfamiliar situations. Some had very little formal education. The training had to start with their strengths and connect with something useful they could actually do.
Often, the classroom was someone’s home
A great deal of this work was one-to-one. I sometimes taught classes, but many of the people referred to me needed individual support. Some had disabilities or injuries that made attending the training school difficult. For some learners, including people using wheelchairs, I went to their homes.
There, it was just the learner and me, working together. I could see whether an explanation had made sense, whether we needed to try another example, or whether the person was ready to move on. The lesson had to work for that individual.
Some of the people I taught were recovering from severe bushfire injuries. Others had been injured at work or were unemployed. Their circumstances differed, but the responsibility was the same: recognise their abilities and help them take a useful next step.
That kind of teaching asks you to pay attention. Someone may need more time with written instructions but understand a practical demonstration immediately. Another person may be comfortable with the paperwork and need help using unfamiliar software. You cannot assume that everyone needs the same lesson simply because they are learning the same application.
The aim was to help the person become more capable and independent. Small steps mattered: understanding a screen, completing a useful task, then having the confidence to try the next one.
A new occupation, not a life from scratch
Imagine a man who has spent 20 years working as a builder’s labourer—building, concreting and doing physically demanding work. Then a workplace injury means he can no longer do the occupation he knows.
He still has two decades of experience. He understands hard work, working with other people and getting a job finished. But now he has to find a livelihood in a completely different setting.
Through my contracts with the Commonwealth Rehabilitation Service, this was the kind of challenge I helped people address.
Moving from industrial work into a service role is a substantial change. Learning to use a computer is only part of it. Suddenly, someone may need to answer customer enquiries, prepare documents, organise appointments or deal with a complaint. The expectations, the communication and the daily routine are unfamiliar.
For someone with little formal schooling, returning to a classroom can be another hurdle. Start by handing him a long written assignment and you may lose his confidence before he has had a chance to discover what he can do.
So you start with something he understands.
A spreadsheet can become a materials estimate. A document can become a quotation. A customer-service exercise can begin with explaining a job to a customer. His existing experience gives the new skills a purpose.
From there, you build towards the work he could realistically do. Perhaps that means exploring an enquiries or administration role in a building-related business, where his knowledge would still be useful. The direction depends on his abilities, circumstances and opportunities.
He is learning a new occupation, but he is not starting life from scratch.
That is what contextualising training means in practice: connecting new learning to someone’s experience, strengths and next step. You adjust the pace, recognise when they need another explanation, and give them enough challenge to progress without overwhelming them.
The result had to matter in working life
In my experience of the government rehabilitation contracts, the work was judged by what happened afterwards. People’s progress towards employment was followed closely. Completing lessons was part of the process; the important outcome was whether the person could get back into work.
I got results, and that mattered to the continuation of the work. As I remember it, if the people referred to you were not progressing into employment, you could not expect referrals to keep coming. It gave the training a very practical focus: what would help this person become ready for a job?
That responsibility stayed with me. A learner’s confidence matters. Understanding the software matters. But those things have to connect to something they can do in working life.
Give someone a reason to learn
With spreadsheets, I found that showing a useful example could change the whole conversation. Instead of beginning with abstract instructions, you could show someone a budget or an estimate and let them see what was possible. The reaction was often, “I could do that.” Now there was a reason to learn the steps.
For someone moving into service work, we also had to work on communication. Knowing a trade does not automatically prepare someone to handle an enquiry, explain a quotation or respond to an unhappy customer. Those are skills that can be practised, using situations the learner recognises.
You also have to judge how much to introduce at once. A learner who has had little success with formal education may find a sudden list of questions or assignments discouraging. Build understanding and confidence, then introduce the next challenge. The pace can change as the person becomes more comfortable.
Formal qualifications and Nite School
In 2010, after years of practical teaching, I began formal study towards my Certificate IV in Training and Assessment. I wanted to become a qualified vocational trainer and develop a deeper understanding of how to help people learn.
Knowing computers and knowing how to teach are different skills. The qualification gave me a more structured understanding of planning lessons, supporting learners, assessing their progress and documenting the work. It helped me organise what I had learned through experience and become a better trainer.
I spent approximately two years studying and writing course materials. I developed my own courses and assessment materials for Certificate II-level Business Services (BSB) and Certificate IV in Training and Assessment (TAE)—the qualification for people who want to become vocational trainers and assessors.
The trainer course gave me an opportunity to pass on what I had learned about helping people retrain after injury, unemployment or a change in circumstances. I could draw on years of real teaching experience, particularly with learners who needed a more practical, individual approach.
After developing the courses, I established Nite School, which achieved registration as a Registered Training Organisation in 2014. Its training programmes brought together computer skills, business skills and preparation for work.
Business Services training concerned the practical skills used in offices and businesses: working with information, preparing documents, communicating and contributing to everyday work. My materials connected those skills to situations learners could understand and occupations they might move into.
The Certificate IV in Training and Assessment was about teaching other adults: planning and delivering training, recognising different learning needs and assessing whether someone could do the work. When I developed my own training and assessment materials for it, I could bring in the lessons I had learned from rehabilitation and one-to-one teaching.
Becoming an RTO was a substantial process. I remember approximately six months between applying and completing registration, with close scrutiny of our records, documentation and training arrangements. It required much more than knowing the subject or preparing a set of lessons.
Finding a realistic business opportunity
For some people, the next step might be self-employment. Helping someone explore a business meant more than showing them how to prepare a document or use accounting software. We had to consider whether the idea fitted their skills, available resources and circumstances.
Enthusiasm matters, but so does finding something customers will pay for. What can you offer? Who needs it? What would it cost to deliver? What do you already know, and what would you need to learn? Those practical questions can help someone turn an aspiration into a plan—or recognise that a different direction would suit them better.
Putting that experience into PIA
I put my formal course materials into PIA, along with the observations, explanations and experience I had accumulated over years of teaching. That included the business courses, my trainer-development work and the lessons learned through helping people change occupations.
There was a great deal of work behind that. I uploaded the materials and spent considerable time working through them in detailed conversations: explaining how I taught, what I had noticed, what could discourage a learner and how to help someone take the next step. I wanted the experience behind the course notes to come through as well as the content on the page.
Much of that understanding was hard won, teaching people one-to-one, including people with disabilities and people rebuilding their working lives. You learn by explaining, listening, trying another approach and seeing what helps someone move forward. Those years of practical experience are a foundation of the approach I have brought into PIA.
The important thing is to make the learning relevant to the individual. Show someone what they can achieve. Give them a reason to learn. Adjust the pace, explain things in familiar terms and build from their strengths.
PIA can support that learning alongside a formal course, helping someone understand, practise and develop confidence while keeping the work their own.
The one-to-one work is particularly relevant here. The opportunity with PIA is to connect an explanation to the person’s background, use a familiar example, and help them practise at a manageable pace. Someone can work towards a formal course with support alongside them. The purpose is to help them learn and do their own work, not complete their assessed assignments for them.
The little fella fights back
Someone whose occupation is changing because of AI faces a different cause of disruption, but may need the same patient, practical support: help recognising their transferable skills, learning unfamiliar tools and finding a realistic direction.
My objective is to help people use these tools themselves—to become more productive, develop new skills, return to work or explore a realistic business opportunity. My aim is for PIA to help people make that transition—working alongside them as they learn, practise and prepare for their next opportunity.
We are fighting back. If AI is changing someone’s occupation or taking away the tasks they used to earn a living from, my response is to help put that same technology in their hands. I call it “fight fire with fire”—the little fella fights back.
Give someone the right training and useful tools, and there is an extraordinary opportunity to increase what they can do. When I was teaching spreadsheets and word processing, those applications opened doors. Today, AI can help someone work through unfamiliar ideas, prepare documents, develop a website, organise a small business and practise new skills. The range of assistance is far beyond what I could offer with a standalone computer in those early classrooms.
That does not mean handing someone a tool and leaving them to struggle. The training matters: help them understand it, check its work, recognise its limits and use it for something worthwhile. Confidence and sound judgment belong alongside productivity.
And those tools do not have to come from us. This is not an argument that someone must buy an American AI product. People should use the tools and training that suit them, wherever they find them. My conviction comes from the people I taught and the results we worked towards: with appropriate support and a real opportunity, people can develop capabilities they may not have thought possible.
No tool can promise a job, a successful business or a particular income. The objective is practical: help someone recognise what they bring, develop what they need and find a realistic way forward.
“If AI is changing your working life, let’s help you put AI to work for you.” — Steve Gye
“Start with what the person knows. Help them see what they can do next.” — Steve Gye
