Funding to support advisory services to lift small businesses’ digital adoption

Dempsey, Tess

Good morning, everyone. Just waiting for the numbers to come up a bit and then we'll get started shortly, so just bear with us.

Just like to remind everyone to make sure that they're on mute. Thank you.

Ok we're one minute past, so we'll start the presentation today.

Ang, if you could go to the next slide, please.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the Australian Small Business Advisory Services Digital Solutions Round 3 Information Session. My name is Tess Dempsey and I'm a Program Manager at the Department of Industry, Science and Resources within the Business Grants Hub.

I'll be taking you through the welcome logistics and session etiquette before we begin. This session is being recorded and will be made available on the business.gov.au grant opportunity webpage. This ensures that all prospective applicants have access to the same information. If you have any concerns about this, please don't hesitate to contact after this session. Contact the team or myself or through the business.gov.au contact center.

To keep things running smoothly please ensure your microphones remain on mute during the session. Q&A - You may submit questions during the session via the Q&A panel, not the chat. If the question you want to ask is already listed, you can vote it up. We'll cover the most popular questions first. This process helps prioritise questions and ensures a record is kept of all questions asked, which will assist with publishing FAQs on business.gov.au after the session.

Use the voting options throughout the presentation. No need to wait until the end. During the live Q&A, we'll use the hands up feature to manage the flow of questions. When it's your turn, keep your questions concise and kindly return your microphone to mute once finished.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Any questions we're unable to answer or take on notice will be uploaded to the business.gov.au grant opportunity page. Finally, while we want to maintain a respectful and inclusive environment for everyone, any unprofessional behaviour during the interactive portions will be addressed immediately and may result in removal from the session.

Thank you for your cooperation. Let's get started.

Ang next slide please.

I'd like to take a moment to acknowledge the First Peoples of this nation and their ongoing cultural and spiritual connections to the lands, waters, seas, skies and communities. We acknowledge First Nations peoples as the traditional custodians and lore keepers of the oldest living culture and pay our respects to their elders past

and present. We extend that respect to all First Nations peoples joining us today. As this is a virtual session, I also acknowledge the traditional custodians of the lands on which each of you are joining from, and I extend my respect to elders past and present in those communities as well.

Next slide please, Ang.

Now that we've completed the key opening times and set the scene for today, let's take a look at the agenda. We'll begin by introducing ourselves and outlining our roles so everyone knows who's here and how we connect to the program. Next, Treasury will take us through the policy context and objectives. Then we'll dive into the grant opportunity and overview, what makes a strong application and how to apply. We'll also explain how to get help if you have questions during that process. Finally, we'll have a Q&A session and talk about what's next. Let's start with introductions and roles.

Next slide. Thanks, Ang.

As I mentioned earlier, my name is Tess Dempsey and I'm the Program Manager for this grant opportunity. Our Program Delegate, Adam Comley, is unfortunately unable to attend today's session. The rest of the team supporting this program includes Angad Dhanoa, our Program Lead, Martin Daenke, Grants Officer and assisting with logistics today are Grants Managers Angela Bryans and Scott Mason.

Next slide thanks Ang.

Now let's have a look at the roles of the Department of Industry, Science and Resources, including the Business Grants Hub and the Treasury in delivering this program. The Department of Industry, Science and Resources, or DISR, administers this grant opportunity through the Business Grants Hub or BGH, which is part of DISR.

BGH partners with government agencies to help achieve their policy objectives by designing and implementing grant programs. For this program, DISR and BGH are administering the process on behalf of the Treasury. This means that DISR provides an end-to-end grant delivery service, managing the grant across its entire life cycle.

The Treasury is the Commonwealth agency responsible for this program and for ensuring delivery on the government's objectives. Part of Treasury's functions relates to small business policies and programs. Finally, the Honourable Dr. Anne Aly, Member of Parliament, Minister for Small Business, Minister for International Development and Minister for Multicultural Affairs delegates powers and functions to DISR under agreed terms so that we can deliver these services effectively.

Next, we'll move into the policy context and objectives. I'll hand over to Christopher Karas from the Treasury to take the lead on this one.

Next slide thanks Ang.

 

Karas, Christopher

Thanks, Tess. I'm Chris Karas I head up the Digital Innovation and Growth Unit in our Small and Family Business Division over in Treasury. I'm joined today, and I'll just quickly bring them on screen for you. I've got Karen, who's one of our Program Managers and has a beautiful background with our new Digital Solutions branding and Sarah as well who's one of the Program Managers at Treasury's end. I will begin by taking us through the policy context for this one.

I'll just get you to go to the next slide there, Ang.

This is the context that the program operates in and it's really to give you a bit of a sense of why this is important to the government, this particular grant and this particular program. I think most of you will have seen that that the government is very keen to be improving productivity and growth and that includes in Australia's 2.6 million small businesses.

You'll see there were a couple of key documents that you might want to review as well in addition to the documents on business.gov.au. You have the 2025 National Small Business Strategy that's available on Treasury's website that was released in February and that highlights some of the key things that are really important to government when it comes to small business. A good document to help get you in the headspace of what government thinks is important for small businesses.

The other thing to note is the government had its economic reform roundtable earlier in the year in August. There was also a small business roundtable as part of that. Again, productivity, growth, resilience of small businesses were key things that came out of those meetings, and digital adoption was really considered to be one of the key areas that there are opportunities to improve the productivity of small businesses, hence a program like Digital Solutions. We know that digital technology can help businesses deliver products and services faster. It can help them respond to changing consumer demands, welcome customers who want to buy things online and helps navigate economic challenges, which I think we all saw through COVID as well.

Couple of other key points to make here. You might also want to familiarise yourself with the Chartered Public Accountants of Australia Asia Pacific Small Business Survey that ranked Australia 10th out of 11 markets in the Asia Pacific region for small business growth.

So again, just helping set out that context, this digital solutions program is really about trying to make sure that Australia is improving its digitalisation, is making sure that it's competitive in the region and that we're really growing that productivity pace for small businesses in Australia.

I’ll get you to click to the next slide.

Here we've got some of the key elements to this particular program. I want to stress this point this is a grant that is for digital advisory services. Organisations that already offer or are proposing to offer digital advisory services. It's not for small businesses per se, although small businesses can apply if they are small digital advisory service businesses.

I do just want to make that clear from the outset. There are three grants available and are available in different geographies and I'll bring up a map of those areas, it's NSW and ACT as 1 area, Area 2 is Queensland, Northern Territory and WA, and Area 3 is SA, Victoria and Tasmania. We're only going to be funding 1 provider to deliver services in each one of those areas. There are 3 areas and there's 3 grants and we will see, up to 3 providers.

Applicants can apply independently or as part of a consortium, but you will need to make sure that you've got one lead applicant, and you can also apply for more than one grant as well. Conceivably one entity could provide services in all of those areas, but they would have to make applications to service all of those areas. The program is known and marketed as Digital Solutions.

This is the third round of the program, so we do have some awareness of that marketing now in the market, so keen to keep that that going and you'll see our new branding as well. I'll run you through that shortly.

At the heart of the program and what this program is really there to do for small businesses, there's two key elements. We need you to be providing free workshops, webinars and self-directed tutorials for small businesses, and really the flagship of this, it's the up to five hours of one-to-one mentoring at a one-off cost of $110. You'll be facilitating that coaching for small businesses recruiting qualified business advisors. It's a really important part of this program. It's really highly valued that one-to-one mentoring so really keen to hear your plans to really meet those key requirements. Details are set out in 5.2 of the grant guidelines. I'd say that's a section that's really important and worth reading in those grant opportunity guidelines.

The other bit of the grant guidelines, I just want to draw your attention to as well as you're pulling your applications together, having a look at the definitions for both clients and small businesses.  Those set out a few things that operate together, but essentially what it means is that this service is targeted and for small businesses that have 19 or less employees. That's the definition of small business we use and they do have to have an active ABN and be trading.

This isn't a program where we're targeting not for profits. It is for small businesses that are for profit. Now, if you are a not-for-profit that wants to apply, that's a separate thing. It's ok for not-for-profits that want to apply. This is just when we're talking about the clients that you service under the grant.

Then we have 5 priority areas, these have changed, and they adapt every time we run one of these rounds. What these priority areas mean is that you'll need to have coaches, webinars, tutorials, etc. that can really talk to each one of those priority areas.

It's how digital can help your business. It's social media and marketing, digital marketing and selling online using business software, the new one this year AI and emerging technologies. We think that's going to be a really important one for the coming term as well as cybersecurity and data privacy.

We can jump over to the next slide there.

As promised, this is our map just of the service areas. I won't run through it in any great detail, but this is all set out in Appendix C of the grant guidelines so if you haven't quite flicked that far through the grant opportunity guidelines yet, it is all set out there for you.

We've tried to make sure that there's an approximately similar number of small businesses in each one of the service areas.

That is also why the grants for the different service areas are different amounts. It's to do with the number of small businesses in each one of those areas.

Jumping onto the next slide there.

Some of the other key elements, and these ones can be a little bit hidden in the guidelines if you're not paying attention, but if you are paying attention they're there quite clearly, but I just want to draw your awareness to them. We do require you to collect data on the clients that you service and report this back to government. Section 12.2.1 of the Grant Opportunity Guidelines set out some of the things that we expect you to collect, but includes things like names, contact details, the ABN of the client and details about the services they receive, so you need some kind of customer record management system.

Providers are required to monitor the quality of the services they do and survey clients and report back to us on that as well.

You need to make sure you're offering digital action plans for the clients. Something they can take away from the program and action once they've fulfilled the requirements of the program.

We'd like to make sure that that you're offering clients servicing at market rates after they've exhausted allocation, so you can maintain a relationship with those clients and you can do so at the market rate rather than the subsidised rate that the program offers. We expect services in a range of formats, including face to face, online, in groups or individually and just make sure that you're advertising and pitching them at beginning, intermediate or advanced level just to help clients find the right service. We do need online and phone registration options, and that's just a reflection that some of the clients may not actually have that digital capability yet, so offering that phone one is really important still.

Treasury does facilitate regular community of practices for the successful providers of the program. We give you that opportunity to share with each other and share lessons and then hopefully learn from each other as we go through this particular grant opportunity.

Next slide.

We have got some changes here between round 1 and round 2. I know some of you might be familiar with this program from round 1 or familiar from round 2. I just want to run you through some of those key changes.

We did note that that from last time it did take a little bit of time to set up the services and get our successful grantees ready to provide services. We have increased the amount of time available at the start of the grant before you service clients. You'll have a bit of time this financial year before you start servicing clients on 1 July next year.

We have extended the length of the grant by almost a year so that brings us up to around three to four years of servicing, which we think will help improve the efficiency of this particular program. Again, I talked about it before but recognizing that growing interest in the adoption and benefits of AI, that's become a new priority capability. Really making sure that you're thinking about how you provide services in that space will be important. We've increased the number of coaching hours to five hours from 4 hours. That again just reflects that this is a slightly longer grant period now.

As well as that being a really valued part of the program, we've made the cost of the program consistent across all the service areas, so we've set that at $110 including GST.

We're allowing a level of cost recovery as well for cancellation. We know that there's a growing problem with people signing up for workshops and then not necessarily coming along and that does impose costs so we're allowing a level of cost recovery.

Greater emphasis on culturally and linguistically diverse communities and First Nations communities and making sure we're reaching those areas. I'd note that's particularly important to Minister Aly. Minister Aly is the decision maker on this program. She is also responsible for the portfolio of Multicultural Affairs so that will give you a sense of where her priorities are at.

The other bit to note on this one, I think there's a really important appendix in the grant opportunity guidelines and that is Appendix D, that sets out what we think or what the targets are for each one of those service areas.

We are expecting applicants to really outline to us how they will meet those targets rather than applicants identifying the targets that they will meet. Those targets are based on our experiences to date with this program and have been set and calibrated based on what we've seen is achievable in the past as well as a recognition that the costs will also have been increasing in the last few years. Also a new distinct logo and branding.

If we just flick to the next slide really quickly.

We're trying to again improve the market recognition of this particular program so this will be the branding that successful applicants are expected to use. It can sit alongside the organisation's branding, but it does have to include both the Australian Government crest and our nice new green logo there.

I think it's my last slide coming up, next slide please.

Again, just to settle this in a bit of the broader context of some of the small business programs that the government runs. Digital Solutions is part of the Australian government's investment of more than $80 million in small business uplift.

We'd be really keen to make sure providers are thinking about how they can refer people to the other programs the Australian government operates either currently or as new ones come online, if that's the case. It is worth familiarising yourself with the Cyber Wardens program, the Small Business Cyber Resilience Service, as well as the Cyber Health Check which launched this week in fact so a new one that you can check out on, I think it's cyber.gov.au. Again, just worth you being aware of these and thinking about how your service may or may not be able to integrate in with those programs too.

I will pass back to, I think it's Tess.

 

Dhanoa, Angad

Thanks, Chris. Hi everyone. My name's Angad Dhanoa. I'll be doing the next section of this information session. Looking at a brief overview of the grant opportunity. I also at this point just want to remind everyone you may already have it in front of you, but there is further information of everything we speak about today, available in the Grant Opportunity Guidelines and you can find that on the business.gov.au website. The same website where you would have registered for this event, and it may be worth having them easily accessible if you don't already as I run through bits and pieces about the grant opportunity and specifics.

Next slide please, Ang.

I'll start with some information about the grant program itself. The program will fund service providers to deliver digital advisory workshops, webinars, online training courses and personalised mentoring sessions to small businesses to help improve their digital capabilities.

I want to make it clear at this point, Chris touched on this as well. The grant is for successful applicants to provide the service, not receive the service.

In terms of the grant amount and grant period, which you'll find in Section 3 of the guidelines. The Australian Government has announced a total of $25.136 million over 5 years, and that's from 2025-2026 to 2029-2030, and there are 3 Grants available under this grant opportunity, and each corresponds with a defined geographical service area. As Chris also touched on, applicants may apply for one or more grants to service multiple areas, remembering, of course, that a separate application must be submitted for each service area if you're intending to apply for more than 1 service area.

The maximum grant amount for each service area over the 5 years. Looking at area 1, which is NSW and the Australian Capital Territory, that sits at $8.819 million. Area 2, which is Queensland, the Northern Territory and WA sits at $7.371 million. The last area, area 3, which is SA, Victoria and Tasmania that's sitting at $8.946 million.

It's important to note as well, the program will not fund proposals that plan to cover only part of a service area, so you need to be servicing the businesses in the full service area that you apply for, and we also expect applications will be for the maximum grant amount available.

In terms of who's eligible to apply for a grant, and this is covered in more detail in Section 4 of the guidelines, we can't consider your application if you do not satisfy all eligibility criteria. Now, to be eligible, you must have an Australian Business Number, an ABN, or an Indigenous Corporation Number, which is ICN, and be registered for the Goods and Services Tax, the GST, and also at this point, please note extensions of time due to GST registration will be considered. You must also be a trading corporation where your trading activities form a sufficiently significant proportion of the corporation's overall activities as to merit it being described as a trading corporation or are a substantial and not merely peripheral activity of the corporation. Remembering as well, you will need to describe how your organisation meets the definition of a trading corporation when applying.

You must address all assessment criteria, including all sub criteria, which can be found in Section 6 of the guidelines, which is the assessment criteria.

Additionally, must be one of the following entities, an entity incorporated in Australia, and this also includes incorporated not-for-profit organisations, registered charities and companies limited by guarantee, or an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Corporation registered under the Corporations (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander) Act 2006 or an incorporated trustee on behalf of a trust.

We also recognise that some organisations may want to join together as a group to deliver a project, so in these circumstances you just need to make sure you're appointing a lead organisation and only the lead organisation can submit the application form and enter into the agreement with the commonwealth.

You also must ensure the application is identifying all members of the proposed group. Now, if your application is deemed meritorious, you'll be required to provide a letter of support as well from each of the project partners. Also keep in mind you must have a formal arrangement in place with all parties prior to 1st of July 2026. Now further information for anything I've covered or anything that I will be covering as I said, you can find these in the Grant Opportunity guidelines.

Next slide please, Ang.

Now we'll cover what needs to be considered to ensure a good application is submitted. Assessment will be undertaken based on information provided via the online application form and attachments provided before the closing date only.

Make sure to check all sections of the form have been filled out and required attachments are present before submitting. Also, as assessors will be using the guidelines to inform the decisions, it's important to pay close attention to the stated requirements as well. In terms of assessing the application, your application will firstly be reviewed against the eligibility criteria. If you pass that section, so found eligible, your application will then be assessed against the assessment criteria and only eligible applications will proceed to the assessment stage.

We consider your application on its merits and this is based on how well it meets the criteria, how it compares to other applications, and whether it provides value with relevant money.

Considering attachments, now you must provide the following documents with your application, a project plan including a risk management plan, a detailed project budget broken down by financial year, marketing strategy for the service area, and a letter of reference with the referee contact details from at least one organisation you have provided services for to verify a track record and where applicable, a trust deed as well. Please make sure that you're also not uploading any blank documents, so just checking those documents before attaching.

You must attach supporting documentation to the application form in line with the instructions provided within the form, and you should only attach requested documents. Also to note please is that individual file sizes cannot be greater than 2MB, while the total of all the attachments cannot exceed 20MB and we won't consider any information and attachments that we do not request.

Please be aware when considering the project plan that it addresses the assessment criteria in more detail. For example, how do you plan to have the service established and operational by the 1st of July 2026, including a detailed timeline as well of how that will be up and running. Detail regarding what resources will be available to small businesses that engage with the service and detailed key activities. What resources you have on hand or plan to onboard to deliver the service successfully. Remember, this is not strictly financial as well and should include expertise and your track record managing similar projects and also potential risks that may rise affecting the delivery of the project and what is planned to mitigate these risks.

Next slide please, Ang.

Now looking more in detail about how to apply. Please remember you're responsible for making sure your application is complete and accurate, so give yourself plenty of time. You're able to view and print a copy of your submitted application on the portal for your own records.

Also, if anything comes up during the process or you have any issues, please don't hesitate in reaching out to the team. Also please make sure to provide all the information requested, address all eligibility and assessment criteria, include all necessary attachments and submit your application before the deadline, and consider time zones and possible issues as well. Give yourself plenty of time when you're going through that application process and preparing your application.

Next slide please, Ang.

We'll now move on to the anticipated question and answer segment of the information session. Questions can be asked in two ways. We have the Q&A panel available, so questions may have already been posted during the session, and please feel free to use that now, or spoken directly by attendees.

If you are asking a question verbally, please make sure you wait for your name to be called. Additionally, when you're asking a question, please ensure you unmute yourself and make sure you're keeping your questions concise. Please then put yourself back on mute once your question is finished as well.

I'll now hand over to Martin to begin the Q&A session. Thank you.

 

Daenke, Martin

Thank you, Angad. I'll just start with a quick question from Mathew, who's asked if the slides will be circulated post meeting?

Just to be clear, a copy of the slides will be circulated after the meeting and also this session's being recorded, and a copy will be made available on the business.gov.au grant opportunity page for this grant.

I'll put out the first question for the panel now, which is from Jaqui. She's asked: in pursuing innovation, is the government open to considering proposals that may not fit traditional compliance models, but demonstrate a new, potentially more effective way of delivering outcomes?

 

Dempsey, Tess

Thanks, Martin. I'm happy to comment first, Chris, and you come in if you have anything additional to add. Thanks for the question, Jaqui. Specifically for this grant opportunity, we're willing to consider any proposal that meets the current eligibility and assessment criteria so if what you're suggesting would still meet that, then yes of course. If you're thinking something separately and you wanted to provide additional information, that's probably more of a perspective that Chris can comment on.

 

Karas, Christopher

We are open to innovation within or around the core offering. You still have to offer coaching, and you still have to offer unlimited access to things like webinars and tutorials, etc.

There is opportunity for innovation around those in terms of how you deliver them. As long as you're still delivering the service requirements of the grant and they're set out in Section 5.2, then yeah, there's room for innovation around the edges there.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Thanks Chris.

I'm not seeing any other questions, Martin, any hands up?

 

Daenke, Martin

Actually we've got another question from Steve and he's asked: would the applications be reviewed using AI or would they be reviewed by department personnel without using platforms that might upload our data and documents included in the application?

 

Dempsey, Tess

At the moment AI is being considered as part of the different policies and procedures, but at this point in time, all applications will be assessed by staff members. If AI is going to be used in the future, then we would make that very clear and transparent.

 

Daenke, Martin

Thanks for that, Tess. I've also got another question from Matt who's asked about gathering clarifications if needed between now and the submission date.

So just on that there are some contact details for this grant opportunity if you have further questions. These will be provided after the Q&A session.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Thanks, Martin and just on top of that, Matt, so initially it's through the contact centre for business.gov.au and then if they're unable to answer any of those initial questions, they'll pop you through to the program delivery team, which is who I introduced earlier. You'll never be left to wonder what's happening. Either way, there'll be an avenue for you to get those questions answered.

 

Daenke, Martin

We have a new question from Jonathan who's asked: what is the strategy behind the formation of the state clusters, i.e versus the alternative of an individual state based model and is the department positioned to facilitate introductions between interested parties who are sole/dual state based providers in service areas 2 and 3?

 

Dempsey, Tess

Thanks, Martin. Chris, not sure if that's one that you'd like to take or one that we can take on notice and provide an answer to.

It was quite a long question.

 

Karas, Christopher

Yeah, just having a look at it now.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Yeah, no worries. Thanks.

 

Karas, Christopher

We wouldn't be facilitating any introductions between parties. You'd be expected to be finding your own partners in states if that's how you were proposing to manage it.

The state clusters, it's a balance between having too many providers and putting all your eggs in one basket. This has been the way the program's been set up for the last 2 rounds and it's largely operated well.

If you're familiar with the program in previous rounds, there's various ways that people have delivered it in the past. Some have one lead organization and then they have organisations that represent in each one of the states.

There's ways and means to get it state-based if that's your preference as part of an application, but you would have to be identifying those partners yourself, as the applicant.

 

Daenke, Martin

We've got a question or hand up in the chat, so Scott we might just let them in to unmute their mic. Thanks.

 

Mason, Scott

Miranda, if you could just unmute yourself and ask your question, please.

 

Miranda

Great. Thank you. You may have already addressed this question. My question was regarding the sites. Is there going to be preference for a sole provider that is covering all 3 sites or would 2 or more providers get just as much weighting?

 

Dempsey, Tess

Thanks, Miranda. Both types of applications would be assessed similar. It would be based on, the proposal they put forward that meets, the eligibility requirements and assessment. It really comes down to how the application plans to deliver on the grant opportunity guidelines and all the criteria that's set out in there.

 

Miranda

Great. Thank you very much.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Not a problem.

 

Daenke, Martin

I'll just take the next question from Colin, who's asked: is our preferred model to have providers in their selected areas? Or for the grantees essentially to have partners to deliver the grant?

 

Dempsey, Tess

I think that sort of covers off just a bit on what Miranda asked as well. Thanks, Martin. So Colin, just very similar answer. It really comes down to the proposal and what's being put forward and obviously how it addresses the eligibility and merit criteria as well.

 

Daenke, Martin

Thanks for that, Tess. We've got another question now from Rebel, who's asked, would there be a requirement for a free version of the program as there was this year?

 

Dempsey, Tess

Free version? As in there's a portion of the program that obviously needs to provide. Sorry, apologies, I'll just bring that part up in the guidelines. Chris, I'm not too sure if you had that one in front of you. If not, I'll just have a quick look.

 

Karas, Christopher

I mean, it's the same requirement as it is for round 2, so there's a paid part of the program, which is the $110 for the up to five hours of coaching and there's also a requirement that there are free workshops and webinars provided. rah

 

Karas, Christopher

There is also hardship guidelines, so if people come to you and they can't afford that 110, then there are ways to accept them into the program if they can demonstrate hardship. Hopefully that answers the question.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Thanks, Chris. That was great.

 

Daenke, Martin

Also just on those hardship requirements, we've got a question from Raj who has asked, quoting from the guidelines, for the purposes of waiving fees where the small business self declares a significant reduction of revenue in the past 12 months, or the owner is in receipt of a Centrelink income support payment or the client shows evidence of a continued revenue reduction for more than 12 months duration. Raj has mentioned this section does not consider startups or new businesses, how do you see this could be addressed?

 

Dempsey, Tess

I mean, at the moment, obviously we've got a definition for what is considered to be, hardship. It's not to say that we wouldn't consider those options as we're working through grant agreement negotiation, so that’s something that we can take on board.

Thanks, Raj and obviously look to come back with a more detailed response on that one.

 

Karas, Christopher

I think I'd add that part of the definition of clients does refer to trading small businesses as well, so it's not necessarily for intenders or people about to start a small business, but for people that that do already have their business started.

Again $110 is a relatively low fee compared to market rates for the coaching component, so we think it probably strikes a pretty nice balance between affordability and hardship. As Tess said happy to consider it through the development of the grant.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Thanks, Chris.

 

Mason, Scott

And we've got a hand up from, Francesca. Would you like to take yourself off mute and ask your question?

 

Francesca Jorio

Hi, thank you. I was just typing it away, but I will ask just a couple of questions. Just in terms of previous tenders/tender rounds, will any of the metrics be shared around those?

 

Dempsey, Tess

Metrics in terms of sorry the?

 

Francesca Jorio

In terms of the volume of businesses that have gone through the program previously, success metrics, etcetera.

 

Dempsey, Tess

I had from my perspective, I didn't see that as being an option. Chris, I'm not too sure from yours, but we've made it quite broad obviously in the guidelines. It's quite clear what the metrics will be for this round, which utilises some of that past data. Chris, I'm not too sure if there was anything you wanted to add on top of that.

 

Karas, Christopher

No, I don't think we were going to share anything more specific than that. The current round hasn't finished yet obviously so these numbers will grow from here, but I know under round 2 in total it's been 12,000 small businesses that the program has helped. It's difficult to go into specifics underneath that, but that's the headline figure and we might be able to think about whether there's any data that we can share that would be helpful. As Tess said our expectations are set out in attachment D, which does take into account all of those more specific level details and metrics.

 

Francesca Jorio

Excellent. Thank you and just following on from that, if a business has gone in one of the rounds previously, are they eligible to do it again? is it sort of perpetual? Can they keep going?

 

Dempsey, Tess

Chris, I'm not too sure if you had a perspective on that. Obviously for round 2, we did allow businesses to access the program again.

Not too sure if we had planned to do the same for round 3.

 

Karas, Christopher

Yeah that's right. I mean, it's a competitive round, so it's open to the whole market. Anyone that is eligible and can apply is welcome to apply. That includes people that have provided it previously.

 

Francesca Jorio

Excellent. Thank you. Thanks for responding.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Right. Thank you.

 

Daenke, Martin

Thanks for that question. We'll go back to the chat now. There's a question from Colin who's asked if our preferred option is to have more online delivery or face-to-face delivery?

 

Dempsey, Tess

It's set out quite clearly in the guidelines, the expectations for this grant opportunity. It really comes down to once again the proposal that each of the different applicants put forward and what they think is going to work best for this grant opportunity.

 

Daenke, Martin

Another question from Jacqui, who's asked regarding delivery KPIs you've provided a range. Are applicants expected to nominate their number within the range or would the department be assessing KPI deliverance compliance within the range provided?

 

Dempsey, Tess

We have included that purposely and yes, we would expect a number within those ranges to be included in the application and in your proposal.

 

Daenke, Martin

Thanks Tess. There's a question from Raj who's asked what are the learnings that you could share from the prior rounds which the department is expecting to improve? If you're happy to answer that one.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Chris, not sure if that's one you want to talk through now. We could potentially take it on notice and provide later.

 

Karas, Christopher

Yeah, just having a look at the question. Sorry, which one's this one, Martin?

 

Daenke, Martin

It's from Raj.

 

Dempsey, Tess

This is the one from Raj. What are the learnings that you could share from prior rounds which the department is expecting to improve?

 

Karas, Christopher

Yeah, I'm happy to talk to that now. I think the slide that that we'll share around that goes to the changes that we've made between round 2 and 3 really gives a good sense of what the lessons are from previous rounds and how we've tried to address them.

We have found that small businesses have really valued that coaching part and that's why it has another hour in it and a bit of a renewed focus there. We found that AI is growing as a really big focus area so we've made sure that that's included.

What Tess was talking about earlier with Appendix D, I think that's probably one of our biggest lessons, that the previous rounds did rely on applicants really stabbing in the dark a little bit about what the service metrics should be.

We've tried to ease that burden a bit. As far as the specifics of the services provided that's trickier to get to. I might take that on notice and see if we can provide some other reflections on that basis, but I can't promise anything on that one.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Thanks, Chris.

 

Daenke, Martin

I'll just take the question from Norm now who just wants to clarify if face to face means in person or online?

 

Dempsey, Tess

It's a combination, Norm. It really comes down to, again, the proposal put forward, so yep, it is a combination.

 

Daenke, Martin

And then there's a question from Billy who's asked three sub-questions, but I'll just start with the first one and that's: can project activities include software development or research aimed at enhancing program outcomes?

 

Dempsey, Tess

I think I'd probably need to get a bit more information about what the software development or research aimed at enhancing program outcomes could be. Billy, it might be worthwhile maybe sending through that query after this session and we can maybe talk it through in a bit more detail.

 

Karas, Christopher

I think I'd as well just flag, Appendix A sets out eligible expenditure and Appendix B sets out ineligible expenditure so just worth noting that too.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Thanks, Chris.

 

Daenke, Martin

Billy's second question was, can collaborators or lead applicants be academic or research institutions?

 

Dempsey, Tess

As long as they meet the eligibility requirements that are set out, each one of those, then they can obviously be a lead applicant, but obviously they would need to meet that.

 

Daenke, Martin

Billy's third and final question was, are there specific target industries such as SME's in Agri food, retail or the blue economy?

 

Dempsey, Tess

Nope. All small businesses would need to be able to access this program. The definition of small business is included in the guidelines and Chris mentioned it earlier so 19 or below employees, just really important that all areas are targeted.

 

Karas, Christopher

Yeah, I think that's right. It's definitely right. I would add that there is some targeting in this and that's around the digital capabilities, so again, just drawing your attention to those five priority capabilities, so not priority industries, priority capabilities.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Thanks, Chris.

 

Mason, Scott

And we've got another hand up. Bamik, would you like to take yourself off mute and ask your question?

 

Bamik Baker

Yeah, thank you. I don't know if my question was answered. I may have missed it. I stepped away for a moment. I did say do you have a platform where we can collaborate with others on this grant if we can't deliver all the items required? Did you already answer that? Sorry.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Chris did touch on it earlier, which is completely fine to go over it again. It is up to the applicants to obviously find those connections and put together that group application, so no. Ultimately the answer is no.

 

Bamik Baker

Ok. Thanks.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Not a problem.

 

Daenke, Martin

It's a question now from Bec, who's asked: as a provider, may we submit more than one application, one as a sole provider and one as a collaborator with others? Or can there be one business only be represented once?

 

Dempsey, Tess

Nope. Nothing in our guidelines that stops you being incorporated in multiple applications, so nope, go for it.

 

Daenke, Martin

There's another question from Jaqui here who's asked regarding the $110 payment. Does the department require the provider to report on the receipt of this payment in their quarterly report?

 

Dempsey, Tess

As part of this grant opportunity, there will be an independent audit report. Auditor fees are mentioned in the grant opportunity guidelines. Part of that process will require each of the different successful applicants to identify the portion of fees that were received. So yes, it would be. Not necessarily quarterly, but more annually.

 

Daenke, Martin

There is another question here from Russell who's asked: does each collaborator or organisation need to meet the eligibility criteria or does only the lead organization need to meet the criteria?

 

Dempsey, Tess

No worries. Thanks Martin. Russell the lead is the one that undertakes the assessment, so we go through and make sure that they meet eligibility. Now in terms of any joint applicants or partners or subcontractors, they would still need to meet some very basic criteria which is set out in the guidelines under joint applications. There's a couple of important areas that they need to make sure that they're not on lists, so for example, WGEA and other redress schemes. We just need to do some basic checks to make sure that they're not on those lists, otherwise no issues.

 

Daenke, Martin

Thanks Tess. There's a question now from Nick around marketing the program to their clients. He's asked: will successful providers be responsible for independently recruiting small businesses to participate in the program? Will the department offer support in sourcing and engaging potential participants?

 

Dempsey, Tess

Not that I'm aware at this stage. Chris I'm not too sure if there was any plan in place to look to try and do some national marketing for this program at a later date.

 

Karas, Christopher

No, I think it would be up to participants largely to be promoting the program within their networks and getting those numbers up. The Commonwealth government obviously provides a level of visibility of the program.

 

Karas, Christopher

Anytime there's minister speeches and ministerial correspondence we promote the program pretty actively. We wouldn't be having a huge national campaign, but we can provide some very basic supports, things like pull up banners and in the previous round we've done some promotional videos and things to help providers. We've developed an image library, so we can do that kind of thing, but we wouldn't do something like a national campaign or anything like that.

 

Dempsey, Tess

We also have the referrals that come through from the business.gov.au website. There is a landing page on there that will direct interested small businesses through to whoever the successful applicants are. That’s been there during round 1 and round 2 and been found quite beneficial.

 

Daenke, Martin

Thanks for that. There's a question from Raj, which is sort of towards the policy of the program. They've asked what is the philosophy behind allocating 5 advisory hours for the entire program rather than renewing the hours each year?

 

Dempsey, Tess

Chris, not too sure if you wanted to talk to that one or take that one on notice.

 

Karas, Christopher

I mean the idea being that there are only a limited number of hours we can really support. You can do that in a few ways. If you did split it year on year, you'd end up with one hour in each year, which we find wouldn’t be enough. I guess by allowing that five hours over all of the years of the program allows small businesses to decide how best to split up their allocation for their situation, and if they need more each year, then they're welcome to pay those market rates. We can't subsidize continually and ongoing though, right.

We think 5 hours is a good offering for small businesses and then they can fund their own from there.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Right. Thanks, Chris.

 

Daenke, Martin

There's another question from Steve who's asked about the clients from round 1 and round 2. He's asked: how could previous participants in round 1 and round 2 be recognized if they revisit the program in round 3?

 

Dempsey, Tess

Thanks Martin. Steve, each reporting period, applicants or successful applicants are required to provide a certain amount of data. Now the data template has been included on the business.gov.au website and I would highly recommend that everyone check that out so they understand what the data metrics requirements are.

Now from that, one of those metrics is the ABN for the business and we track that ABN across round 1, round 2 and we'll track that across round 3. That's how we would identify who's been accessing the program.

 

Daenke, Martin

Thanks, Tess. There's a question from Jaqui who's asked: how are we calculating the hours of the workshops and webinars and the one-to-one advisory hours?

 

Dempsey, Tess

How the numbers were calculated in the guidelines?

 

Daenke, Martin

No, so I think there's just a need to clarify that the one-to-one hours for the advisory services are separate to the workshops and the webinars.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Oh, Ok. So sorry, Martin, just to clarify. So how we came to the totals or how we'll be calculating them each reporting period? I'm a bit. How are you calculating the hours of the workshops and webinars in the five hours?

The five hours are separate. They're the one-to-one hours. The workshops and webinars will be a different metric which will show as to what they have attended. The one-to-one hours will be very separate for the clients to access based on their requirements or things they've identified when accessing the service.

Angad's just pointed out to me that obviously the webinars and workshops are unlimited so thanks for that Angad.

 

Daenke, Martin

Thanks for that Tess. That's all the questions we have at this stage, but we might just give another minute or two for people to post any more questions in the chat. Feel free to raise your hand as well if you've got any questions you want to ask.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Great. We'll give it an extra minute or so if anyone has anything. I see the numbers are starting to go down a little bit.

 

Daenke, Martin

Just another question from Jaqui that's come in about the workshops and webinars: how will you be assessing the number of hours delivered for the workshops by the number of participants?

 

Karas, Christopher

I'm going to take a stab. I'm going to look at Karen off to the side here as well. I think the way we're assessing workshops this time around is asking have you delivered the workshops rather than trying to calculate hours of participants of those workshops. The KPI is have you delivered those workshops, and I think that's then just a yes or no and how many have you delivered?

 

Keast, Karen

Yeah, that's right, Chris. It's just tell us the number of workshops and webinars that you've delivered in that quarter. But we are asking you to provide us information on the number of one-to-one hours each client has received and what capability area that refers to. So did you give them an hour of one-to-one mentoring on digital marketing social media etc.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Great. Thanks, Karen. Thanks, Chris.

Any others there, Martin?

 

Daenke, Martin

There's no other questions at this stage, but I might just give a last chance for people to put their hands up.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Good.

 

Daenke, Martin

If that's all, I think we might just bring this session to a close now, Tess.

 

Dempsey, Tess

Thanks, Martin. We'll just move on to our final slide. Thanks, Ang.

We will just wrap up today's information session. For more information, including eligibility and application details, visit the business.gov.au grant opportunity page, the same place where you've already found the guidelines and other supporting documents.

This session recording will be posted there along with any questions and answers. If you need guidance on applying for a Commonwealth Government Grant, you can access the Grant Connect, specifically the Help and Information section.

For details on the grant process, visit the Department of Finance website, specifically the grant process section. If you have any questions during the application process after this session, you can visit business.gov.au, Call 13 28 46 Monday to Friday 8:00 AM to 8:00 PM or you can use the Contact Us section on the website.

All links on the slides have been added into the discussion comments section for easy access. Thank you, Martin. Lastly, please remember to seek assistance early to ensure you've had enough time to complete your application successfully. Once that closing date and time passes, we're unable to accept any additional applications and I just want to say thank you for attending today's session. We appreciate your time and interest and have a great day.

Thanks, Ang if you can end the session there.

Please Note: This transcript was generated by Copilot from a transcript of the Information session and reviewed and revised by Business Grants Hub staff.