The dark cloud of lockdown had two silver linings for Ntokozo Nxumalo, programme co-ordinator at TWIMS (the Toyota Wessels Institute for Manufacturing Studies). “We now offer our short courses online — at a massive discount — and our dates are a lot more flexible, he told Dealerfloor.

TWIMS was launched in November 2018 to provide structured programmes aimed at developing Africa’s manufacturing leaders through formal academic courses in partnership with the Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS), as well as a range of non-academic, short courses.

Nxumalo said TWIMS has developed six short courses to support leadership development in manufacturing. The first of these, Future Manufacturing, scheduled for 18-20 August, had a booking deadline on 14 August, but Nxumalo said providing the courses online enabled him to co-ordinate different dates for executives who could not meet the deadline.

Nxumalo said a dozen executives had enrolled for the three-day course. The course normally costs R20,000 when participants enrol and stay at TWIMS’s academy in Kloof, but this cost has been slashed to R12,000 for online participants.

He said the Future Manufacturing course is popular as it shows executives the strategic tools that are re-framing the manufacturing sector’s development trajectory. This includes 3D-printing, connectivity, or the lack of it in markets, and the Internet of Things (IoT), and also using big data.

Nxumalo invited all executives in manufacturing who do not simply want to be up to date with current trends, but ahead of the curve to contact him for a slot in the online courses.

He said TWIMS has four more short courses scheduled this year, starting with Green Manufacturing and African Trade and Industrialisation in September, followed by Lean Operations Management and Lean Supply Chain Management in October.

“Email me on academic.support@twimsafrica.com,” Nxumalo invited.