By Henning Lubbe and Claire Strydom (SCASA Board Members)
As board members of the Specialty Coffee Association of Southern Africa (SCASA), we spend a lot of time thinking about what will define our industry over the next decade. It won’t only be better equipment, prettier cafés, or trendier menus. It will be whether we can build repeatable competence in people—the kind that holds steady on a busy Saturday, across different shifts, and even across multiple sites.
South Africa’s coffee industry is full of talent. But too often, that talent sits with a few individuals instead of being embedded in a system. The pattern is familiar: one strong barista leaves and quality drops; a new branch opens and standards drift; a roastery grows and suddenly consistency becomes a daily struggle.
This is exactly why the Skills Development Act matters to coffee businesses—cafés, chains, and roasters alike. Not as a “tick-box” exercise, but as a practical framework for building capability that lasts.
Skills development is not paperwork—it’s how you protect standards
At its heart, the Skills Development Act is about increasing skills in the workplace and improving employability. In real-world terms, it encourages businesses to treat skills as something you plan for, invest in and measure—not something you hope people pick up by watching whoever happens to be on shift.
When a business can clearly define what good looks like for each role, recruitment becomes easier and fairer. Training becomes more efficient because it’s targeted, not random. And promotion becomes more credible because it’s based on demonstrated competence, not just confidence or seniority.
Most importantly, structured skills development reduces the chaos of “learning by survival”. If you’ve ever had to reteach basics because each senior barista trains differently, or if your quality changes depending on who’s on bar, you already know the cost of informal training done without a system. We will go more in depth in the next article and assist with guidance on what is required.
In specialty coffee, the real pressure point isn’t speed—it’s communication
When cafés get busy, we often blame speed. But in many cases the breakdown is actually communication.
Unclear order-taking leads to remakes. Junior staff hesitate because the bar feels high-pressure and high-status. Recipe language becomes inconsistent (“strong”, “extra hot”, “not too milky”, “very foamy”). And customer frustration sometimes gets handled defensively, because staff aren’t trained on how to respond calmly and professionally.
That’s why customer service training can’t be reduced to “smile and move faster”. The best service teams share a common language and have simple routines that keep things steady under pressure. When your team communicates well, the café feels calmer, mistakes reduce, and customers experience professionalism—even on your busiest day.
Team-based service makes training easier (and the bar less intimidating)
One of the quickest ways to lift performance is to adjust how teams work during service, especially when you’re onboarding new staff.
New baristas often don’t struggle because they’re incapable—they struggle because they’re learning in the middle of a rush, in a space where they feel watched, judged, or in the way. A small change in team structure can make a big difference. Pairing a junior with a calm senior during peak, doing quick pre-shift huddles so roles are clear, and using call-backs to confirm orders all reduce pressure and prevent errors.
When intimidation drops, learning accelerates. And when learning accelerates, standards become consistent.
Training that “counts” is training you can see and measure
Coffee is one of the best industries for outcomes-based learning because results are visible. You can taste when the espresso is off. You can see when milk texture improves. You can track waste and remakes. You can observe workflow and customer interactions.
This makes workshops a powerful tool—when they’re designed to produce real, observable change.
A sensory calibration session builds shared language and shared expectations. Sensory is not an inborn gift some people have and others don’t—it can be trained. Calibration reduces disagreements (“this tastes fine” vs “this tastes sour”), improves dial-ins, and helps the whole team describe coffee in a consistent way.
A coffee storytelling session is not about giving a lecture on origin. It’s about explaining a coffee simply, confidently and in a way that connects with the person in front of you. When staff can describe a coffee in 30–60 seconds, customers trust recommendations, sales improve naturally, and specialty coffee becomes more accessible (without anyone feeling intimidated).
And for supervisors and managers, costing and pricing training is not separate from coffee—it’s what allows quality to survive. If leaders understand cost per cup, waste and remake cost, and margin targets, they can make better decisions, reduce unnecessary losses, and keep quality affordable and sustainable.
SAQA-aligned training: a smart move for growing coffee businesses
If your business is growing, your training cannot depend on one trainer’s opinion of what “good” looks like. You need consistent standards, fair assessment, and credible evidence of competence. This is where SAQA-aligned training and outcomes-based assessment become strategic—not because coffee needs to feel corporate, but because coffee deserves to be professional.
Many workplaces use recognised unit standards for assessor development (for example, SAQA Unit Standard 115753: Conduct outcomes-based assessment). The exact route and requirements must be handled through the appropriate accredited provider and quality assurance process, but the principle is straightforward:
When you build internal assessment capacity, you protect your standards.
For cafés, chains and roasters, SAQA-aligned assessors support consistent beverage standards across multiple shifts and sites, credible sign-off for promotions and role progression, stronger documentation of competence (especially where formalisation is needed), and healthier learning cultures because feedback becomes structured and fair.
This is how we professionalise coffee roles and create real career pathways—without losing the energy and creativity that makes specialty coffee special.
Hospitality occupational qualifications are developing—Food & Beverage Service matters
We also want to flag important developments in South Africa’s training landscape that affect coffee directly. Occupational Qualifications for Hospitality are developing, and SCASA will share more information as these developments progress—particularly where they relate to Food and Beverage Service, which is widely recognised as a scarce skill in South Africa.
Food and Beverage Service is not “basic work”; it is a skilled profession that includes communication, guest experience, product knowledge, workflow, and the ability to perform under pressure. Strengthening this area strengthens cafés, restaurants, hotels, and the wider service economy.
There are also developments around Chef qualifications, as well as smaller qualifications that fall under CATHSSETA, which form part of the broader hospitality ecosystem that coffee operates within. When these pathways are clearer and better implemented, the industry becomes stronger from the ground up.
A new Roasting Skills Programme is on the way (FoodBev SETA)—and industry input is essential
On the roasting side, there’s another exciting development: a new Roasting Skills Programme linked to the FoodBev SETA has recently been scoped and will be written with the input of industry members.
This is a valuable opportunity for South African specialty coffee. Roasting is technical, practical, and quality-critical—and programmes work best when they are shaped by people who do the work every day. But this only succeeds if industry participation is strong.
We need more voices: roasters, production teams, QC leads, training managers, café operators who roast, and experienced industry professionals who understand what competence looks like in the real world. SCASA will share updates and ways to get involved as the writing process continues.
Trainer capacitation: the real multiplier for quality
A strong barista is an asset. A strong trainer is a multiplier.
Trainer capacitation is one of the highest-return investments any coffee business can make. Good trainers don’t just teach recipes—they build confidence, reduce intimidation, coach communication, and create consistency across a team. They know how to give feedback that improves performance without breaking morale. They can assess fairly, develop people deliberately, and keep standards stable even when staff turnover happens.
If we want an industry that grows sustainably, we must build more capable trainers—people who can transfer skill properly, not only demonstrate it.
What’s next from us
Our industry grows when we grow people—not only products. Watch out for our upcoming Customer Service Webinar.
Also, look out for our next article, where we’ll unpack Mandatory Grants, the requirements for Skills Development Act reporting, and how to align your staff training, workplace skills plans, and reporting on the training you already do.
For support and more information on how to align your business with the road ahead, you’re welcome to contact us via SCASA (or your preferred accredited training partner), and we’ll point you in the right direction as these developments unfold.
Specialty Coffee Association of Southern Africa (SCASA)
Email: info@scasa.coffee
For SDL information contact Henning Lubbe: henning@kushindaacademy.com
.jpg)
.png)
