Spence, who is also chairman of Western Australia's State Training Board, will be speaking at this month's Australian Gas Technology conference in Perth. He said big picture thinking was required from operators in the industry.
"The industry needs a collective plan to address this shortfall," he said. "Everyone is looking after their own plans, but there is no overall picture of the response. Is enough being done? In short, we don't know."
Spence said that in the past oil and gas businesses had their pick of candidates and had the luxury of undertaking training in-house, something which would have to become the exception rather than the norm.
"But with all the additional LNG projects coming online and the need for other similarly qualified workers across the resources sector as a whole, a more strategic, collective industry training effort is required to meet the demand for workers," Spence said.
While he praised efforts from the industry thus far, Spence said a lot more needed to be done.
"There are limitations on the number of workers that can be trained at any one time, as there are only a few established training facilities. To meet industry needs over the next four years the training efforts will need to grow right across Australia to train local Australians in local jobs."
