We have our academy and we do tap into that as well. Customer service is a dying art. We are a manufacturing business but we are still client-facing and we actively deliver bespoke client service training in-house.
ML: We operate in three sectors: veterinary nutraceuticals, agriculture and hospitality. So, we have a lot of different needs and requirements and we are based in Lytham.
It is difficult to get people willing to be in the office full-time. A lot of businesses offer working from home or a hybrid. That’s not something we can do, because our manufacturing and warehouse and all our other businesses are 100 per cent on site.
We provide internal training, especially for our veterinary sector area sales managers who are based across the UK. We hire graduates for those roles, and they get a really extensive training plan that’s completely delivered in house. We’ve got vets with us. We’ve got people who have been with the business for 20 years that deliver that training.
When it comes to other staff we offer apprenticeships. I’m an apprentice myself. I’m doing my CIPD Level 3 in HR. We’ve someone in R&D doing an apprenticeship.
JM: We are residential and commercial roofing contractors covering all disciplines. I started the business in 2016 and soon realised I was going to have to bring more people in. I put adverts out there to try and attract experienced people and that didn’t work.
So, we made the decision to bring everyone in from scratch. We began training people and we now have 13 employees. Today 91 per cent of the people working for us are currently undergoing some kind of additional training and everyone has either completed or is completing an apprenticeship with us.
There’s a lot of different disciplines in the industry, and we’ve even got a marketing apprentice. We’ve got an office administrating apprentice and we’ve just taken on a project coordinator. There are different elements to the industry. It’s not just being on a roof.
I sit on a number of industry committees and the common topic is based around skills. The average roofer is between 50 and 60 years old. There are very limited options for younger people, or people who are interested, to get into the trade.
There is an industry issue with trainers who don’t have the qualifications. They’re teaching from the syllabus, but they don’t have the ability to check what they’re implementing meets any standard. The fundamentals aren’t being taught.
KG: When it comes to training, we need people for the shop floor. What we are looking for in an individual is attitude. We can work with that because all the training is provided in-house. We’ve plenty of knowledge and talent and skill in house, so we are rather self-sufficient.
Anything basic for manufacturing is being taught in house. When it comes to more specific skills, that training is also in-house, but if we can send people on courses to reinforce that knowledge and skillset, that’s what we do.
We’ve actually developed a fenestration apprenticeship with the college here. All the
Chris Waddington
teaching and learning will happen on our premises. People will constantly have that hands on experience and they will be moulded into what we need.
We always promote from within. All our supervisors, managers and directors started at the very bottom. There’s a lot of job shadowing involved and, again, we do it in house. It takes years. It’s never a rushed decision.
There’s lots of coaching and mentoring and once they progress, we do send them on college courses. Most of our managers have had training, either a Level 5 or Level 6 with Blackpool and The Fylde College.
JM: There are so many unskilled roofers, which is the scary part, and there’s no licensing. Anyone with a set of ladders is a roofer, and where do they find the training? If they want to do it right, is it available? The answer is no.
Laura Taylor
Do you offer work experience and how does it work for you?
EG: We do offer work experience as and when we can accommodate it, and at the moment we are looking be able to offer more work experience opportunities.
We want to bring them into the work environment. We’re a subcontractor so our staff are very busy with clients. Affording that time for them to sit down with somebody undertaking work experience is something we are working on.
We have the Addison Academy and the Training and Innovation Centre and we’re looking to do that collaboratively on the Hillhouse employment site. The idea is to be able to house maybe ten work experience students at the centre and offer them lots of different experiences within the engineering sector.
We’ve got three apprentices who have come from work experience. They’ve done a week
When your business has invested in work
experience, the end product is someone you actually want to take on. Without that experience how do they learn
SH: The training landscape is confusing. But we don’t want businesses to worry about that. You tell us your problem, and we will try and find the right solution for that, and if we can’t find it, we’ll recommend somebody else who we know.
We need to make it simpler for people who are running a business. That’s what you need to focus on.We need to just make that easy for you.
We welcome employers to come and help us. We genuinely want to hear about problems. Connect with your local college because they want to talk to you about how they can help on different levels.
with us and then we put them in touch with the college and we’ve got them. They have just been brilliant. It really does work.
SH: In order for young people to get the work readiness they need we have to give them some meaningful work experience. We need businesses to invest in that, whether it is a couple of weeks or a T Level placement.
When your business has invested in work experience, the end product is someone you actually want to take on. Without that experience how do they learn?
Continued on Page 48 LANCASHIREBUSINES SV
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47
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