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Skills Shortages

The construction industry (namely services) is suffering from skills shortages without an apparent solution. There has been a flurry of press activity but not much action. How does the industry make itself more attractive to the younger generation? There are short training courses offered but these are not the solution and there are many mature people entering the industry on the promise of a quick buck. The majority of these (that I have encountered) have little passion for the industry and the quality of work can be quite poor. We don't want to end up in a situation whereby these guys are training the next generation.

I think that the apprentice schemes should be made easier for SME's to take part in. Many are small concerns and cannot commit to the burden. However, some of these owner operators have so much experience to offer and it's a shame to let the knowledge pass by. Perhaps the 'apprentice' could be in charge of his/her own portfolio and it to be made easier for them to jump between companies to gain their experience? The colleges could hold a register of approved organisations so that the system is not abused by people wanting cheap labour....

I have met youngsters that have been able to attend and pass the first year of college but unable to progress further because they cannot find companies interested in taking them on. How can this be so with the skills crisis? I presume the bureaucracy is putting off the SME's.

I would guess that other industries have similar issues?

Parents

0 Roy Bowdler over 5 years ago

It is perhaps interesting to seek an understanding of how we got to where we are, but obviously more important to seek a solution.

In a sense Andy Miller nails it by referring to the loss of “big paternalistic companies”. Without wishing to take a politically partisan view, the private ones were subject to increased global competition from emerging economies in particular from the 1970s and the public ones were privatised and broken up. I was a CEGB Apprentice and later moved into the Training Department. The Electricity Supply Industry more widely, offered apprenticeships and ran its own training establishments in every area of the country. Others did similar things with industries like Coal and Steel underpinning several regions. I later worked for the BICC group, a dominant employer in some communities (e.g. Prescot Cables still play in the Northern Premier League). These training opportunities were decimated by the 1990s, with other effects, on career patterns, pensions etc.

The main policy response to equipping young people with skills was the expansion of Higher Education and there is a strong case that this has proved to be a success, albeit not an unqualified one. Higher Education has itself become one of our most important “industries” which now underpins the economies of many Towns and Cities. The generation to benefit are better educated and equipped to compete where such attributes can be productively deployed. However, the culture of academia generally and the incentives offered have tended to relatively undervalue, those parts of the further and higher education system that were more vocational in nature, such as Technical Colleges and Polytechnics who often worked closely with employers.

A policy shift (I hope influenced by people like me) has attempted to rebalance the system to increase employer’s power and influence, with messaging from government level that a good apprenticeship isn’t an “inferior” pathway, but implementation because it is a government initiative has been typically slow and hampered by red-tape; hopefully this will be overcome. If you examine IET policy statements around these issues, I feel that we have understood the challenges and are on the whole acting a force for good, but there are many others still influential in PEIs who, as some used to say in my youth “wouldn’t recognise an apprentice if they found one in their cornflakes” and would just direct such persons to the “Tradesmen’s Entrance”. Forms of social and intellectual snobbery are an unfortunate side-effect of our current education system, with “social mobility” lower than it was 50 year ago. We have introduced political correctness which may have had some measure of success in tackling racist and sexist attitudes, but whatever anyone’s gender or ethnicity, without good career prospects they are at severe social disadvantage.

In another country that provides many of our skilled workers, employers of any scale capable of offering proper work-based training are engaged with colleges who take responsibility for the training. The managing agent organisations in the UK act in that role, where colleges find this difficult. The same principal is employed for more academic preparation where universities have control. As an employer from the apprenticeship tradition I tended to oppose the “provider led”, rather than “employer led” option, but if the quality is right then it doesn’t really matter.

The fundamental issues as I see it is how to incentivise collaboration, such as between smaller employers to achieve critical mass (e.g. “trade associations”), Technical Colleges and vocationally orientated Universities. I think that the IET has a potentially very useful role to play and is showing willing to do so. Lack of collaboration has been the greatest weakness, with inappropriate incentives creating dysfunctional competition for government funding, whilst often failing to serve the actual “coal-face” to ensure high quality skills training closely aligned to employer’s needs.

One of the weaknesses of PEI’s that stems from their tradition as learned societies is to prioritise “learnedness” over “productivity”, if this occurs within the IET then it is perhaps something of a betrayal of that part of our heritage which was the Institution of Manufacturing Engineers of which “Industrial Engineering” was an essential element. Perhaps another casualty of change, or has it been “replaced” by IT or “systems engineering”?
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0 Roy Bowdler over 5 years ago

It is perhaps interesting to seek an understanding of how we got to where we are, but obviously more important to seek a solution.

In a sense Andy Miller nails it by referring to the loss of “big paternalistic companies”. Without wishing to take a politically partisan view, the private ones were subject to increased global competition from emerging economies in particular from the 1970s and the public ones were privatised and broken up. I was a CEGB Apprentice and later moved into the Training Department. The Electricity Supply Industry more widely, offered apprenticeships and ran its own training establishments in every area of the country. Others did similar things with industries like Coal and Steel underpinning several regions. I later worked for the BICC group, a dominant employer in some communities (e.g. Prescot Cables still play in the Northern Premier League). These training opportunities were decimated by the 1990s, with other effects, on career patterns, pensions etc.

The main policy response to equipping young people with skills was the expansion of Higher Education and there is a strong case that this has proved to be a success, albeit not an unqualified one. Higher Education has itself become one of our most important “industries” which now underpins the economies of many Towns and Cities. The generation to benefit are better educated and equipped to compete where such attributes can be productively deployed. However, the culture of academia generally and the incentives offered have tended to relatively undervalue, those parts of the further and higher education system that were more vocational in nature, such as Technical Colleges and Polytechnics who often worked closely with employers.

A policy shift (I hope influenced by people like me) has attempted to rebalance the system to increase employer’s power and influence, with messaging from government level that a good apprenticeship isn’t an “inferior” pathway, but implementation because it is a government initiative has been typically slow and hampered by red-tape; hopefully this will be overcome. If you examine IET policy statements around these issues, I feel that we have understood the challenges and are on the whole acting a force for good, but there are many others still influential in PEIs who, as some used to say in my youth “wouldn’t recognise an apprentice if they found one in their cornflakes” and would just direct such persons to the “Tradesmen’s Entrance”. Forms of social and intellectual snobbery are an unfortunate side-effect of our current education system, with “social mobility” lower than it was 50 year ago. We have introduced political correctness which may have had some measure of success in tackling racist and sexist attitudes, but whatever anyone’s gender or ethnicity, without good career prospects they are at severe social disadvantage.

In another country that provides many of our skilled workers, employers of any scale capable of offering proper work-based training are engaged with colleges who take responsibility for the training. The managing agent organisations in the UK act in that role, where colleges find this difficult. The same principal is employed for more academic preparation where universities have control. As an employer from the apprenticeship tradition I tended to oppose the “provider led”, rather than “employer led” option, but if the quality is right then it doesn’t really matter.

The fundamental issues as I see it is how to incentivise collaboration, such as between smaller employers to achieve critical mass (e.g. “trade associations”), Technical Colleges and vocationally orientated Universities. I think that the IET has a potentially very useful role to play and is showing willing to do so. Lack of collaboration has been the greatest weakness, with inappropriate incentives creating dysfunctional competition for government funding, whilst often failing to serve the actual “coal-face” to ensure high quality skills training closely aligned to employer’s needs.

One of the weaknesses of PEI’s that stems from their tradition as learned societies is to prioritise “learnedness” over “productivity”, if this occurs within the IET then it is perhaps something of a betrayal of that part of our heritage which was the Institution of Manufacturing Engineers of which “Industrial Engineering” was an essential element. Perhaps another casualty of change, or has it been “replaced” by IT or “systems engineering”?
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Skills Shortages

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