Transcript
Speaker: Good morning and welcome to the Upskilling Engineering podcast.
Speaker: Today we have got TDR and also CETA with us and we'll be talking about the program, the courses that can go through the Northeast Workforce Skills Program.
Speaker: I will start by letting Jeff and Connor do a bit of an introduction.
Speaker: They come from the world of engineering, so I'll let them do an introduction of themselves.
Speaker: Connor, if you would like to go first.
Speaker: So I'm Conor Darnell, an engineering tutor at TDR.
Speaker: I've been in the training industry for just over a year now.
Speaker: My area of expertise is mechanical manufacturing and machining.
Speaker: Before TDR, I was a machine shop supervisor for a company specializing in the overhaul of electromechanical machinery.
Speaker: I decided to get into teaching as the most enjoyable part.
Speaker: My previous job role was the upskilling and training of staff.
Speaker: And now I can focus on that aspect without the stresses and pressures of a high production environment.
Speaker: As part of ESF, I'm currently delivering milling, turning, abrasive wheels, industrial environment awareness and AutoCAD.
Speaker: The commercial training is the best part of my job as it offers a great freedom in the way in which courses can be delivered to the varying range of skill levels we encounter without being bound to a curriculum.
Speaker: Also meeting many people from different sectors within the industry is fantastic and I often find myself learning from them as well.
Speaker: Excellent, thanks Connor.
Speaker: Do you think that the ESF courses have helped the commercial offer within TDR?
Speaker: Because you can offer things fully funded.
Speaker: Yeah, without a doubt.
Speaker: I mean, during my time in industry, I got sent on tons and tons of courses.
Speaker: And all of them, you know, your employer at the time has to weigh up whether it's like financially viable.
Speaker: More often than not, you have to sign agreements that you have to pay it back within a certain amount of time.
Speaker: And now that we're able to offer these courses all fully funded, it's a no brainer for employers and the influx of people that we've had in has been absolutely massive just for the fact that they can get good quality training and it's all fully paid for.
Speaker: Excellent.
Speaker: Thanks very much.
Speaker: And Jeff, would you like to just do a short introduction for yourself?
Speaker: Absolutely, Shauna.
Speaker: My background is in sheet metalwork and welding.
Speaker: I served my time as a sheet metalwork welder.
Speaker: In my early 20s, I got involved in the sales of asbestos welding consumable.
Speaker: Consequently, in my mid-30s, I got my first role as a managing director of a specialist welding and fabrication company.
Speaker: developed my career, reached the ripe old age of 64 and made some realizations.
Speaker: The realizations that I made were that while I have been reasonably successful in my career, being very, very lucky, I could have been significantly more successful and considerably more lucky or luckier if I'd latched on to what was available out there to bring my colleagues and workmates and
Speaker: co-directors, et cetera, up to speed.
Speaker: When you're an MD, you're absolutely and completely focused always on net profit before tax because the first people you've got to satisfy are the stakeholders and shareholders.
Speaker: And you've got a one-track mind.
Speaker: You're always focused on bottom line, bottom line, bottom line.
Speaker: Of course, first aid and health and safety and quality and delivery are critical, but they're kind of a given.
Speaker: And as a result of that focus, you sometimes miss the bigger picture.
Speaker: And while I hate to admit it, it's taken me to the age of 64 to come to see that to realize that I perhaps didn't have the level of business maturity that allowed me to see beyond the narrow broadband of what I was doing, which was trying to make a profit.
Speaker: And I realized I possibly could have been a bit more successful.
Speaker: I could have been, my colleagues could have been a bit more successful if we'd only latched on to the training that was available and develop people to the sort of potential that we're more than capable of if I'd been open minded enough to allow them to do it.
Speaker: So for me, I'm very much converted.
Speaker: I'm like an ex smoker.
Speaker: Would you say that it's helped you?
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: win over businesses now that you actually have made that switch from thinking that it wasn't worth it to being worth it now?
Speaker: I always kind of thought it was worth it, but it wasn't as important as bottom line or achieving the EBITDA KPIs.
Speaker: As I said, I'm embarrassed about it, but yes, by virtue of the fact I'm on the other side of it now,
Speaker: I can understand it far more than I ever have.
Speaker: But more importantly, from my point of view and from Cita's point of view, because a lot of the people I'm talking to, I came up through the ranks with, they'll probably listen to me a little bit more.
Speaker: And I am finding that we're able to convince people because they know what I know.
Speaker: And I know that they're too busy being busy to look beyond the parameters of what they perceive the job to be, because that was me.
Speaker: So, yeah, I'm very, very passionate about delivering training now simply because nobody convinced me otherwise in my managing directorship days.
Speaker: Great.
Speaker: Thank you very much, Geoff.
Speaker: Connor, do you think that coming from the industry has helped you understand and helped you form the TDR offer into what actually employers want rather than what training providers think they want?
Speaker: Yeah, definitely.
Speaker: I mean, I've been here just over a year now.
Speaker: I'm constantly getting asked about, you know, for my input as to what we should be offering.
Speaker: And I try and give my opinion as to what I think we should be doing because just based on where I was, the kind of training that
Speaker: I thought was relevant to me in the industry and especially to the people that were underneath me, what I think that they, the training that they should have been receiving as well.
Speaker: It has opened up a lot of doors and thankfully we are now able to offer these fully funded courses and hopefully we can continue to do so and sort of expand upon the current listing that we've already got.
Speaker: Great, thank you very much Connor.
Speaker: And Catherine, how do you think
Speaker: that the engineering courses are generally getting received by your businesses?
Speaker: Do you think that they are...
Speaker: warm to the fact that they are fully funded.
Speaker: We often find that fully funded courses kind of means people think they're free, which means they think that they're not worth going on.
Speaker: How do you feel about?
Speaker: I think to begin with, a lot of businesses thought it was too good to be true.
Speaker: So it kind of was a hard sell.
Speaker: But as times went on and they've sent people on the courses and they've had good feedback, they are wanting to send more people on the courses.
Speaker: So I think generally now, businesses are quite keen to get people on the courses.
Speaker: Excellent, thanks.
Speaker: And Joy, as this has been a project and it's kind of moved and changed as time has gone on, and obviously it was meant to start at the beginning of COVID and it didn't, has it helped that
Speaker: We've managed to be fluid with courses that we've managed to add courses on as in when employer demand has asked for it.
Speaker: Most definitely, Shona.
Speaker: It has actually become more and more successful as time's moved on.
Speaker: Organisations out there, as Catherine quite rightly said, consider something which is free to perhaps not be anything of great quality.
Speaker: What we've been able to do as an organisation is we've been able to speak with not just our apprenticeship companies, but non-apprenticeship companies.
Speaker: So we've got a good proportion of both of those types of companies on board now, probably around about 40% of our apprenticeship companies, but a massive 60% of non-apprenticeship companies.
Speaker: And what we've been able to do is actually our offer, our full commercial offer.
Speaker: So because we're very well respected in the region anyway, the majority of people who do know us knew that it was actually a quality offer.
Speaker: But what our apprenticeship companies have done is they've actually really taken the opportunity to actually multi-skill a lot of people within the organisation that perhaps they might not have been able to do so.
Speaker: More and more, since Geoff came in as well, we're actually working with organisations now who have actually got what I would consider to be not just a straightforward offer, where there is actually quite a lot of strategic and operational thinking around the training needs of the organisation,
Speaker: And we're probably in a position now where we will be looking to tweak a little bit of what we're offering to actually be able to fit in with what the needs of their businesses are.
Speaker: So we're very much looking forward to the next phase of the project as we start to wind down.
Speaker: But in actual fact, we have got about 14 months left to actually be able to do a great deal of training, which will actually make a big, big difference to organisations in the North East.
Speaker: Very much.
Speaker: Great.
Speaker: Thank you very much, Joy.
Speaker: When you're delivering the courses, what's the one thing that learners go away thinking that actually it was worthwhile doing?
Speaker: Is there any one thing that they kind of think, oh, actually, I'm going to use that in everyday life?
Speaker: Or is it because they're engineering courses, they generally tend to, it's more practical based?
Speaker: Yeah, I mean, I think the people that have been sent on the courses are there for that reason, that they actually want to be there.
Speaker: The feedback that I've had is that the courses we've offered so far have been fantastic, it's really good.
Speaker: the question that I get asked most at the end of the delivery is, what else can I do?
Speaker: Can we do anything else?
Speaker: We hand out leaflets, we advise them, we sort of signpost as to the other courses that we offer as well.
Speaker: And they seem to be, more often than not, they seem to be inclined to want to come back and upskill even further, which I think is fantastic.
Speaker: And are they quite prepared to pay for courses?
Speaker: I know this is a fully funded offer, but are they quite prepared to then come back and pay for courses if that's what's required?
Speaker: Yeah, definitely.
Speaker: I mean, the courses that we offer currently are kind of of a basic level.
Speaker: We have a lot of introductions too.
Speaker: Most of our courses are kind of along that, in that kind of field at the minute.
Speaker: There's a lot of beginner level basic and a lot of people are inquiring as to whether they can take it further.
Speaker: Do we offer any advanced training?
Speaker: Is there anything extra and additional that we can offer?
Speaker: So it has got us vacant.
Speaker: It's got us thinking and we're currently looking to try and revamp our commercial model and trying to see if we can offer more advanced training to suit their needs.
Speaker: Excellent, thanks.
Speaker: Stranger, we were having a conversation about digital yesterday and the same thing has come up there.
Speaker: And I don't know whether it's the same with engineering, but a lot of employers don't know what they don't know.
Speaker: They don't know what they need to be able to upscale their workforce.
Speaker: And I don't think it's a lack of knowledge.
Speaker: I think it's a lack of understanding what's out there in the training world and what they can get their hands on.
Speaker: I'm just wondering, have CETA and TDR noticed that as well?
Speaker: I'll go to CETA first.
Speaker: You can choose who wants to answer it between Jeff and Joy.
Speaker: Shona, what we've been finding is that a lot of the organisations we're dealing with are actually picking up on quite rightly what Connor said.
Speaker: They're picking up our current commercial offer where there is actually a lot of introduction to a particular subject area.
Speaker: And then they're actually asking us if we can actually go on and offer a more advanced course.
Speaker: which they in most instances prepare to pay for.
Speaker: And like I said earlier as well, some of the inquiries that we're having are really fairly complex, which are actually
Speaker: intended to close the skills gaps in their organisation.
Speaker: So a lot of them are genuinely actually employing people that can go out and work with the particular departmental heads to actually put a proper skills matrix together.
Speaker: And what they're asking CETA to do now is to say, this is what we need.
Speaker: This is who we've already got involved.
Speaker: but these are the gaps.
Speaker: Can you help us put a programme of training together?
Speaker: Which is what we're getting more and more of now and I'm sure Jeff would agree with me with that.
Speaker: So what we're finding is probably there will actually be a little bit of dropout commercial full cost training in there and most certainly from a point of view of apprenticeships
Speaker: We've got more apprenticeship companies actually requesting training, but we've also got some of these people who haven't worked with us previously, but have done now because of the ESF project, are now saying, well, next September, we want to actually put an apprenticeship into your company.
Speaker: So all in all, it's been a winner.
Speaker: Fab, great.
Speaker: And what about TDRs?
Speaker: Is there a perspective on that, Catherine?
Speaker: We're exactly the same as CETA.
Speaker: So we've had
Speaker: a company come in yesterday they've put loads of apprentices and staff through the ESF courses and but they want to focus on health and safety in the workplace so we're kind of working with them to see if we can develop ESF courses and tailor them and so that it'll meet their needs so we're exactly the same yeah yeah fab and I suppose the million dollar question is there any engineering courses that are currently not in the offer that you feel that
Speaker: actually companies would benefit from and it would be worthwhile putting into the offer.
Speaker: I think we really should look to explore the advanced training.
Speaker: Just to touch on a point that you mentioned earlier about people coming in, whether they feel that it's worthwhile.
Speaker: I do think it could potentially be perceived that they are free courses, so maybe they're not worth their while.
Speaker: Some of the courses that we're offering, an introduction to,
Speaker: people automatically assume, well, you know, I've been doing this job for however many years, so why do I need to be set on a course and get this upskilling when I can do the job?
Speaker: And it's actually surprising how many people are...
Speaker: are kind of experts in their field that they come in and they receive this just this basic level introduction to whatever and they they're actually reaping the benefits and you can you can change their their perceptions of these courses um you know you get people coming in saying that you know you're doing things that you know i do on a daily basis which
Speaker: You've just blown my mind.
Speaker: I wouldn't have even thought that I could learn anything more than what I have.
Speaker: And that's great.
Speaker: And it's fantastic for us as well because we see it and it's such a basic offering that we're providing at the minute.
Speaker: And I definitely see some potential if we can have a good look to see if we can get some of these further courses, more advanced courses out there.
Speaker: I think it's going to be fantastic.
Speaker: It's definitely going to pick up.
Speaker: That's excellent.
Speaker: Thanks, Connor.
Speaker: I mean, it is, you have hit the nail on the head.
Speaker: People, I think, get so entrenched in everyday work that they forget about gaining more knowledge or they don't think they could gain any more knowledge.
Speaker: And actually, every day is a school day, isn't it?
Speaker: We can all learn something and we can always bring something more to the table.
Speaker: And actually, we should embrace change and change is actually good.
Speaker: And, you know, there is ways to make
Speaker: things easier and quicker and especially in the world of engineering, you know, so if we can make efficiencies and that's even better.
Speaker: What about you, Joy?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: As I say, we actually have got some organisations who are particularly looking for a more advanced training offer,
Speaker: What we're actually doing now going forward is we will be at some stage probably in the new year now looking to see if we can actually extend the offer with some more advanced training.
Speaker: You know, for example, advanced milling and turning.
Speaker: Obviously, like Connor said, we offer an introduction to milling and turning, but some people actually want something more advanced or they want something more specific to them.
Speaker: So I think what we have to do as a training organisation, we have to actually listen to what those...
Speaker: needs are and actually develop a course that will actually encompass everything that an organisation needs but then obviously go out and market it so that we can actually offer it to a number of organisations and have a class size which makes commercial sense
Speaker: So I think that would be the only stumbling block we would have is in offering the advanced level, getting enough people onto the course.
Speaker: So I think it's kind of more of a full team effort to make sure that we get our message out there to say that, look, we can offer more advanced provision.
Speaker: We can actually speak to an organisation, listen to what their needs are, and maybe tweak a programme.
Speaker: So I think that's probably the challenge for us to offer the more advanced training.
Speaker: But I don't think it's anything that can not be overcome.
Speaker: Great.
Speaker: Thank you very much.
Speaker: I mean, now we don't have Liz Truss in power, levelling up might be back on the agenda and we might get some more money back into the North East because she was going to hammer that, which means we will probably get more skills money into the shared prosperity funding.
Speaker: which means that we could potentially bid for the shared prosperity funding and this project could move forward into that.
Speaker: Do you think that would be worthwhile from a provider point of view to carry on this offer, albeit maybe it'll be slightly different?
Speaker: We don't know what shared prosperity is going to look like, but do you think companies would embrace the fact that
Speaker: there is this offer and it is there to stay and that, you know, we can offer some fully funded courses for businesses.
Speaker: At Cedar, we have actually already discussed that with a number of companies to explain that.
Speaker: Obviously, as part of that fund, there would actually be an offer for businesses.
Speaker: They have embraced this particular part of funding really very well and,
Speaker: say that there will be a continuing need and really hope that that funding is there for them to be able to access.
Speaker: What I hope, obviously, a lot of these funding pots will do is perhaps give us
Speaker: a pot of funding which will not just be obviously in Northumberland and Tineway but will enable us to actually access it for County Durham and Teesside companies obviously it will be given to the various local authorities so I mean if as a project we can actually be discussing it with not just maybe City of Sunderland and Newcastle etc etc we can discuss it with some of them a little bit further afield because I see that we have a number of organisations who are literally just over the border and
Speaker: Had it actually been covered in those particular areas, we probably could have had a great many more outputs.
Speaker: I mean, I think hopefully, well, depending on who comes in power, to be fair, we might be able to get a combined authority.
Speaker: And that would make life a lot easier if we got a combined authority, because then the money would sit with a combined authority and not with individual councils.
Speaker: That would be absolutely great.
Speaker: Yeah, I believe County Durham are hoping to be in that, aren't they?
Speaker: So the Combined Authority would be, it would be all the outlying councils would come into the Combined Authority.
Speaker: So it would be, you would have, it's looking like the North of Time Combined Authority would then merge to be.
Speaker: just the Northeast Combined Authority and then there would be the Tees Valley Combined Authority.
Speaker: Yes, I believe County Durham are hoping to actually come in with that new Combined Authority, which would be absolutely brilliant for the continuation of this project because indeed there's a great many of those companies just across the border who would like to actually be involved.
Speaker: And Connor, Catherine, how do you feel about this extending beyond the end of ESF?
Speaker: Do you think it would be worthwhile for TDR?
Speaker: Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker: I mean, the more funding that we can get for this project, the better.
Speaker: We've been delivering for maybe just over a year now, potentially a year and a half since this sort of came to fruition.
Speaker: And it is still very early days.
Speaker: We're just starting to tap into the market and to get these companies on board.
Speaker: So hopefully we can keep this going.
Speaker: And as Joy said before, we can approach a wider audience.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: if not the Northeast, but hopefully nationally, there's a lot of inquiry so far for these courses.
Speaker: So the more funding we've got and the more publicity we can get to try and push these courses out, even nationally, the better I think it's going to be.
Speaker: Excellent.
Speaker: Yeah, I have many conversations with Yvonne Walker from Simpsons Malt and about their many sites and how they would like to use TDR.
Speaker: We have them all the time.
Speaker: So that's positive.
Speaker: Good.
Speaker: Well, thanks very much for your time, guys.
Speaker: That's been really useful.
Speaker: And I'll just say goodbye now from the North East Workforce Skills.
Speaker: Thank you so much.
