Change needs to start within education if we are to finally address the longstanding skills shortages blighting the manufacturing industry.
For too long, the government and education have placed far too much value on academia over hands-on, technical skills. There is a huge disparity in how we promote university courses and apprenticeships to young people, and we are drilling into the minds of our youngsters that the only route to sustainable employment is through the university pathway, a notion which is entirely false.
We need a change of emphasis not just to address skills gaps, but also to improve the mental health of our young people and build up their resilience and self-management. We often see youngsters coming through our doors believing because they did not get the best academic grades that they are of no use to society and will ‘end-up’ working in a factory for the remainder of their lives, like that is not a respectable role. They come to us with crippled self-esteem, and we must pick them up and teach them that a grade on a piece of paper does not define their value – which is what education should be doing.
Instead, we cram years of teaching into young people and send them down the cul-de-sac of having to pass an exam to define their worth. Everyone learns in different ways and education needs to provide better pathways for those who aren’t academically minded and show them that there are alternative routes into employment through technical competencies.
I also work as a local enterprise adviser, providing a voice from industry to work with careers leaders in schools and make career planning and support better for young people. This work is measured against the government’s eight Gatsby Benchmarks, which when combined are designed to deliver the very best careers provision in schools, special schools and colleges. While our local enterprise adviser network’s emphasis is on meeting Benchmarks 4, 5 and 6, I question how all stakeholders can channel more effort into Benchmark 3, which focuses on tailoring support to the young person’s requirements. This suggests that we still have a long way to go in providing appropriate alternative support and different pathways to cater for different types of learners.
Another significant part of the wider problem is the negative connotations around being non-academic and going down a vocational pathway. Manufacturing is perceived as a manual, dirty and non-lucrative industry to work in, which is set aside for those who cannot pass an exam. Far more value needs to be placed on both our industry and the technical skills required to work within it.
Furthermore, education does not teach the soft skills necessary for the workplace, such as those around emotional intelligence and individual resilience. We as industry leaders must then bear the burden of teaching these skills ourselves to help make these graduates more work ready.
Within the Skills and Post-16 Education Act, there are question marks over how Local Skills Improvement Plans can be delivered when there are so many stakeholders involved. I have been involved in numerous workshops and meetings with fellow industry leaders, local authorities, education and young people to share perspectives on how skills shortfalls could be addressed by education. However, business says one thing and education does another. This is not helped by the fact that those doing the teaching have often never been into the industry and experienced it for themselves. So, we are asking people who’ve never worked in industry to deliver on our needs. This disconnect won’t disappear overnight to enable all stakeholders to come together and collaborate effectively.
Given that colleges have not worked to deliver on the needs of industry for so long, firms like ours are looking more to private specialist providers to help deliver apprenticeships. However, issues remain around the quality and depth of courses available. Many of these still don’t quite line up with industry requirements and can be very theory based, meaning the skills learnt aren’t translatable to operational processes. We need better-quality courses and better quality teaching, focused on technical skills, to deliver on what businesses require.
Meanwhile, a lot of the emphasis is being placed on businesses to do much of the groundwork in upskilling the next generation by giving them the hands-on experience. While I fully agree with this idea, we need to balance this with running our businesses day-to day, stimulating the economy, and helping facilitate the national drive toward Net-Zero. The expectations being placed upon business are far too great.
The funding model for the delivery of skills and training is also too focused on education and is not conducive for young people to come into businesses and train. This makes taking on apprentices a significant financial burden for us as well as an administrative one, given how heavily our sector is regulated.
Key Points:
• Our education system places too much value on academia over technical skills.
• Emotional intelligence and soft skills needed in the workplace are not being taught.
• A disconnect between education and industry raises questions over how Local Skills Improvement Plans can be delivered.
This article originally appeared in The Leaders Council’s special report on ‘The Impact of the Skills & Post-16 Education Act on the Construction, Engineering & Manufacturing sectors’, published on July 4, 2022. Read the full special report here.
Photo by Rafael Juárez on Unsplash
