Your help needed by industry
April 6th 2009 The UKWA is taking steps to fill what its chief executive officer, Roger Williams, believes is an unacceptable gap between the needs of warehouse operatives and managers and the current training and qualifications available from existing training providers. He wants HSS readers to help define the training products their business needs.
Training is vitally important to industry. Both the private and public sector is suffering skills gaps and shortages and dealing with some fundamental underlying problems that are damaging the UK’s productivity.
For example, recent research has highlighted that over 60 per cent of employers are finding it difficult to employ people who are up to the job; an estimated 2.4 million workers are considered less than fully proficient in their jobs; 40 per cent of employers report that they have employed somebody in the last year with less skill than they were seeking; 37 per cent of employers think the gap between the skills they need and the skills in the workforce is getting worse.
Within a warehouse, failure to properly train picking staff and forklift drivers not only has a detrimental impact on efficiency it also drives up accident statistics. In fact, given that most lift truck related accidents are generally the result of operator error, the management and training of drivers is clearly vital if the risk of on-site mishaps is to be minimised.
There are so many benefits to employing forklift truck drivers who are professionally trained. For example, turnaround is quicker and smoother, and accidental damage – to both the truck and the product being stored – is reduced. A sympathetically driven machine also enhances truck reliability and, needless to say, improves general safety throughout the facility where the truck is operational.
Given that most truck operators have realised the significant cost benefits that are achieved by choosing a forklift truck supplier with the service and maintenance credentials and infrastructure required to ensure that truck downtime is kept to a minimum, it is perhaps surprising then that many truck users – both the bigger fleet operators and the smaller one-off buyers – sometimes fail to see the substantial performance benefits that professionally trained operators can bring to their business.
Throughout its long history, the United Kingdom Warehousing Association (UKWA) has been at the forefront of warehouse training matters. Indeed, UKWA was the Industry Training Organisation (ITO) for our sector in the early nineties, and when consolidation occurred, UKWA was a founder member of the Distributive National Training Organisation (DNTO) and, subsequently, a founder member of its successor, the Skills for Logistics Sector Skills Council (SfL).
In many respects, none of these organisations has fully matched the needs of the third party logistics services sector and, I believe, there remains a glaring and unacceptable gap between the needs of warehouse operatives and managers and the current training and qualifications available from existing training providers.
UKWA has been looking for some time to take a lead in addressing this situation but has been discouraged in the past by a lack of available investment income and, to a degree, by a shortage of enthusiasm on the part of employers to engage meaningfully in an industry wide initiative that would drive up skills levels.
However, there are indications that the time could now be right to put these historical obstacles behind us which is why UKWA is looking at ways to provide nationwide generic logistics training and bespoke training and qualifications in those areas where there are gaps.
A small group has been formed, comprising two members of the current UKWA Management Board, a National Training Provider and myself. Its function is to develop fully UKWA’s training concept and then, of course, to deliver the training.
The next stage requires input from our industry as a whole. I am looking for the expertise and input from employers who share my passion for driving up standards in our industry. We need help to identify the training products YOU want to make your workforce more productive. We need your input to develop qualifications that YOU feel are most useful for the industry.
Initially, I want to identify (without any commitment) the names of companies who would like to contribute to this exciting and vitally important project - even if it is only a willingness to comment, from time to time, on the steps we propose to take. Let me know if you are willing to help.
Roger Williams can be contacted by telephone on 0207 836 5522 or by email at: rwilliams@ukwa.org.uk
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