It’s not only footballers that attract transfer fees
You may be surprised to hear that qualified and experienced forklift engineers have been in such demand that they sometimes attract transfer fees. F-TEC managing director Karl Baum tells HSS editor Simon Duddy that this is symptomatic of a broader skills issue which the body is tackling with PRO-TEC, the industry’s first register for professional forklift engineers.
Forklift engineers throughout the country play an important role in keeping logistics moving. We are seeing this more than ever during the coronavirus crisis, where there has been a lot of disruption and stock outs in shops. In order to keep the economy moving, forklifts need to be in good working order and consistently available to move palletised goods.
But there are recruitment issues in forklift engineering.
F-TEC managing director Karl Baum explains: “The poaching of engineers has been rife and we have even seen transfer fees in some cases, which is ridiculous. But we are staring to see more companies begin to realise the importance of growing the next generation of staff.”
The mission of the Forklift Training Engineering Centre (F-TEC) – a joint-venture of the forklift industry’s leading trade associations, BITA (British Industrial Truck Association), and the FLTA (Fork Lift Truck Association) – is essentially to tackle this.
There is a generation gap in forklift engineering, there’s a lot of capable and experienced people but they skew towards an older age bracket. Nothing wrong with that, but it does mean that when they retire, it places great pressure on the industry to find replacements.
Part of the answer is F-TEC’s new PRO-TEC initiative, which F-TEC launched this year.
PRO-TEC aims to make it easier to find and assess employees by setting the standard for competence, gathering data on engineer competences and monitoring as this develops.
The register comprises a confidential online assessment system to evaluate skill levels and join the national Register of Professional Fork Lift Truck Technicians (PRO-TEC Technicians).
Designed as a recruitment and benchmarking tool for the FLT industry, the online assessment tool is open to employers, engineers and technicians. Participants are required to answer randomly selected questions covering health and safety and technical topics.
Upon completion, the user will either achieve a Level 2 or Level 3 accreditation qualification or receive advice on what further training is required. Successful candidates will be invited to enrol on the nationally approved PRO-TEC Register.
Karl says: “This brings a number of benefits as it helps us to both grow apprentices and developing existing engineers. After all, the old adage states ‘the salesman sells the first truck, the service team sells the second and third…’. We have included customer service in the PRO-TEC matrix, because we recognise the importance of soft skills alongside hard skills. And we certainly want our engineers to have the hard skills. We go past the manufacturer fault codes, we train our engineers to go in and find the fault.
“As well as helping with apprentices and upskilling existing workers, the PRO-TEC register will help assess people brought into the industry from areas such as plant engineering. Furthermore, to customers it demonstrates a clear commitment to high standards of customer care and provides quality assurance as part of a tendering process.”
