FACILITIES MANAGEMENT JOURNAL JOBS
FM CAREERS - RECRUITMENT
ENGINEERED
FOR SUCCESS Between 20–30 per cent of all UK engineers are employed in FM, but the UK
faces an engineering skills shortage. Sara Searle, Head of HR & Payroll and
Julie Connell HR Generalist at Liebherr, explain how a long running National
Apprentice Scheme is helping to address the skills shortfall
Sean Maughan is the
living embodiment of an
apprenticeship success
story. Now 27 years old, Maughan
was 18 when he joined Liebherr-
Great Britain as a Workshop
Apprentice, having first completed his Level 1
and Level 2 Diploma in Motor Vehicles. During the
apprenticeship, Maughan was lucky enough to be
involved in the build of three high-rise material
handling machines for metals recycling and ports
customers in Southampton, Kent and Barking.
He also travelled to Rathcoole to assist Leibherr
Ireland for a week and visited the Liebherr Ehingen
factory for three weeks as part of the apprenticeship
exchange programme. Post-graduation, he was
o ered a role as a Workshop Engineer. Eighteen
months later, in 2017, his line manager asked if
he’d be interested in being a Supervisor. Maughan
initially had his doubts that he was ready to manage
others and was rather daunted at the prospect. His
manager sensibly suggested he do a six-week trial –
needless to say, he aced the trial.
Historically, the Liebherr National Apprentice
Scheme would take on eight to 10 apprentices
annually though this year that number dropped
to five. This was nothing to do with the onset of
COVID-19 however, it was down to both the lack
of candidates applying and the suitability of those
that did. The HR department just didn’t feel that
many of the wannabe apprentices had the skills or
understanding the job demanded and were vital for
the ‘academic’ element of the apprenticeship when
they spend time at college. More than this though,
candidates lacked a real passion for engineering - be
that just tinkering with their own bike or car in their
spare time. Exam results are not the be-all and endall
for Liebherr – they look for a brilliant attitude and
an ability to practically apply themselves to the task
in hand.
RECRUITMENT STRUGGLE
The struggle to recruit good engineering people
is not new and is widely acknowledged to be an
industry-wide issue. There is a huge number of
competing companies all trying to recruit from the
same small pool of talent and engineers are known
to move around for even minor salary increases. This
is exactly why Liebherr-Great Britain created their
own scheme so that they could nurture talent and
‘grow their own’ engineers according to the skills
their business demanded.
It's not just engineering apprentices that Liebherr
looks for – business apprentices are recruited on
alternate years. Business apprentices generally work
on a six-month rotation throughout the business and
study via an online college course to achieve their
NVQ Level 4 in Business Administration.
Liebherr would ordinarily set up shop at Careers
Fairs ready to promote the opportunities on o er
but due to the pandemic, only managed to squeeze
in one this year. It has always looked to build
bridges directly with local schools and colleges and
until recently, would tour institutions to mentor
students and practise interview techniques.
Liebherr-Great Britain also regularly takes on work
experience students (generally aged 16 or 17) for
a one to two-week period and these o en serve
as a good ‘door opening’ exercise. The Liebherr
brand is undoubtedly their USP when it comes to
recruitment and the fact that it’s a family-owned
company with family values means it’s far from
usual for the team to be celebrating 10, 20 and 30
year work anniversaries – many of whom started out
as apprentices themselves.
Liebherr passionately believes that the
government could do more to promote engineering
and its invaluable role in the modern world in the
National Curriculum, especially given the multitude
of jobs consistently on o er in the industry. The
company has also found that certain vocational
courses at college are becoming scarcer and this
has certainly been the case for recent Paintshop
Apprentices. Liebherr also cite the lack of funding
available for apprenticeships for the over-21’s as
an area that needs to be urgently addressed by the
government. In short, the end to end supply chain
of apprentices needs to be fine-tuned by a working
party of government, educational institutions and
businesses.
CASE STUDIES
Matthew arrived at Liebherr HQ directly a er
completing his A-levels in Engineering and Maths at
a local sixth form college. It was, in fact, the college
who had pointed him in the right direction for finding
the apprenticeship. Matthew is now in the final year
of the scheme as a Crawler Crane Engineer and as
well as completing his Level 2 and Level 3 NVQ in
Plant Maintenance, has enjoyed travel to Liverpool,
Teeside and Sheerness as well as extended periods
working at the Dublin Docks. There have also been
trips to the Liebherr factory in Austria where the
cranes are built. It was during one of his Austrian
trips that he was fortunate enough to attend a course
in hydraulics put on by Bosch Rexroth (who make
the pumps for the cranes). Matthew is currently
talking to the company about opportunities once
he has completed his apprenticeship. He loves “the
variation of my job and knowing that every week will
throw up something new.”
Ed is one of Liebherr’s freshest faces having joined
in September of this year. Following his A-levels,
Ed originally embarked on a university degree in
Mechanical Engineering but fairly soon into his
studies, concluded that the three-year course was
not going to help him get where he wanted. He
successfully applied for the Mobile Cranes and
Harbour Cranes position but took up the former
o er as, in his own words, “You get a lot less wet!”
Ed has already completed his first three-week stint
at Sta ord College and his four years of study will
ultimately lead to a Level 4 Diploma in Mechanical
Engineering.
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