What to look for in your engineering training provider

IN MANY industry sectors, business success and continued growth is being hampered by skills shortages or by lack of investment in relevant training for employees. In spite of this, most nationally recognised, accredited engineering training courses tend to take a 'broad brush' approach in terms of course content, with little relevant practical assessment to gauge whether delegates are competent at the end of the course. There is often a disjoint too, between what is taught and what delegates actually do on a day-to-day basis in the workplace.

Certificate of competence or attendance?

Many employers feel that a training certificate simply represents a "proof of attendance" and is no guarantee of competence. Employers should look for a training provider that focuses on the practical side of training, which runs in parallel with the theory. This will encourage interaction with practical training rigs and a ‘learning by doing’ approach. The objective is to improve delegates’ knowledge and understanding, which will lead to competency in that discipline. Courses should not produce ‘robots’ that have been taught about theory only - they need to understand what and why they are doing things in a certain way.

Keeping delegates’ attention on a training course doesn’t simply mean doing three days of theory followed by one day of practical sessions. The two should run in parallel with lots of crossover and should be intrinsically linked. Delegates should be assessed during and at the end of the course to check for competence. This shouldn’t just be a multiple choice assessment - the focus should be on the practical exercises, ideally on special purpose training rigs designed for that course.

Each subject should be presented in its most straightforward context so that candidates can explore the essential issues and engage with the learning experience intended. For example, if candidates are learning about isolating three-phase motors, specially-wound 40 Volt 3-phase motors should be provided for them so that they can connect the motor control gear and demonstrate that they can individually isolate the motors in a range of scenarios.

Taking ownership of machines

Production downtime in the process industries - food and beverage processing, metal processing, chemicals and pharmaceuticals - can be extremely costly, so employers need to train their production operators to take more ownership of machines, including their maintenance and availability. Employers need to make their staff feel more motivated by providing the appropriate training that allows them to feel more valued, improving their confidence and decision-making. Upskilling operators should then lead to improved productivity, reduced maintenance costs and increased machine uptime.

Martin Smith, MD at Technical Training Solutions

For more information: 

technicaltrainingsolutions.co.uk

Tel: 01634 731470