The ongoing driver shortage has the transport and logistics sector looking for different avenues to get more people behind the wheel.
In Queensland, this has taken the form of the ‘Road Ready’ course. Run by Strategix Training Group in collaboration with Programmed Skilled Workforce, it aims to provide people with barriers to employment the skills to enter the industry.
Students are taught theory and given practical, hands-on experience with the goal of getting them their heavy rigid licence, and ultimately, a job within transport.
Lizzie Tafilipepe is Strategix’s national workplace training manager, responsible for all the training that they do in conjunction with their various employers.
This ranges anywhere from pre-employment training, like the Road Ready course, to traineeships and on-site workplace training.
While they work across a number of industries, transport and logistics has become their main focus due to the current demands of the industry.
“The Road Ready course has been running since April of this year, and goes through two weeks of theory along with practical work,” Tafilipepe tells Owner Driver.
“There’s such a shortage in the industry right now for skilled workers. Our students will obtain six accredited units to do with load restraint, fatigue management, chain of responsibility and vehicle inspection in one of our warehouses in Coopers Plains or Loganholme.
“After those two weeks, each student is provided a timeslot where they come in from Monday to Thursday for an hour and a half each day for their lesson in the truck. They get taught all the workings of driving a HR truck.
“We’ve found that our success rate in training that way, rather than just doing the six-hour lesson, gives them time to process what they’ve learnt. On the final day, they’ll then do their licence upgrade with Transport and Main Roads.”
The course is looking at how the industry can find new pathways for people to join the industry, particularly from demographics may not usually.
It was founded through funding that Programmed received through the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations’ Local Recovery Fund. This enables jobseekers from a number of agencies to be referred to the program.
“These are people that generally have some sort of barrier to employment,” Tafilipepe says.
“They could be long-term unemployed, Indigenous, mums returning to work, early school leavers. They’re either underemployed and not in an industry they want to be in, or not employed at all. I’d say nearly 100 per cent are not in transport and logistics.
“We’ve got quite a few people who have family or friends are truck drivers and that’s ignited their interest. We’re letting them know about the industry and helping them make their way into it.”
Once students complete the two weeks of the course and pass their HR test, they are then connected with one of the many employers that Programmed works with.
They work to facilitate workplaces that will suit students’ locations, hours and working ability.
While most are encouraged to move into HR driving roles, some companies will opt to move them into other entry level positions and work their way up.
Some students will move into a courier driver role first, to get used to the demands of the transport industry and the process of making deliveries to clients and businesses.
Interested Queenslanders are encouraged to get involved, as Tafilipepe believes courses like Road Ready benefit both the industry and potential workers.
“We’re helping solve two issues at the same time,” she says.
“We currently have a very low unemployment rate. For companies, it’s hard for them to find good, skilled workers because they already have a job.
“We have the problem where we have these candidates that have these barriers to employment that they haven’t had the opportunity to work through.
“Having this course where they can come in for two weeks, be there at 8:30 and stay until 3pm, are required to take specific lunch breaks. They’re learning to present in front of people, call someone up if they can’t make it.
“They can learn those soft skills, but also the tangible skills to be a truck driver like load restraint and fatigue management.
“They’ve got a short burst for two weeks and then they have the opportunity to be placed in front of these employers who have a good shot at a job.”
As many companies look towards diversity in their workplaces, this is something else that courses like this can offer.
“These courses bring together an extremely diverse group of people from different countries, ages and genders,” Tafilipepe says.
“By having these courses it gives these students opportunities they may not have had before.
“It also gives the employer an opportunity to get someone a little green to take under their wing and show them the ropes. They can get the staff they actually really need.”
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