SHOP TALK
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• The industry was just getting its act together on recruiting and training school leavers to maintain the high-tech systems that are becoming commonplace on trucks today. Even that golden word "apprentice" was back in the vocabulary; there's a feature about the motivating and training of parts technicians in this issue.
But suddenly things are different. As was said of the England cricket team, "they plucked defeat from the jaws of victory". Recession has destined the move towards training fitters to the same fate.
Truck selling dealers have no choice but to cut staff. But those who only service and repair trucks are generally faring much better withou': the overheads of a sales team. The short sighted among them will rub their hands as they look at the growing pool of unemployed fitters, but others will be filled viith horror. What incentive is there for employers to give better training and conditions when there is a ready trained pool of unemployed fitters?
Well perhaps there is the biggest incentive of all, long term survival. Truck manufacturers are getting more work into their dealers' workshops and play heavily on highly trained staff. Now, while the dealers will find it difficult to respond, could be the time for the independents to make up the ground they have been loosing for some time.