“What’s a pretty little thing like you doing working on cars?”
“What’s a pretty little thing like you doing working on cars?”
I recently had the opportunity to speak with Michael Medalla, Manager of the Toyota USA Foundation. The Toyota Foundation recently joined TechForce Foundation® as a supporting member, so it was the perfect opportunity to get Toyota’s perspective on the skills gap we are facing as a country, and how our new partnership could contribute to help solving that issue.
The automotive aftermarket is a $277B industry, growing since 2010 and predicted to continue. It’s fueled by consumers keeping their vehicles longer, putting more miles on them and needing more help when it comes to servicing them.
I have been able to do many great things in life because I am a technician. I pursued a profession which played to my innate abilities and passion, and because I’m a tech, I have had a long, successful and impactful career. That career opened up many new career opportunities but at heart, I am still a tech.
It is no secret that the transportation industry is in dire need of technicians. The demand is greater than it has ever been before and the situation is only getting worse. Up to this point, industry has tried to fill their need for technicians by offering jobs with training attached. They are trying to recruit prospects, offer some small perks and limp by until those technicians get enough experience to actually contribute to the dealerships. Some dealerships are hiring technicians from schools, offering such things as sign-on bonuses and tuition reimbursement and putting them to work. While these have worked with minimal success, the problem still persists.
This blog is the third and final installment in Tony Molla’s three-part series, highlighting the abundance and diversity of opportunities offered by careers in the transportation industry. Read the second installment here.
This blog is the second installment in Tony Molla’s three-part series highlighting the abundance and diversity of opportunities offered by careers in the transportation industry. Read the First Installment here.
This blog is the first installment in Tony Molla’s three-part series highlighting the abundance and diversity of opportunities offered by careers in the transportation industry.
If you have been around the transportation industry for any length of time, the phrase “technician shortage” has to be a familiar one. Other than a brief respite during the Great Recession from 2008 into 2009, this has been the most talked about issue in the industry, bar none. And “talked about” is a generous term. A more apt description might be “talked to death.”
Many automotive technicians were inspired to work in this industry for very personal reasons – maybe they grew up working in their family’s repair shop, have a knack for taking stuff apart and putting it back together again or they’ve just always had a passion for cars. Instead of listening to conventional wisdom’s claims that the only path to a successful career is through a university education, they chose to go their own way and make a living using a trade.
