Work with schools to address skills shortage

With GCSE results out last Thursday and A Level results over a week ago, the independent garage sector is being urged to work within schools to encourage more young people to choose to join the automotive sector and address the long-term causes of the skills crisis by Easy2Recruit, the agency helping garages hire overseas talent.

“Many of those getting their exam results will already have chosen a career,” said Ambi Singh, CEO of Easy2Recruit, “and sadly for us as an industry, not enough will be looking towards the garage sector. If we want young people to join our industry, we need to go into schools; we need to be the ambassadors talking to them when they are forming their career aspirations.”

Garages have been struggling to fill staff vacancies for a number of years as older mechanics have left the industry. At the same time, the number of school leavers entering the sector has dropped with young people gravitating towards other areas.

“We've moved our sector forward in so many ways, and today it’s a great environment,” said Ambi. “Many independent garages are doing amazing work. Their workshops are phenomenal. Unfortunately, this is not getting through to young people in the process of choosing their careers.”

This trend continues to impact on the available skills pool. The Institute of the Motor Industry (IMI) Vacancy Rate Tracker for June 2024, using data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS), showed the automotive industry now has approximately 20,000 vacancies across more than 200 roles. While there is a slight improvement, the automotive sector is still second on the Vacancies by Sector ranking, with only hospitality seeing more job openings.  

“Even when I was at school, our industry was wrongly portrayed as being a second-class option,” said Ambi. “We need to be part of the solution and show those young people that they can thrive in the independent garage sector, or else the skills shortage will only grow more severe.”

As the founder of Easy2Recruit, Ambi knows first-hand about how difficult it already is for garages to obtain qualified staff: “Up until Brexit, one solution for plugging skills gaps was taking on mechanics from the European Union, but now this door is closed.”

To help garages stay fully staffed, Easy2Recruit has been helping automotive businesses access skilled workers from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and India.

“We cover relocation from overseas right to the garage’s doors in the UK,” said Ambi. “The owner of the garage simply needs to perform a video interview with the candidate. All pastoral care for the overseas worker, including the visa application flight booking and accommodation is then handled by us. Ultimately, we prepare the route for the first day at work.”