Dunbar Armored<\/a>, told Fleet Owner magazine at the TMC\u2019s annual meeting that the shortage of heavy-duty technicians is growing and recruiting process for the profession needs a wide-scale overhaul.<\/p>\n\u201cThe heavy technician shortage is going to get catastrophically worse,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
In the U.S., 77 million \u201cbaby boomers\u201d will retire over the next two decades, with only 46 million new workers set to replace them, according to numbers tracked by the American Society for Training and Development (ASTD).<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s a deficit that is only going to continue to grow,\u201d White said. \u201cWe can\u2019t fix it tomorrow; it\u2019s going to take long-term work. What we need to do is start recruiting in the grammar schools; we need to get in front of them there because by the time they\u2019ve completed two years of high school, we\u2019ve lost them.\u201d He added that the educational system prioritizes academics in college over the pursuit of a vocational career, making it even challenging to attract young people.<\/p>\n
In the same article, Terry Clouser, VP of fleet services for leasing company Fleet Advantage, said technicians and their ongoing training needs are of the utmost importance for the trucking industry; Everything from pay and benefits to working conditions,\u201d need to be evaluated.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe also must continually train them; that\u2019s a cost the industry can\u2019t afford to do without. Trucks are only going to get more complicated; on average there are 13 computers on board a commercial truck today and only more will be added.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kevin Tomlinson, director of maintenance for South Shore Transportation Co. and TMC\u2019s outgoing chairman noted the industry needs to do a better job selling itself.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe need to let them know what we as an industry can offer them,\u201d he explained in the article. \u201cKids can go to college, come out $150,000 in debt, and go work at McDonalds. Or don\u2019t go to college, come drive or turn wrenches for us, and start out making $55,000 with no debt.\u201d<\/p>\n
White played a similar note: \u201c (We) need to get in front of high school guidance counselors\u201d who push college over vocational careers regardless of students\u2019 strengths and weaknesses. \u201cWe need to get in front of them and the parents. We need to let them know about the opportunities in the vocational fields.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The heavy-duty trucking sector should begin recruiting future technicians in grammar schools, says the new chairman of the Technology and Maintenance Council (TMC). Doug White, who is VP of maintenance…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":253,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[28,54],"tags":[196,198,574,199,575],"class_list":["post-1899","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-labour-hr-driver-shortage","category-technology-equipment","tag-maintenance","tag-technicians","tag-tmc","tag-training","tag-truck-mechanic"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1899","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1899"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1899\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/253"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1899"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1899"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1899"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}