Member Article

Jardine Motors Group apprentice accelerates his career

A 21 year old motor vehicle technician from Blyth has accelerated his career with Jardine Motors Group (Lexus Newcastle) thanks to an apprenticeship with B-Skill Ltd.

Dan Taylor joined the Service department of the automotive dealership when he was just 16 and completed Lexus’s Franchise training scheme, which provided him with the skills to work as a technician.

However, ambitious to move onwards and upwards within the company, when an opportunity came up to retrain and work half the week in the parts department, he was quick to apply.

Tom Cleary, aftersales manager at Jardine Motors Group (Lexus Newcastle), said: “We are focused on attracting and retaining the best staff which means investing in their continuous professional development.

“When a parts supervisor decided to retire, Dan identified this as an opportunity for him to develop new skills and we were happy to support him by delivering the additional training needed through a B-Skill customer service apprenticeship.

“Dan is now half way through a 12 month programme but already we have seen a fantastic improvement in his development especially in the areas of self-motivation, problem solving, communication, organisational skills, customer handling and overall time management. He has grown in confidence as result of this programme and I would fully endorse it for any employee who needs some further training to go to the next level or to improve their current skills and confidence levels.”

Dan commented: “The B-Skill training has been excellent and my assessor Keith Batey has been helpful, keeping me informed about my progress and the next steps along the way. It’s well worth doing to progress my career and I’d encourage others to do the same.”

Paul Wileman, managing director of B-Skill Ltd, added: “We’re thrilled that Tom and Dan are pleased with the programme’s results as this shows that apprenticeships work brilliantly when delivered to meet an organisation’s individual needs, which is our specialism.

“Apprenticeships are a great way to upskill employees and can be enjoyed for a relatively small fee – the fact that the bulk of the costs are paid by the government make them highly appealing. What’s more, here at B-Skill we do everything we can to make life easy - the employee does not leave the dealership and our assessor goes in on a regular basis to work with the individual. It’s a very simple but effective scheme that creates a win-win situation for all concerned.”

Organisations interested in B-Skill’s apprenticeship scheme can find out more by contacting Emma Storey on 0845 2303736 or by emailing business@b-skill.com.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Sarah Waddington .