Everyone who works in logistics is welcome to join The Logistics Guild
All sectors of the logistics industry face similar issues where a lack of motivated, qualified new entrants will restrict recovery as even the most impressive logistics organisations struggle to recruit. Our sector can only continue to add to the UK’s recovery by bringing quality people into the industry. One key source of recruits will be men and women leaving our Armed Forces as the services go through a period of downsizing.
It is quite natural that the logistics sector should turn to the armed forces, given the latter’s dexterity in supplying front line units in the most arduous of circumstances, which essentially laid the foundations for the modern logistics industry. There is enormous potential for not only career logisticians in the services but also those seeking a challenging and stimulating career with potential to cut across all mainstream industries. This can mean opening the eyes of companies who are committed to creating job vacancies within SfL’s “stepping stones” programme for military leavers.
Service leavers generally have two main concerns: how to translate their military experience into civvy-street and, secondly, convincing a civilian company to employ them. These concerns will be assuaged as Skills for Logistics brings on stream its Logistics Guild.
Designed to serve all logistics workers, The Logistics Guild (which is a free-to-join member network, run by its members for its members) will provide the perfect bridge for service leavers who will find they can use the Guild to translate their military experience into civilian language and to provide the stepping stones to civilian employment.
There are no qualifications for joining The Logistics Guild and no fee. Members, whether ex-military or not, can use its services to share ideas, offer support, guidance, career and skills development.
The Guild houses SfL’s Professional Development Stairway (PDS), which allows individuals to match their skills, qualifications and job roles to agreed national job standards across the industry. They can see where they are in their career.
Moreover it allows them to see directions they can take and the skills/experience combination that employers are looking for. All of this information is underwritten by SfL’s industry remit for National Occupation Standards for all jobs across the logistics functions. For those not yet in logistics then it gives clear visibility of what those qualifications and skills are and where those skills can be obtained.
In addition to the translation and stepping stones, there’s the Guild’s fraternity that will give members a career-long network for their personal development. Each member has an online locker space in which their skills, experience, jobs, training and activities will be held. Essentially, the Guild aligns the member with skill sets, a road map for development and the job that matches that talent.
By joining the Guild candidates will be demonstrating self-awareness and willingness to grow, which are qualities that are valued by employers. The PDS works two-ways and gives employers an accessible toolkit for their recruitment. At each defined job role an employer can post the number of people it needs at the various levels. In a sector as diverse as logistics, the ability to match jobs to people in a systematic, objective way has great value for employers looking to recruit from new talent pools, such as the Services.
Everybody and anybody who works in logistics is very welcome to join The Logistics Guild which will be formally launched in the Autumn. Watch this space (and many other spaces) for more information about The Guild and the array of benefits it offers. If you can’t wait for that – email us at guild@skillsforlogistics.org for more information.
Over 25,000 of you have a Skills for Logistics Apprenticeship certificate and we would love to hear from you. Dwarfing that, we are a family of some 2.4 million people, all working in the same industry – let’s get together and make The Logistics Guild work for us.
