Bromsgrove's school of road transport studies
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AS TRAINING becomes an accepted part of the normal routine of transport organizations, "favourite" institutions are likely to emerge prominently in each area. In the West Midlands, Bromsgrove College of Further Education is .well placed to play a unique role in road-transport circles, building on the firm foundations of its work for the vehicle-production industry and its distribution functions.
The Bromsgrove College principal. Mr. Maurice Ross, is a member of the Road Transport Industry Training Board. He is a gifted educationist with great breadth of mind and the capacity to inspire the enthusiastic support of staff and students. Also, very important, he is able to evoke the generosity of industrialist patrons of his college. When he was first appointed principal at Bromsgrove the institution was small, and largely devoted to the training of ornamental gate craftsmen. In 20 years he and Mr. P. L. Coad—who joined six months after Mr. Ross and is now head of the department of engineering—have built up a fine establishment with 7,000 students and a staff of 160. The college is still growing, with a new management training block in course or erection. Bromsgrove's proximity to the Longbridge plant of the Austin Motor Co. Ltd. gave a natural impetus to automobile engineering training courses. The late Sir Leonard Lord, when chairman of Austin, helped to establish a fine engineering laboratory bearing his name. The motor industry as a whole is notably generous in providing the college with up-to-date engines and components for instructional purposes, recognizing that it is a waste of money to train on obsoleie equipment. Sometimes the college spends several thousand pounds to buy essential training tools, such as a Perkins stationary gas turbine engine, but this is exceptional. On my tour round the workshops I was given many instances of used modern equipment or components presented gratis or purchased for a nominal charge.
Wide–ranging
The range of courses provided at Bromsgrove is much too wide to list in detail. Part-time, block release, sandwich and full-time courses are provided for vehicle mechanics, technicians, body builders, sales, service and other functional staff. On the management side the diploma courses in motor trade management and automobile engineering are particularly well known. I was interested to note that the electrical-testing workshop which impresses many visitors to the High Ercall Motec was based on the layout and equipment at Bromsgrove.
New paint and trim shop
Local bodybuilders, such as Carmichaels at Worcester, with whom there is a friendly relationship, are well served, staff and equipment-wise. A new 4,000 sq. ft. paint and trim shop is almost completed. It is typical of Bromsgrove that the college refused to go along with proposals by the Department of Education and Science that instruction could be given using scale models! The aim always is to provide workshop facilities comparable with the best obtaining in the industry. Commercial vehicle crash repairs are relevant in the context of training: Bromsgrove intend to teach the best methods and I should not be surprised if some virtual "write-offs" are not restored to pristine splendour by students.
The establishment of the RTITB and the passing of the Transport Act inspired Bromsgrove to set up their School of Road Transport Studies. Specialized short courses of from one to six days' duration were launched and plans laid to provide a comprehensive range of courses of varying duration for the haulage and P.S.V. sectors of road transport. A three-year sandwich course for the Diploma in Road Transport Engineering is designed to start in September 1970. On the same basis, potential management recruits could register for a course covering the Higher National Diploma in Transport Studies, or a sixmonth full-time course for a Diploma in Transport Management.
Experimental and exciting
One of the most exciting things about Bromsgrove is its experimental, innovating approach to training and education. The distinction between the two is a fine one—cultural and leisure education may be even more significant than vocational training in the future, I suspect.
A recent seminar employed the use of critical path techniques for educational courses. If that sounds obscure to some it means, in effect. studying how to get the best value in terms of course organization, length of lectures, use of visual aids, etc., for a given expenditure of effort and money. School and further education is so costly that any measures to stem the tide of public expenditure are welcome, not least to critics of the training boards.
Practical workshops—short demonstration courses—on the use of audio-visual aids are being launched at Bromsgrove next February. Training officers of road transport groups certainly need to know all about using 16mm sound, 8mm loop, slide, filmstrip and overhead projectors together with tape recorders. They also need to know, even more, how to integrate such useful tools into a variety of learning situations, and I hope many other colleges will provide similar courses.
Programmed learning using electronic recording devices is making rapid advances in certain schools. I was interested to meet Mr. Colin Webb, at Bromsgrove, for he has a real flair for devising programmed learning packages for particular purposes. He is currently building a package designed to help aspirants to the transport manager's licence. Any technique that avoids the drudgery of attendance at lectures and the sitting of a subsequent examination would be greatly welcomed by many people in road transport. It may not be long before programmed learning packages are cost evaluated in relation to conventional teaching methods. The unkind critic might equate programmed learning methods to the do-it-yourself "painting by numbers" kits. The results are what counts. I hope Mr. Webb's colleagues do not persuade him to try to interpret all the Transport Act's ambiguities in terms of black-and-white press-button answers!
Residential courses
A number of short residential courses for road transport managers have been arranged by Bromsgrove's Business and Management Studies Department, in conjunction with the Midland Region RTITB. The earlier courses were split into two threeday periods but the one I visited recently held at the Worcestershire Hotel, Droitwich, ran right through the week. The students came from diverse places, with professional road hauliers in a minority, and several representatives of own-account operators and local authority departments. Mr. Ross. who has recently been appointed as educational consultant to the Road Haulage Association in the West Midlands is planning to put on a replica of the Droit with course at Tipton, where no doubt, his lecturers will very capably adapt their material to a different audience.
This adaptation of course content to a particular group is very significant. At Droitwich there was another Bromsgrove College course for Shell-Mex and BP Ltd retail sales representatives. Some of the lecture subjects were identical but one lecturer told me his presentation was entirely different at the two groups. It obviously helps to get the material over if a lecturer either knows about a particular industry's problems at first hand or has taken the trouble to find out some of the salient .problems.
The bedrock of all current courses in road transport management consists of lectures on finance and accounting. I like the stress given by Mr. B. Jacobs, a Bromsgrove lecturer, to the need for accounts to be comprehensible. Any accountant producing figures that are not clearly understandable should be summarily dismissed, he said. Mr. Jacobs' insistence that the form of presentation of accounts was less important than ease of understanding was relished by many of the students and it is to be hoped that some standardized book-keeping and accounting methods will be developed as management training seeps down through the road transport industry:
Simple book-keeping
There may be a case for single-entry book-keeping records for small hauliers. Many small businessmen, club stewards, etc., use this method now and it would not be difficult to devise analysis sheet rulings which would simplify accounting and costing procedures for busy road hauliers. A simplified record for costing purposes is contained in CM'S "Tables of Operating Costs." Medium and large-sized firms are, I gather, beginning to make use of centralized computer accounting systems. All -transactions are on a magnetized sheet and forwarded to the bureau for analysis. A system of this kind is being used by some Ford main dealers in conjuetion with Kalamazoo Ltd. who provide detailed analysis to users of the system within three days of the end of the month.
The Bromsgrove College premises are intensively used for 48 weeks of the year. Lecturers, I understand, get 12 weeks' holiday, in total, though some choose not to take their full entitlement. Many of the lecturing staff undertake consulting assignments in their leave periods, and this is very much to be welcomed, in my view. In a week's course attended by a small group of road transport people it would be strange if the particular problems of students' firms were not ventilated. Consultancy assignments often develop from the friendships made between lecturers and course students. And there is a consequential "feedback" to the college which is invaluable in the up-dating of course material.
I was pleased to learn from Mr. Coael that technical and trade papers such as CM are regularly studied by college staff and students. The days when local technical colleges existed in splendid isolation from, their environment have gone, never to return. Today, teaching institutions must not only reflect the demands of contemporary industry; they must anticipate the requirements of five or 10 years hence.
Insurance advice
Some salutary cautions about general insurance matters were given at Droitwich by Mr. H. W. Jones, acting head of Bromsgrove's management department. Although the industry is fairly well briefed on vehicle and goods-in-transit aspects, I suspect there is much ignorance about the wider problems of insurance.
Fire policies, for example, should be reviewed at least every two years to see if cover is adequate. The cover provided should be at least sufficient to meet rebuilding costs (excluding land costs) with an allowance of eight per cent for necessary architect's fees.
Because it may not be possible to rebuild in the same way the policy should carry a local authority clause so that the insurer is indemnified for the additional cost of rebuilding to current building standards.
As regards equipment, it was desirable to include a clause for the replacement of "as-new" plant and machinery. If the cover, for example, only meets half the replacement value the insurers would only pay half—and that would not go far to renew essential stock in trade. When a number of depots are involved and equipment may be switched from place to place it is important that the relevant clause permits this, It would be interesting to know how many small businesses are covered for consequential losses--loss of profits, etc—arising from fire damage. A business closed down for a period will have to face a number of charges though there will norevenue—other than insurance benefits—to meet them. In a serious fire it could well take a year or more to reinstate the premises. Decisions would have to be taken as to the number of staff to be retained. Policies can be drawn to allow for the additional cost of working the business following a closure, e.g., to meet the cost of obtaining fresh customers. Consequential loss policies are customarily issued by the fire insurers but there is no reason why another company should not be patronized if desired. It should not be necessary to emphasize that a hard-up road haulier who deliberately sets fire to his premises will NOT receive a penny under a consequential loss policy!
Employers' liability policies are also indispensable, said Mr. Jones, A great virtue of such insurances is that there is less antagonism between the employer and employee following an accident. The premiums on employers' liability policies are based on the wages bill and if the claims record is good they are not excessive. With up to• £50,000 now being awarded by the courts for loss of life, any skimping on employers' liability cover would seem to be most ill advised.
Public liability policies are no less necessary. The premiums vary with the number of people likely to use the premises and, of course, their state of preservation.
1 was glad of the reminder that Cash in Transit policies cover National Insurance stamps as well as the hazards involved in conveying cash to and from banks. The rate per cent depends normally on the amount of ' money carried and the district involved, the insurers being interested in the amount of maximum risk at any one time.
As regards National Insurance stamps, Mr. Jones worked out that for a typical small firm with only 10 employees, at any one time the value of half-full stamped cards, with £4 stamps including SET, could be around £1,000. That is a lot of money to lose. There is, it seems, a thriving market for stolen stamps. Any employer having stamped cards stolen is liable to replace the full value, though if it can be proved to the satisfaction of the National Insurance headquarters office that the cards have been destroyed in a fire, the value is credited. Mr. Jones counselled the use of franking machines, costing perhaps £100, plus dies (£8 10s.). By paying for a quota of stamps by cheque there is no risk of loss in the event of burglary.
Mr. Jones' final point was to commend the use of a good insurance broker. Insurance on a do-it-yourself basis could be very expensive in the long run. Small businessmen should profit from the unbiased advice of a good broker.
My all-too-brief visit to the Droitwich transport manager's course and to Bromsgrove College was a stimulating experience. Students from as far away as New Zealand and the United States would not opt for a Bromsgrove course if the College's reputation were not deservedly high. The college caters for some of Rolls-Royce's management trainees and it is likely that it will soon be undertaking management training tailored for the specific needs of major own-account operators as well as professional roadhaulage concerns. Interested principals should lose no time in meeting Mr. Maurice Ross and his talented colleagues.