Candor3 Espouse Engineering As A Great Career Option

John Gardiner, sole Director at Candor3, recently posted on the Candor3 website his thoughts on a NZ Herald article on a recent Government report showing that engineers, IT professionals and scientists have the best chance of securing a job in today’s market. As John said, “Given the increasing demand for our services, the difficulty in finding contractors to carry out works and continuing strong drivers in the housing market, it was no surprise to see engineering high up the list of occupations cited as having the best chance for students securing employment.  It also prompted the following few comments on my part based on recent experience.

“Engineering, and also surveying and town planning, are exciting, varied and challenging careers with great opportunities for development and advancement. Unfortunately I think many companies are doing poorly developing their talent in the workplace. I have recently had the chance to interview and work with several students and graduates and have been impressed by the calibre of the people that the profession is attracting. However, I also recently interviewed a woman who was but a short time into her first job after university. Sadly, the work she was doing wasn’t motivating or empowering her and while she was of the view that it was part of the learning process and she would get more interesting work as she gained more experience, I don’t necessarily share her view as she also made the comment that she didn’t feel supported in her career development.

“The above events have given me cause to think about the responsibility companies have to provide appropriate ongoing training and career development to their staff and to relook at what we are doing as a company. I have been fortunate, through most of my career, to have good mentors and to work with motivated people. However, in contrast, I had one job where the complete opposite was true and despite a lot of great people I can only describe the organisation as desperately unhappy and it has since dissolved completely.

“I suspect that many companies think that they are doing well developing, training and motivating their staff however surely the most honest measure of this are the views of those being trained and by this measure maybe companies aren’t doing so well. It isn’t easy in the face of day to day pressures but that is no excuse.

“Reflecting on my own experiences, and considering how many people I have interviewed over the years who recount similar stories, it has prompted a review of what we do as a company as the last thing we can afford is to waste the talent we have through poor training, processes that stifle learning or through having talented staff completing work that doesn’t motivate them. Last year we put a time into developing a review system which certainly worked but given the sort of feedback that we are getting from those people we are now seeking to employ it seems that we have not gone far enough. Research into the software available in this space has left us disappointed with the quality of what is on offer and consequently we have embarked on a major project to write our own internal career management software that will give staff far more guidance, feedback, support and control over their careers. This dovetails with other IT and training initiatives that we have underway. It is a fascinating process and while daunting we think we are on the right track – time will tell.”

For more information on Candor3 please go to the website at http://www.candor3.co.nz .