Cheer up, working class
Russian shipbuilding companies are severely short of skilled workers in some specializations. In particular, shipyards attribute the current situation to absence of training in required sectors. Educational institutions, in their turn, blame it on improper organization of practical training at the enterprises.
Russian shipbuilding industry has been feeling the deficiency of skilled workers for about five years already. This has been proved by the data provided by Yuliya Sakharova, Director of HeadHunter’s North-West branch. According to the company findings, only 2.5 resumes correspond to each vacancy in shipbuilding while average amount of applications for each vacant position is 5.6.
As Natalja Zhdanova, Personnel Director at Vyborg Shipyard, says, the search and selection of employees is hindered by the absence of long-term backlog of orders (current backlog of orders cover the period till 2017). Besides, there is no adequate housing programme for the employees. Natalja Zhdanova also emphasizes low efficiency of vocational education (when it comes to supply of Vyborg Shipyard) and low prestige of the profession.
“We visit schools on vocational guidance purposes. Yet, whatever we do the occupational prestige is still low,” Natalja Zhdanova complains.
To attract young specialists, Vyborg Shipyard develops programmes aimed at ‘regeneration’ of the staff through up-to-date incentive arrangements, elaborates the housing programmes for personnel, provides the employees with free medical care, covers their travel costs and, in certain cases, their lease payments.
The problems are the same at Baltiysky Zavod – Sudostroyenije.
“Recruitment is one of the problems at the shipyard. We need turners, operators, layout specialists. As of today, vocational schools can train specialists in only 5% of professions we require,” says Tatjana Paklinskaya, head of Baltiysky Zavod department for recruitment and personnel development.
According to her, colleges do not take into account the demands of the shipyard while training the specialists the company does not need. “They train technicians while we need machine operators. Finally, we take those technicians and retrain them for specializations that are in demand at the shipyard”, Tatjana Paklinskaya says.
To solve the personnel problems, Baltiysky Zavod – Sudostroyenije has obtained a perpetual educational license for in-house training of specialists with hard-to-find skills (slingsmen, crane operators, assemblers of metal hulls, assembly/fitting workers, boilermakers, pipefitters and operators of computer-controlled machines).
Educational institutions, in their turn, attribute the shortage of certain specialists to low interest from young people.
“They are not willing to be trained as machine fitters that are in demand at the shipyard, they are more interested in information technologies, - says Marina Morozova, head of the resource center at Saint-Petersburg College of shipbuilding and applied technologies, - Vocational guidance is very important here and we ask the shipyards for assistance.”
According to Marina Morozova, the key problem is in practical training that is poorly arranged at the shipyards.
“Adequate practical training is needed to make a good specialist while shipyards are reluctant to arrange training. Particularly, not many trainees are invited”, she says.
Marina Morozova says the trainees are seldom involved in real production activities over a practice period which lasts for half a year. At the same time she praises fruitful cooperation with Severnaya Verf and Admiralty Shipyards.
The problem of manpower shortage has been aggravating for a long time and it cannot be solved immediately. Only joint efforts of all stakeholders will let improve the efficiency of vocational guidance and encourage the potential employees be trained as requires specialists.
Margaria Babkova
