Bespoke Training, Mentoring and Auditing
Offering a unique service to fire extinguisher protection companies and engineers. Whether this is on-site or classroom, bespoke courses created for your training needs.
How did the important role of fire extinguisher engineer become just working from a list? This means head down and robotically moving from fire point to fire point, with no awareness of the environment.
Welcome, I’m Steve James
I’m an independent consultant, here to help you. My aim is organic growth and compliance for your business and professional development and competency for your engineers.
There’s a problem in the industry and we need to raise the bar in standards.
This matters!
I’m here to tell you that in my experience as an auditor and trainer, there is a gaping hole where compliance used to live.
Standards are slipping at an alarming rate. This is too important to not make a noise about it.
I know that this is important to you too, because you’re here.
How about if we were to all take a consolidated approach, in understanding that additional training for engineers is essential?
An engineer, on their 3-day training, may have the ability to retain information, pass the course and receive a certificate of competency but this does not mean that an engineer leaves as competent.
In a classroom environment they are taught all that they need to know. Unfortunately, the only hands-on experience they get is how to service a fire extinguisher.
But what happens when they’re out in real life and find themselves in a dirty factory, a big industrial building or complex premises? There hasn’t been any hands-on training when it comes to this environment. The reality of on-site situations hits home and is overwhelming as they try to implement classroom learnings
Time and time again I see the results of this lack of experience. Where the written word of the classroom rarely translates to doing the job properly on site.
Their day-to-day work inevitably means just servicing what’s already there with no awareness of the environment and what is actually needed. Robotically working from lists, moving from fire point to fire point.
The engineer’s struggle
Engineers struggle to evaluate the site competently, to identify the risks that need covering and the correct placement of equipment. They don’t know how to work out the required number of extinguishers or understand the fire ratings. This can potentially mean that no recommendations are made.
A new and unique approach
I know that this is new, I’ve never seen additional training for fire extinguisher engineers. It’s unique (matching my wife’s description of me from time to time.)
It’s something I wish would have been available to me when I started out.
I’m here to bridge the gap in training from the classroom to live on-site situations. To ensure a well-rounded and professional skill set for your engineers. That they work to their full potential, providing you as a company and your customers with all that is required of their role.
Whether you need an auditor to find out what is happening on your customer’s premises, or whether you need on-site or classroom training for your engineers, you’re in the right place.
On-Site Auditing
Do you want to know what’s happening on your customer’s sites? have you got concerns about your engineers? This is the way to find out.
It would be easy to presume that having taken the training, your engineers are doing all that they should be. You would expect that they are implementing this learning to ensure compliance on your customer’s premises. This is a mistake.
My auditing experience indicates problems across the board. Things are being missed, sites aren’t being evaluated properly. Servicing is not being carried out as it should. Auditing is so important.
On-site Training
On-site training gives me the opportunity to mentor an engineer one-to-one, giving advice/training specifically for them. Not everyone learns best in a classroom environment so this is ideal for a learner that needs a more kinaesthetic/experiencing approach.
Engineers really don’t know how much they don’t know. They believe that the external training was all that they needed. This is not the case.
Courses
All courses can be presented in-house or if facilities don’t allow I have a training room at my home in the West Midlands.
As well as BS5306, Parts 3 & 8, I have bespoke courses created to help you and your business. They’re new and haven’t been available before. All courses have been designed in a way to be engaging for your engineers and taught in a way that’s easy for them to absorb.
What people are saying
Recently we had the pleasure of a visit from Steve James discussing all things fire extinguishers, from the changes to BS5306, the standard of servicing and the gradual shift in quality of service over the years.
Steve is aiming to correct all the wrong doings by offering extra training for engineers, to ensure the quality of service, knowledge, communication, and everything in between, is at the level we’d all expect from engineers.
I couldn’t endorse his services enough, experience is something you cannot buy but it is something Steve can teach so I’d 100% recommend this!
Jack Beale
Director, Fire Equipment Maintenance Ltd