Manufacturing Leaders

Diversity Fuels Innovation in Manufacturing

• Mark Bracknall • Season 12 • Episode 3

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When a manufacturer doubles its workforce in just seven years despite industry-wide skills shortages you know they’re doing something special.

In this episode, Lorinda Lackay, Operations Director at Minicam, shares the innovative strategies that have transformed this Salford-based wastewater inspection systems manufacturer.

✈️ Growing up near an airfield in South Africa, Lorinda’s early spark for engineering shaped her belief in inspiring young people to see curiosity as the start of an engineering career.

🌍 Diversity as a strength: with 15+ nationalities across just 60 employees, Minicam proves how varied perspectives fuel innovation, resilience, and adaptability.

📚 Rethinking the apprenticeship levy: reskilling existing employees mid-career, moving experienced shop-floor talent into quality and safety roles, while creating new career pathways.

🤝 Culture as the driver: from collaborative hubs to open workbench layouts, Minicam shows how an environment that encourages conversation and ideas leads to lasting change.

Whether you’re tackling recruitment challenges, looking to futureproof skills, or building a stronger culture, Lorinda’s story shows what’s possible when manufacturing leaders think differently.

Please subscribe to the channel for more content! Theo James are a Manufacturing & Engineering Recruiter based in the North East, helping Manufacturing and Engineering firms grow across the UK. Please call us on 0191 5111 298

Speaker 1:

Hello and welcome to an episode of the Manufacturers Reliefs podcast with me, mark Bracknell, my director of Theo Change Recruitment. Today we're welcoming on Lindsay Lekay, the operations director of Minicam, based in Salford. This was such an important episode to do because of some of the topics we discussed which are going to really help a lot of companies going through growth. We touched on the challenges behind growing right now, the challenge behind attracting people into manufacturing, and particularly the younger generation. So what have ManyCam done about it? They've thought differently and they've got a different process. They've concentrated on having a culture of different diversities. They've actually got 15 different nationalities in their business, not by accident, something they have gone out to do to intentionally attract people in the business who are from a different landscape, a different nationality, a different business, and then create a safe space within a business to innovate, to share, to workshop ideas and create different ideas and things in their business to make sure they are pushing and they are progressing as a business. And I thought it was amazing and Lorinda talked in detail about that and you're going to learn a lot about that as a business. It's a real different way to look at growth. We also talked about the importance of training and the importance of using the apprenticeship levy to actually train people mid way through or even towards the end of their career into something different, to make sure you are retaining your staff but also retraining them into a different part of the business, and that's had a dramatically positive effect on minicam's retention and growth in the business too. We talk about everything else as well in terms of lorinda's journey into leadership, into engineering engineering, coming from originally South Africa, into the UK.

Speaker 1:

It's a really enjoyable episode I know you'll like. So please, please, please, help me, as ever, to grow the show and just comment, like and subscribe to the show. Massively helps. Please sit back, enjoy the episode, speak soon. Excellent, so a massive warm welcome to you from Lorinda, who is the Ops Director from Minicam, based in Salford. How are we doing, lorinda? Okay?

Speaker 2:

I'm doing well, thank you.

Speaker 1:

Excellent. Well, really looking forward to this one, I can't wait to get into your journey, but also the journey that Minicam have been on since your time there as well. But the first question is the same question I ask everyone.

Speaker 2:

What does it mean to you to be a leader, developing my people, leaving them better off than I actually inherit them or join them, and making sure that they can actually contribute to the company, the industry and to the UK?

Speaker 1:

Perfect. So for you, do you feel that responsibility sometimes, because I think you obviously see that as a privilege in the role you have to, to be someone who influences someone's career for the better, which is amazing and I completely agree but do you also sometimes feel that level of responsibility that you are that person sometimes?

Speaker 2:

Yes, I do. At the end of the day, you're always trying to make things better for people. You're trying to, in your way, change their lives a little bit. There's a lot of pressure to make sure that you're always there to support them and you're actually always getting the best out of them.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, 100%.

Speaker 2:

Well, can you tell us, for people who don't know, can you tell us a little bit briefly about minicam and what they do, and then we'll go into your journey, if that's all right yep, so minicam, we manufacture our wastewater inspection systems, so we manufacture locally our push camera and crawler systems, and then we also have subsidiaries that are based in denmark as well as in poland and that manufacture the in-situ or in-pipe lining systems and robotic cutting as well, so they basically use to rehabilitate our wastewater systems across the world.

Speaker 1:

Excellent, all right, interesting, okay, and so if we go back to 10-year-old Lorinda, did you think when I asked you what you'd be doing in X amount of years, year's time, you'd be doing this? Where did that engineering passion come from, would you say?

Speaker 2:

um, actually I've always wanted to be an engineer. Um originally started out wanting to be an aeronautical engineer. Um grew up near an airfield in south africa, always seeing planes, always wanted to actually kind of work in design planes, but unfortunately ended up working in mining first and then moving on through to where I am now, so been in different industries. Engineering is a transferable skill. It's how you think, so I love it. Still Not so much hands-on engineering and technical engineering anymore, but you know what? At the end of the day, the skills and the thinking are still there yeah, absolutely, and so you're an engineer at heart.

Speaker 1:

It's interesting that because I would say probably most people fall into it. Most people you know, pick up an apprenticeship and and um, they get pushed into one and then they start to enjoy it and work their way up. Obviously, you know, you had that experience of living near an airfield. Was that just the amazement, as a young girl, seeing these things and thinking how they're made, or was it nature or nurture? What sort of led you to that passion?

Speaker 2:

It was definitely more nature than nurture. Growing up there wasn't many engineers where I'm from. Seeing the planes, seeing just the wonder of it, they kind of always got me interested. I was always very curious, used to see a lot of things, just wondered how they work. So I realized everything that I see around me is from engineers, whether it's the car, the plane, even our roads. It was just which form of engineering? So for me it was aeronautical at the time.

Speaker 1:

It's interesting, isn't it? Because I still think that not a lot that awareness there is still lacking. Let's take the UK, for example. A lot of kids love airplanes and love big machines and love to see big cars and monster trucks, but then they get a bit older and they get amazed by it and then we don't bring them into factories and see how things are made and all the stuff, all the amazing stuff happening right now. It's still a big gap, isn't it? And probably part of the reason why we have such a skills gap now.

Speaker 2:

It is One of the things I always wonder. You always see little boys playing with their little diggers and their graders. How many of them actually ever realize it's used in mining, it's used in every industry. It has to be manufactured. We never push and actually show them how those things are made so they can become the future engineers. We never nurture that early curiosity that a lot of kids have, male and female. We just take it for granted that they'll fall into it. But we don't actually actively drive a large part of any economy, whether it is mining, primary industries all the way through to secondary industries and manufacturing. It hasn't been intentional to develop that in many cases, using it early on. We don't do grassroots engineering skills like we do football or any other sports or a lot of other things, like music even I couldn't.

Speaker 1:

I couldn't agree more because actually, if you actually reverse engineer to be an engineer, there's a lot to it, there's a lot of learning. You know, you don't you know, fall into it and just organically pick up those skills. It's the you know, it's the mathematics, it's the physics side to it, it's the understanding of it, and they need to be taught and nurtured from a such a young age, before it's too late. And you know, unfortunately we get a load of people now who you know, leave education with really generic understanding of of you know, things they're not really that interested in, and and it's often not that it's too late, but often they fall into a job that they don't love. And then you know, next thing, you know they're waiting for Friday every week and there's too much of that isn't there? It really is.

Speaker 2:

It is Definitely as well as a lot of people that only figure out later on in life that if they actually knew what their passion was early on and if we actually nurtured that, they would have paid better attention in maths class, they would have actually been more committed to the science side, which, unless you can see where you want to take it, a lot of kids don't make that link early on and won't put in that effort because they can't see where it's going to take them yeah, I completely agree.

Speaker 1:

Engineering's one side, leadership is another, and you mentioned that. You say you know your role got to a stage where you wasn't as hands-on. A lot of people get into engineering and stay in engineering because leadership is a completely different job. Some people are thrust into management and they are just presumed to be good leaders because they're good as they're good engineers. What was it for? Was it something you strived to do? Was it quite organic process? How did that leadership evolution happen?

Speaker 2:

For me, it was actually by chance, Literally what got me into leadership, and my first step into managing and leading people was by chance. One of my previous MDs actually came down to the floor and actually saw me getting people together to solve a problem, and he realized that actually something as simple as being able to get people talking, get them together, get them focused on something not necessarily that's their day-to-day focus, but actually supporting or showing a leadership skill that he felt is needed in anyone. And actually he started working with me and gave me an opportunity to move into leading a team and leading a department, and that's when I made the jump not just from engineering to operations, but also to leading a wider team and a more diverse team as well. So it was purely by chance that someone saw that ability in me. That kind of led me into the next step yeah, it's interesting that it.

Speaker 1:

It just shows importance, isn't it as a leader to always be looking for future leaders in the business, because a lot of companies wait until they have opportunities and wait to see who applies. But I think it's also our job to see that raw talent sometimes, isn't it?

Speaker 2:

I think we need to be more intentional about making leaders and actually developing opportunities for people to step forward. It's something that People talk about succession planning. It's not sitting in a boardroom, it's the day-to-day finding those opportunities, seeing what your people are capable of and then giving them the chance to spread their wings.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I couldn't agree more. If you think about leadership styles and how leadership styles have changed over time from probably what once was a very old-school dictatorship-type environment and there's probably less of that now, what leadership style do you think suits you the best? Has that changed over time, would you say?

Speaker 2:

For me, probably it hasn't changed too much. When I moved into leadership, like I said, it was by chance. It was always trying to help people solve problems, so my leadership style has always been very much a servant style. I try to get people to work together. So it's much more democratic as well. So it's about pulling the team, getting them to solve the problems, getting them to get involved. So for me I don't think it's actually changed too much, but it hasn't been the standard that's been in most industries. It definitely wasn't the standard in the heavy industry that I was in. So for me, one of the things I have seen over time is that move to that becoming a more standard style of leadership, where before it was much more autocratic, a lot more directive, a lot more management than leadership, and now it's about the people instead of about the leader.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I agree. How do you train? That, do you think? Is that companies need to do more external training? Is it more internal training? Is it allowing them to make mistakes and learn from it? What's the best way, I guess, if you look at your organization, where you're bringing the next level of leaders through.

Speaker 2:

I think it's two parts. There is the training part to it, giving them the skills so that they can be comfortable doing that, but I also think it's culture. A company's culture will actually attract the type of leaders that the culture actually creates and dominates as well. That diverse, organic leadership style across an organization, as your identity, goes a long way as well.

Speaker 1:

Excellent, yeah, and I'll pick your brains on that as we talk about that transition to, obviously, to your current role at Minicamp. I'm curious to see the jump you made because obviously before here you were at Avery Dennison, which was back up in the Northeast. I'm calling, or speaking from now um, what led you to that move to the uk? Because I imagine that was. You know, it's a, it's a big decision, isn't it, to leave your home country to to work other side of the world. So what led you there?

Speaker 2:

um. For me it was following my husband. He actually came across. He is at the University of Leeds as a lecturer, so we came here for career opportunities for both of us as well. Both of us are professionals, we're both engineers and at the moment it's actually very much a skills gap in the UK, so it was an area that we felt we could contribute.

Speaker 1:

Excellent. And were there any obvious differences culturally, if you look at engineering and manufacturing from the UK, than there was in South Africa, would you say.

Speaker 2:

There's a few differences.

Speaker 2:

In South Africa we're very much still a primary and secondary industry country, so there is a lot more investment in actually the training side of it as well.

Speaker 2:

People are much more likely to go into these type of careers, so there's a lot more workforce available in the UK. One of the things I've noticed is it's not as popular, particularly amongst the youngsters these days, to go into engineering and also heavy industry as well. Even where I am now electronics there is a bit of a shortage on skills. So getting people into that using um apprenticeships, kind of driving that early career development in manufacturing on our shop floor, actually has a large difference as well compared to South Africa where that's freely available um. One of the things I've also realized in the UK we've lost a lot of more experienced workforce compared to South Africa where people have left industry or actually just left their careers. So especially post-COVID you have a lot of people that's taken early retirement or just left the industry. So there's a gap on that experience side where you now actually have to either cross-train multi-skilled people to actually kind of get that experience back again.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and I guess you're absolutely right. They are real life current problems at the moment. This industry If you take that, then then obviously you're at Minicam now you've been there for seven months. This is a company which is going through, you know, exciting growth. You know growth is growth is fantastic, but it's challenging and obviously you couple that with all the challenges you've just spoken about. Since you've been there, how have they tackled those problems to try to keep growing and hit the targets they need to hit?

Speaker 2:

So we've had to adapt in multiple ways introducing temporary workforce to kind of adapt and get people in quicker. Look at new training methods as well. For our team We've had to look at reskilling employees as well to move people from manufacturing, where they understand the products, into some of the support areas health and safety, quality and actually build that up as well. Um, and actually build that up as well. We actually also having to look at our internal training quite a bit, um, because at the end of the day, we're competing against a lot of industries for a very small pool, um, and then also diversifying our workforce um. A lot of our incoming employees are expats as well, working in the uk where at the moment, with the skills shortage, we have a lot of people coming from other countries that actually do bring in skills that the UK need as well excellent.

Speaker 1:

A couple things I pick up there and, uh, other people can learn from the internal training, being one of them. And I'm right in saying, um Lorinda, that you have utilized the, the levy, the apprenticeship levy, for this as well, which which I actually think there's still probably a it's it's underused in my opinion. But what I'm really interested in is, traditionally, people see apprenticeships, as you know, 60 to 18 year olds. You know a routine which is a fantastic route for people, but I know you not only have done that, but you've used people who are not, you know, a sort of a more further on in their career to do that. Can you tell me a bit about what you've done there and any success you've had, please?

Speaker 2:

Yep. So what we're doing is using Skills Levy to actually cross and reskill workforce as well, so utilizing people that actually have that engineering or manufacturing background and actually bringing them into other areas of the business, for example, moving into quality if you understand the manufacturing processes, and actually bringing them into other areas of the business, for example, moving into quality if you understand the manufacturing processes. We're utilizing the levy to actually get quality practitioners in, so taking our existing employees, training them up through the levy over the next few years and actually getting them into new careers where, having understood our company and our culture, they can then take the next step on their careers and help us do the changes that we need to do as they learn those skills as well.

Speaker 1:

Apologies for interrupting this episode with a very quick announcement about my business. Theo James are a specialist talent provider specifically to the manufacturing and engineering sector. I'm incredibly proud of what we've achieved since our inception in 2015. We specialize in roles from semi-skilled trades right the way up to our TJ exec search arm of the business. Both from the contract and permit side, we offer both bespoke one-off campaigns for hard to fill roles or a full partnership service where we become an extension of your business. For any information, please get in touch with me or the team. I hope you enjoy the rest of the episode. Thank you. Brilliant, excellent. Has it been plain sailing? Any sort of issues along the way? What's that journey been like?

Speaker 2:

Nothing's ever plain sailing, if you're honest. For a lot of employees it is tough. You're going to go back to school. A lot of them haven't studied in 20, 30 years. It's a new job while they're learning new skills. For them it's scary, it's exciting, but it's also a challenge at the same time. Growth if it's comfortable isn't growth. The mere fact that you're changing, mere fact that you're being stretched, is uncomfortable, and it's about supporting the employees and making it possible for them to do it. So, not having unrealistic expectations, but being there, guiding them, helping them take those steps constantly, a little bit, every day, challenging them and keeping them motivated while they do it, and you get through to the other end and basically you have a brand new employee that's done the impossible to them no, I know and I love that and I think it's very well timed at the moment because of everything we've spoken about.

Speaker 1:

You know the the fact there is a real skill shortage, but actually, you know, as, whatever you want to call it, you know 4.0 or you know whatever it is in terms of the manufacturing is obviously coming to a more automated and digital age and I think there's some understandable fear of people who are in a, you know, a lesser skilled role that they're not going to be used and I think there's definitely going to be element of that. You know that that is that's a real, real fear. But actually they need and should be utilized for different areas in the business and I think this is where you know you've quite rightly used that levy to do so. So you know you can, because I think some people are in a job and then they think progression is just up, sometimes at management, and they don't want to be a manager. Actually, you know you can retrain.

Speaker 1:

You know there's different ways to progress in a business and I think that for me, is such a clever way of growing the business because you know my job is to recruit people. It's hard and there's not an endless amount of people who want to get into the industry as well, and that's that is a real challenge because, as you quite rightly said, a lot of the younger workforce they don't want to work in sometimes really heavy, dirty environments, you know is, do you have that challenge and issue to attract people to that environment? Because I know a lot of my clients do.

Speaker 2:

Yep, so one. We're working in wastewater manufacturing. Wastewater isn't a glamorous industry to service. We're not manufacturing anything that looks particularly exciting. We're not aviation. We're not the fancy robotics. We, real life, every day, make a different type of electronic components and we're not the fancy robotics inspection systems. Our crawlers are going down our sewer systems. It's not going into space. It's not a Mars rover.

Speaker 2:

So it doesn't have the glamour when you're looking at companies that your BAEs and your big manufacturers have. But it's the companies that actually keep the economy going, literally keeps us from being flooded every time it rains. So it is difficult to attract the younger generation. Many cases we are attracting an older generation and more senior people because they actually see the value and they understand the stability the industry brings, but definitely not glamorous. So you don't get the wider range of students that you would hope apply for positions. You don't get the youngsters all hopping and running for apprenticeships like they would in other places. So it's something that being able to reskill people in gives us that wider range of being able to mix what we can get in while still keeping the company growing by reskilling and then being able to attract in people at a lower level that can actually then work on the shop floor, develop themselves up and then move when those opportunities arise again.

Speaker 1:

I think it's great. I think you found a perfect solution and you know to more people, to your business, how it works. And, like you say, just because the purpose isn't sending people to the moon doesn't mean there's not a purpose there. You know the purpose there is exactly that. So the the importance of what you do is crucial because it will stop people the country from flooding. So I completely agree. And, um, I'd also like to talk about that multicultural um piece as well, because I think it's really important.

Speaker 1:

I know we had a chat previously about this in terms of what you've done.

Speaker 1:

The business, I think I don't think I know a lot of businesses need to open their minds a little bit more about this and and you know I don't mind saying that we have this challenge. Sometimes, you know, when we're recruiting and we, we come up against companies who really have a a lack of wants to try something different and they we come. There's some friction there if there's a superb candidate who might need sponsorship or there's just a lack of awareness behind it, but there's a lack of will to want to understand it enough to change their process. I know you as a business have worked really hard to to um, to make it work, and I'd like to talk about it, to really sort of challenge from people's mindsets about if that's okay, living there. So can you tell me a little bit about what you've done there as a business, because I'm right in saying there's 15 different nationalities there on site, which in itself is brilliant, but that doesn't happen overnight. So how have they done that, would you say, and what steps have they taken?

Speaker 2:

So I'm actually part of the journey that Minicam's been on. I sit at the board level and I'm an expat myself. The company's actually sponsored me to join as well. It actually comes from our parent company, helmer. They look globally for the best talent possible, but for minicam, that's one of our values diversity and embracing anyone and everyone that's willing to come and contribute. Like you said, we've got 15 nationalities on our site. We're just over 60 odd people on site and, at the end of the day, if we have 15 different nationalities and multiple languages being spoken on site at any given time, you can imagine how diverse we actually are.

Speaker 2:

Everyone comes with a common purpose to actually be a good employee to the business, be a good teammate to those around them, irrespective of where they come from, and one of the things that you actually see is the difference in thinking. That it does bring people's different lived experiences, does impact how they actually overcome challenges. We have people from all over the world. We've got people that come from different socioeconomic backgrounds and that does actually show in terms of how we challenge ourselves and how we actually deal with issues. It brings a resilience and adaptability to the business that most places, if you're very homogenous. The only thing you're going to have is that immediate areas thinking. We don't have that here. It's actually one of the things that I love about minicamp. It's one of the reasons I joined minicamp and hopefully I can continue driving my team to embrace it even more I think it's brilliant for all the reasons you just said there, because exactly that, you know some industries.

Speaker 1:

Just take the same people with the same experience and the same background, you just get the same results and same ideas, don't you? And you know, you know to. You're a good example of someone who's worked in a complete you know, across the other side of the world, a complete different culture. You know you'll bring different ideas and see things differently, and you get a room with those people. I imagine the meetings you have as a team are very creative, I guess because of that.

Speaker 2:

Yep, everyone has a different idea. It's about blending those ideas together and also, when we do have an idea or a way forward, it's about being able to see what the risks are, see things maybe inside out, upside down, look at it 20 different angles and see what are we missing. There's always someone that will think a bit differently and go have you considered this? Have you considered that? It just gets people thinking? And sometimes it's more about generating the discussion rather than just a solution, because the discussion gets people thinking about the solution. Most of the times where a challenge might seem impossible to overcome, just having that discussion with someone, they might spark something that you never thought about. That actually gives you the solution. And that's what the team does on a day-to-day basis. They're always supporting, always talking One of the things you'll see on our shop floor while people are working.

Speaker 2:

They're actually talking to their colleagues, finding out things. Just actually yesterday I had of my employees who's um from zimbabwe talking to one of the employees that's actually from portugal and teaching him a bit of solo. So it's quite fun place to work. It keeps people engaged, it keeps people challenged. There's always something to learn, something to get involved in, and that comes from our diversity. It's not just the heads down.

Speaker 1:

It get on with your job place how do you, how do you organize those, those spaces? Because you know, if you look at manufacturing, often it is a head down and do it and everyone just do the shift and the clock on, the clock off. How do you organize and have a culture where you have got that continuous improvement and actual space for people to understand it? Is it literally a case of this? Is when we do this and this is a session, is it just culturally embedded into to keep talking about opportunities? How do you do that?

Speaker 2:

um, it's more of our culture. So a simple thing is if you actually had to visit minicab, you'll see what we call our hub or our common room. It's an open space where everyone meets. It doesn't matter whether you're an office member or shop floor worker. You're all together in that space. Everyone meets there and has a discussion. It creates kind of that family environment, that team environment that we have here and that actually spreads across the business as well. If you go to our shop floor, it's very open. Our work benches are either across from each other, so people can actually face each other and talk, or it's next to each other, where they are still in fairly close proximity, so those conversations can happen more naturally. Our team leaders are right there with their teams amongst them, actually driving the conversation in many cases. So it's just become our culture as a business to have those conversations going all the time.

Speaker 1:

Excellent and that I imagine, won't happen overnight. So if you were to work in a different business tomorrow and the business was classic manufacturing, you know the, the opposite, almost the opposite to what you've got now. You know the cultures wasn't there. What would be the first few things you would start to change? To start to turn to to where you can now, because you can't get that overnight, can you?

Speaker 2:

no, it's going to be a journey, but it's about creating first that common space, that area where people meet in an informal setting before you take a formal, whether it is driving people into your canteen, if you have one, creating that informal space where they can meet and have those discussions, setting time for them to actually do that as well, whether it's making sure that you can have that at lunchtime or in different other sessions. Creating that time and that space where you actually encourage it and, as leaders, stimulate it. That's one of the things as well, when you're early on in that journey, pulling those people together, having those discussions and kicking it off before you step away and allow them to have it. That's what we as leaders can do to actually get that culture change going.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, excellent, because that space, Jimmy, like that psychological safe space for people to learn, you know it's so important and I definitely see it. I see a lot of companies doing it. It's great. But I don't see enough of it because actually I think we're in a situation now where it will be tested because companies have never been more stretched financially and the word from the top will be to improve productivity and process and so on and so on. But actually to do that, like you say, you have to enable people to feel safe enough to be able to think the right way, don't't you?

Speaker 2:

if you don't encourage the thinking, the actions never change. If you don't change the culture, people's beliefs and the actions will never change. I'm a firm believer that the culture trumps everything else. The culture will eat your strategy for breakfast if you're not careful. So it's what you do on a day-to-day basis to drive the culture that will actually deliver that change that you want to see.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I love that, the sponsorship piece for some people who have just never gone down that route. And I do have companies that go. We don't do it, which is incredible, but they do how complex is that to set up? Because I guess to go to the extent you have to have, you know, 15, 15 different nationalities, that is is mind-blowing for a lot of businesses to have that. How complex is that to start and set up and start attracting people from different nationalities?

Speaker 2:

so before you actually go down the sponsorship route, there's a lot of people out there that actually do have dependency visas. They don't need sponsorship. That's always a good option. You have a lot of highly qualified people that way to actually early on boost that as well. Looking at setting up one, there's a lot of consultancy firms that actually can support you on that journey. Getting your sponsorship certificate, applying for that it's a bureaucratic exercise that can be tiresome, but once you actually have that in place it does open up a lot of opportunities and a lot of workforce as well skilled workforce as well.

Speaker 2:

One of the things that people do need to consider is a lot of companies and a lot of employees will take on the option of a skilled worker sponsorship. There's a certain aspect of they're willing to cover some of the cost as well. So there's a lot of people that are actually coming to the UK that actually, if they get the chance, would cover some of that expense and share that burden. They're looking for a company that will commit with them. So it's not necessarily that companies all have to carry the full burden. Companies that do can actually attract a higher class of professional as well. So there are different options that companies can pursue as well.

Speaker 1:

Excellent. Thank you, Because those basics sometimes are needed to start that journey, which I think is absolutely needed to improve manufacturing. The business has obviously been on a journey. Minicam what's the size of the company now? How many staff?

Speaker 2:

We're just over 120.

Speaker 1:

And that's doubled in size in a relatively short period of time, hasn't it?

Speaker 2:

Over about seven years, we've actually just over doubled in size.

Speaker 1:

Which is which is really good going. Really good going because there's one thing, hiring 60 people, but, as we know, to try get from 60 to 120, it's more than hiring 60 people. There's obviously some some churn there along the way, naturally. How, what, what do you think? How have you done that as a business and what, what you put that success down to? Would you say?

Speaker 2:

how have you done that as a business? And what? What you put that success down to? Would you say, um, there's different aspects to it. Um, it's the culture, so always wanting to grow. Um, the business has always been very agile, very much customer orientated as well, so that's actually enabled a lot of growth. Um, being very much entrepreneurial still, even though we've become a bit more corporate, and still having that hunger and that edge as a business to actually find those opportunities, and also investing in our people. So, by investing in our people, we've always been a business that people want to join, which actually has enabled that growth as well, and we attract that same agility, that same resilience in our employees that we have in our culture as well.

Speaker 1:

So that's actually been the two big levers that actually, on a day-to-day basis, allow the company to actually grow at this amazing pace yeah, it's amazing because it is extremely hard to do and I think will continue to be extremely hard to do, but it's um, it stays down to the, the culture. You've done that because money manufacturing and engineering right now is it's hard. Um, if you, if you could wave a magic wand, how would you? How? What would you change about the industry you think to to get there? Because I, I really fear for the uk manufacturing industry. I, I used to hide behind this powerhouse piece, but we're not anymore. You know it's, we're just. So what would you do differently? Do you think if you could wave that magic wand and improve the industry?

Speaker 2:

For me, it would actually be get skills going again, get entrepreneurship going. Make it easier for companies to be entrepreneurial, innovative and actually get products out there. Get skills that can actually manufacture those products, Because, at the end of the day, technology is driven by the skills People make technology. Technology actually makes manufacturing possible and actually is a product that's manufactured in itself. So, driving that innovation, driving the skills, driving that hunger back into, like we said, driving the skills, driving that hunger back into, like we said, start with young kids. If you're actually encouraging the kids to get back and playing with Lego when they're at nursery school, getting them to build and drive things, they will continue building and driving and actually creating the next range of products, which is what's going to actually keep industry going.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I couldn't agree more. I think it's a huge part of it. Sometimes I like to phone a few random questions we say which which might feel a bit like interview questions. I apologize in advance, lavinda, but I'm sure you'll be absolutely fine with them. But I'm always curious who's the best manager you've had and why, would you say?

Speaker 2:

because I like to talk about leadership piece sometimes for me it would have been that previous MD that I've mentioned before. Terry actually changed my career, seeing something in me that at the time I didn't see in myself. Having those discussions, being a mentor, being a coach when I needed it, helped me change my career. It's what actually led me to leaving South Africa and actually seeing a large part of the world. So for me he was probably the most influential leader I've had.

Speaker 1:

Excellent, and what excites you now? Do you think, in terms of the day-to-day now, what's the most exciting thing for you about the next few years?

Speaker 2:

Seeing my team develop, seeing the cross-skilling and the re-skilling that I've started here actually take root, and seeing people do jobs that they never thought they would do. Seeing people take on new challenges that, when they've actually achieved it, they look back and go. You know what I never thought I could do that yeah, love that.

Speaker 2:

The flip side is what's the hardest day you've ever had as a leader um, the hardest day I've had as a leader is actually seeing people not achieve what they wanted to, seeing people give up, seeing people actually throw the towel in and rather change to something that they consider easier. Leave the industry, leave engineering, just choose to actually go into retirement without actually paying it forward. Because, at the end of the day, if we're not challenging ourselves, if we're not growing, if we give up at the first hurdle, what are we actually adding to our lives?

Speaker 2:

We can take the easy route, but it's not always the best route.

Speaker 1:

It's that resilience piece, isn't it? You know, we talk a lot about the new generation and we have to make sure they innovates and we have to give them, you know, the opportunities that perhaps people had previously, but we also need to try to teach that resilience piece because it's lacking, isn't it now?

Speaker 2:

I think one of the things that I've seen with the new generation coming in they're looking for the easy career. They think they will fall into something that magically just feels right. They don't necessarily understand the value of hard work in terms of its own value and growth. To them hard work is a slog sometimes because they actually haven't just been taught the value of growing through hard work. Also, they don't necessarily know what they want to do.

Speaker 2:

We don't do enough guidance counseling on careers early on where they can actually really have that passion. So a lot of them would start a career and actually hop very quickly. They don't actually stick around to see actually what is it that I can do as a person in this career to actually make it valuable and engaging for myself? They want that external validation very quickly, which doesn't always come in careers like manufacturing. It's you in a role for a while. It takes time to become proficient in something. You don't just magically fall into it and you're competent the next day. It's hard work, it's time, it's effort and I don't think that that's always actually value for what it actually brings yeah, I completely agree and really well communicated.

Speaker 1:

Just finally, you're in debt. What's the next couple years looking like for minicam? What? What are you excited about the next 18 months? What's happening?

Speaker 2:

um continuing to grow. We've got some strong growth targets that we also want to achieve and right now, with where we are, we're expanding in terms of our next range of products, developing our next generation coming in, actually continuing to develop our products and our teams to actually be there for industry.

Speaker 1:

A lot of our infrastructure is aging globally, so it's about making sure that we can actually keep up and make sure we actually maximize that demand and for me personally, it's actually just seeing my team grow um, not just in number um, but the skill level, making sure that people actually see career growth and see the hard work pay off by actually feeling like they've added to that part of the company perfect, thank you, and one of the things I've picked up so much stuff there but every time I ask you about leadership, you talked about the team, you talked about your passion through, through making sure that they grow as a you know, as humans and seem, and I think sometimes we have to just stop and reflect and see what impact we have on other people, because we're sometimes so engrossed in the day-to-day we don't realize the impact and the influence we have, or we should have, on people's lives as leaders. And it's such a position, responsibility and you've really reminded me of that today that it is an absolute privilege that we do this job. But so many lessons for people here and I'm really felt like a really important episode for me because there's obvious skills gap and we know that in manufacturing. So what we can do about it and this is hopefully an episode where people will go right, we're not doing everything we can do, because if we're just trying to attract people and try and attract people and we get the same people, it's not happening. We'll get the same to your using the leverage, your advantage, and you're actually upskilling people who are midway through their career or towards the end of their career. I think that's brilliant, because I just think we are sometimes so short-sighted that apprenticeships needs to be that early stage in their career. Basically absolutely doesn't have to be. It's a great way to retain staff in your business as well. 100 training internally is just the is as important as hiring people. I think it's perfect.

Speaker 1:

But the way that Minicam have integrated so many different cultures and nationalities into their business is very unique. It's very unique. You don't come across businesses like that very often, because a lot of businesses won't go the hard miles to get there. But once you have got there and you've built the culture you have, which is which is open, honest, innovative, you have everything you've got now, which is a business, which which a group of people who care and care for for each other, and I think it's brilliant. So you've demonstrated that so well and a lot of people will learn a lot from this living. So, uh, yeah, I just just want to thank you for your time, everything you've done today.

Speaker 2:

It's massively appreciated thank you for having me.

Speaker 1:

Thank you so much for listening or watching this episode of the manufacturing leaders podcast. Please just like or subscribe. It really helps grow the show and obviously improve the industry. If you want any more information about theo james, as I mentioned midway through the episode, please get in touch with me or the team. I would love to talk about how it can help you directly or your business. We are more than just a recruiter and I know people say that, but it's something I'm incredibly passionate about. We are in business for much more than just a bums on seats approach. We want to help people grow, we want to help improve their lives and, ultimately, I want to work with businesses and people who share the same values as we do, and that's something I'm incredibly passionate about. So please, if that is you and you are passionate about that dream role or passionate about your people, please get in touch with me or the team. I would absolutely love to talk a bit more detail. Thank you very much. Speak soon.