Episode 3: Making the logistics sector attractive - Generation Logistics Initiatives

Podcast Series: Gender Mainstreaming, Episode 3

Sudipa Sarker, Lecturer in Logistics and Supply Chain Management and Programme Lead for MSc Global Logistics and Supply Chain Analytics interviews Bethany Windsor.

Bethany is the Director of Stakeholder Engagement Relationship Management at the Chartered Institute of Logistics CILT UK. In this role, she promotes the logistics sector to various underrepresented groups. She also oversees generation logistics, which is partly funded by the UK government.

Episode 1 I Episode 2 I Episode 3 I Episode 4 I Episode 5 

Transcript

[00:00:00] Thank you for tuning into this podcast series on gender mainstreaming. We are recording five podcasts and today marks the third episode of this series. In this episode, we will explore how we can make the logistics sector more attractive for not only women, but also for every gender. Our guest today is Bethany Windsor.

She is the Director of Stakeholder Engagement Relationship Management at the Chartered Institute of Logistics CILT UK. In this role, she promotes the logistics sector to various underrepresented groups. She also oversees generation logistics, which is partly funded by the UK government. Her work with women in logistics on Bethany, the 2015 multimodal Women of the Year Award.

Bethany, thank you for joining us today. We appreciate you taking the time to share your insights and experiences with our listeners. First, tell us a bit about Generation Logistics. What is it? Thank you very much for having [00:01:00] me. Uh, Generation Logistics as Sudeep has said, is a sector backed, government funded initiative to inspire the next generation of logistics professionals.

We are supported by about 52 companies as well as the Department for Transport. to create significant campaigns across social media and in education to really open up the breadth and depth of the sector. So if you ask your average non logistician, what does the logistics sector do? We pick and pack in warehouses and we drive lorries.

which are two jobs that we absolutely do and that are absolutely necessary, but they are not our only two jobs. So we want to get out across social media directly into the eyes of those kind of, um, 13 to 24 year olds. And also, directly into education to support their teachers, their careers leaders [00:02:00] in busting some myths about the sector.

And really, as I say, opening their eyes to the range of jobs that we have that we need those jobs. So the skill shortage really represents an opportunity for their young people to step in and step up at pace and to give them the information that they need. to talk knowledgeably about our sector in the context of subjects that they teach and subjects that young people enjoy.

Thank you, Bethany, for that answer. So who is the target audience for Generation Logistics? So, we have two different target audiences. Our first is those young people directly. So, those 13 to 24 year olds. We target them across Instagram, TikTok LinkedIn, for those that might be searching for graduate roles, for example and other social media besides.

With the campaigns for those young, for the young people directly, [00:03:00] for the 16, as the 13 to 16 year old age group, we very much have a kind of awareness feel. So we've got little games that allow them to get an insight into the sector. It's not a hard sell on careers information. For those 17 to 24 year olds, it absolutely is.

So they are at the point where they're looking at jobs and we want to be talking to them about that. We have a secondary audience, albeit just as important, of those teachers and educators more widely, so perhaps careers leaders certainly within that as well. For them, we talk to them across education press, we talk to them on LinkedIn, we have an education hub where teachers can go and download curriculum mapped resources, again, just to try and make subjects that they teach analogous to jobs and logistics.

So we hope that in years to come, you know, we may, we will extend that audience. to other stakeholder [00:04:00] groups as well, but at the moment focusing on those 13 to 24 year olds and to their educators. Great answer. So why was generational logistics needed in the first place? A good question and always a good question to ask before you start spending the sector and the government's money, for sure.

So Generation Logistics came about as one of the 33 measures for the future of freight, which was an initiative spearheaded by Grant Shapps during his time as Minister. Various different initiatives, 33 of them, in fact, that All leant towards how do we secure the nation's supply chains? One of the biggest issues is the lack of people choosing the logistic sector, not only young people, but, but people more widely.

And this was one of the, you know, one of the initiatives that the government funded to try and Make that different. When we did our [00:05:00] benchmarking research before we kicked off with year one of the campaign, which was 2022 we did, that piece of research and fundamentally found that while people thought logistics was important for the economy, they thought it was important for the country, they thought it was important for them personally particularly after COVID.

We found that the majority of people couldn't say what a career in logistics would offer them because they didn't know what logistics was. Um, Where they did know what it was, they had quite accurate perceptions of it. So, fast paced, well paid, challenging In a positive sense, opportunity to travel where there were more negatives.

They were certainly accurate. We know we could do better on the facilities from for drivers. We know we're heavily male dominated sector, particularly at top level. But as I say, most people couldn't answer that question. So that's where generation logistics comes in. We are an awareness campaign, not a recruitment campaign.

So we want to raise awareness [00:06:00] of the sector so that then we can. All of the companies that you know, that want to go out into schools, colleges, have graduate roles, then get to talk about them and their roles and why they're great as a company. They don't have to do that first bit of, what's logistics?

What am I going to be doing anyway? So, yeah. Yes, a big job. But as we look year three in the eye where we are today, so that will start in October 2024 it is all to play for, you know, we have to keep going and doing this because of course, as with anything in academia, you only get one year once.

So yes, big job, but very rewarding to to be taking taking the time to do.

again for the answer. I think you have already spoken about it before, but have you missed any initiatives that generation logistic scheme is doing in your previous answers. So you can speak about different initiatives. That are taken by generation logistic scheme. Yeah, so we talked a little bit already about [00:07:00] the kind of social media presence.

I think probably what might be interesting to think about is how we do those campaigns. So where do we get the ideas from? Some of them are through what's called trend jacking. So what's in the media at the moment? And how do we, how do we change it to be logistics focused? So a good example would be the the World Cup, for example, or the Olympics, where we might have a top Trump style campaign talking about different roles that help to deliver that kind of event.

The campaign that we've got out at the moment talks about how much beer you need for festivals. So, some of it is, you know, what's current at the moment. We also try to look at shortage So jobs that we are short of in the sector, as well as underrepresented groups. So again, a good example might be the campaign that we did around female drivers.

So how can we convince people that, you [00:08:00] know, firstly, it's a good profession and it's an open profession for women indeed for all genders, and, you know, address some of the misconceptions, as well as being realistic about, you know, the position as it stands today. So some of it comes, you know, some of the campaigns come from the sector saying, you know, this is what we feel we really need to tackle.

Some of it comes from the zeitgeist of the moment, you know, and what's going on in popular media. And hopefully all of that comes together to make some really compelling campaigns. We're certainly seeing so in the figures.

So what are some success stories of Generation Logistics? So in terms of what we have achieved, certainly in the first year, so the first year ran from August 2022 to the end of September 23. We had a target of 600 million opportunities to see. So an opportunity to see is when you know that something has crossed someone's eyes.

Um, It might be on a bus [00:09:00] stop or on a social media feed, but you've not done anything with it. We achieved over 812 million opportunities to see, which was quite frankly phenomenal above, you know, above where, where we thought we would ever get.

With opportunities to see, of course, what you really want is someone doing something with your content. So that's engagement. We didn't have an engagement target, something that we do have in year two, but we achieved over three and a half million engagements on social. So a share, a click, a like a comment, for example.

And in terms of website hits, we created a new website, so the Generation Logistics Hub, and we targeted 600, 000. website hits and we achieved 789, 000. So again, well over where we wanted to be. In terms of how we changed the demographic or how the demographic feels about us, I should say we achieved 11 percent increase in awareness of the sector, which was below where we wanted to be, but we achieved [00:10:00] 170 percent increase in sentiment about the sector, which was below where we wanted to be.

over way, way over what we ever thought we would. So I think I think the targets for those was 20 and 25 percent respectively. So whilst we didn't achieve as much increase of awareness as we would like, with the people that we raised awareness with, their sentiment, their positive sentiment was changed phenomenally.

So what that's really led us to, you know, to, to draw a conclusion of is if we can reach more people and get that awareness percentage even higher. Hopefully we can maintain that percentage of sentiment and keep talking to more people and changing their minds. So in year two, we are already on track with our engagement target.

I think we're at about 70 percent of that with still several months to go. So we won't complete year two until the end of October. We are at about 80 percent of our website hits. already. So again, we expect to exceed [00:11:00] that. And then we've added in a target for downloads of our educational material.

And in a couple of weeks time, 24th of June, we have got Generation Logistics Week going out to all schools and colleges in the UK. So we're hopeful that that will drive that even further. And we sit at about 35 percent of that target achieved today. With, of course, the plan that the majority of that was always going to be captured during the week.

So very new Generation Logistics Week launching in and of itself is definitely a success for the campaign. And we'll be able to say in a few weeks how well it's gone.

So great successes already. So what are the challenges Generation Logistics faces? It's very difficult to change perceptions that have been around for years. logistics is a tough thing to raise awareness for because we only get into the media when it goes wrong. Toilet rolls over COVID. I maintain that was manufacturing and not logistics.

But um, [00:12:00] you know, people saw it as a delivery issue. So we get into the press when, when, when things go wrong, because supermarket shelves stocked every day is not, you know, not top news. So I think we are a really hidden sector. And we are one that has heritage viewpoint, you know, people have viewpoints about us being a an outdated sector.

So dirty warehouses and, you know all lorry drivers are men over 50 and um, there's no progression routes. It's, you know, I hate the phrase blue collar, but that's a, you know, a myth that we often hear as long as there's any blue collar jobs, you know, my son or daughter wants to go to university, so it's not for them.

They are the biggest challenges is trying to, you know, trying to, to, to overcome those perceptions. And we're lucky with our sponsor support that we get fantastic case studies. We get fantastic, um, input from them on things like sustainability, innovation, technology, you know, all of which change that mindset, but it is a long [00:13:00] game.

You know, we have to keep, keep banging the drum to make sure that we get that reach. We get those, those perceptions changed. So, yes, a big, it is a big job, as I've said, but if we don't do it, we don't stand a chance of, as a sector of winning that, you know, that, that war for talent. We don't only now fight with, you know, Ourselves, you know, let's say one 3PL having drivers from another 3PL for an extra 20p an hour or whatever it might be.

We're fighting with other sectors for things like sustainability roles, big data roles, roles in emerging technology, AI, et cetera, that every sector is going to need, if not is already needing. So we have to make ourselves attractive, competitive and position logistics as a profession of choice. So big challenge, but one that definitely needs doing and, and one that lots of our organizations are [00:14:00] willing to turn their hand to support.

So what advice do you have for the young people who will join the workforce this year or in coming years? It is a profession that will always be available. And I'm not sure, particularly when you think about the changes in AI and technology, I'm not sure that every profession can say that. And whilst our young people today don't necessarily think about a career for, you know, as in staying in one place 50 years and a gold watch, they do think about, you know, Paying the bills and, you know, buying a house and all of the other good stuff.

And I think knowing that you're in a profession that has longevity and that has variability, you know, there are so many jobs. We talk about 14 different job families, never mind individual jobs within those. It is a really good option. The reason that I say I feel, and it is personal opinion, that logistics will always be [00:15:00] needed is we will always need physical stuff.

You know, we love virtual stuff and we love 3D printed stuff and we love, you know, that, that kind of immediate nature of both of those things. I don't think physical stuff is going anywhere anytime soon certainly not in my lifetime. And even when we invent things like teleportation of our physical stuff that I think we will always need, the people who tell us what we can teleport and maintain our teleportation devices will be the logisticians of the future.

You know, so I think will we always need to have stuff and move stuff? Yeah. and plan stuff and make stuff, you know, all of the jobs that look at that end to end supply chain, that plan, plan, source, make, deliver model and return will always be needed in my opinion. So I think there's, there's that as a great opportunity for that kind of longevity, the breadth, and I think There is something for every [00:16:00] level of education and professional development.

If you want to go down the graduate route, the degree apprenticeship route the apprenticeship route and kind of step in and step up at pace, the fact that we have a skill shortage means that you've got the opportunity to do that. You know, we've got some fantastic general managers in the sector under 30, you know, which is phenomenal.

So that kind of managerial level, significant budget holders, significant teams. If that's the route that you want to go down and it doesn't have to be, you know, unlike let's say medicine or engineering, it's not only open to grads. You can do that with some of the other routes equally as a young person.

If you have had your fill of education right now, we still have great jobs at entry level, direct entry that pay well, because we don't have enough people. So again, that skill shortage representing an opportunity. If you want to come in, do a good job, well, go home at the end of [00:17:00] the day and not think about it to tomorrow.

We've got that too. So I think not only have we got the diversity of roles, we've got the diversity of entry routes. That means, you know, my, my top piece of advice to young people would be to think about logistics, go and do some investigation and see whether there is a niche there for you, because it's probably not one that's been talked about much at school.

So you might have to do your own research, but you know, I know myself that had I have found operations management a lot sooner I would have done that instead of going into teaching, you know, the bits I liked about teaching were the, what is operations management fundamentally. So Even if nothing else, even if we can't tempt you in as a young person, you know, investigate it and see whether it, you know, it feels like a fit for the future, or if nothing else that educates you a little bit more about what logistics is, that there is more to it than what you might think of seeing trucks and seeing grey boxes on [00:18:00] the side of the motorway.

Do you have any last minute thoughts on gender mainstreaming in the logistics sector, especially what can CILT do or is already doing that younger generation is not aware of? We must work together and I think this is where our, our trade associations, our membership bodies, the Chartered Institute is an educational charity with members, can add real value.

Any organization with members has that you know, captive audience almost. We have about 7, 000 members in the UK, 33, 000 worldwide. How can we be instrumental in sharing best practice, in platforming people working exceptionally well to make workplaces better as you said, right at the start, Sadiqa, for all genders, you know, how can we support with that?

That, that sharing of knowledge, looking at how that might be applicable to bigger companies, smaller [00:19:00] companies. You know, I see that very much as the role of the Institute to bring that best practice together, facilitate networking opportunities to have those conversations. We are not a lobbying organization, the Chartered Institute, but we, we are a critical friend to the government and advisor.

So you know, to be able to listen and learn from the sector and input that into policy positions equally as important. So sharing amongst the sector, sharing with government and through things like generation logistics, sharing beyond the sector really is, you know, the role that we see ourselves playing as the Institute in making sure that all of the good work that is being done about gender mainstreaming gets out there and indeed those companies that want to do more but don't know what to do are supported.

Thank you once again, Bethany, for sharing your valuable insights with us today. We truly appreciate your time. [00:20:00]