Magazine editor Paul Caddick offers his views on the state of the current ADI nation and what the biggest challenges are facing the sector today and in the future.
The ex-BBC radio journalist has been at the heart of the instructing industry for well over a decade, first as the editor of adiNEWS and now as the editor of the recently launched Intelligent Instructor magazine that is the industry’s only independent publication providing impartial information, news and features as well as essential career and business advice. We spoke with Paul about the threat of low lesson prices, the lack of authoritative voices within the sector and how autonomous vehicles could devastate the industry much sooner than many of us believe.
What are the biggest challenges facing ADIs today? Earnings and low lesson prices are a struggle that have gone on for many years. Parents and potential pupils want to pay the least and for the very shortest time; we live in a society that believes driving is a right rather than a privilege and it is difficult to see how this will change greatly.
In the end, any change must come down to ADIs fully marketing what they do and the importance of good training for young driver safety and how the added short-term expense of higher cost driving lessons will ultimately save money in the longterm – for instance, passing the test first time, less chance of bangs and scrapes to the car or horrific/deadly physical injuries through crashes.
After all, parents are happy to pay much more to help their offspring learn the piano or get a taxi for example, but they are not life-saving skills and they’re also unlikely to improve your chances of getting a job! But these are the types of conversations ADIs need to have with potential customers. It’s not easy admittedly – selling isn’t for most of us – but it is an essential part of being an ADI, and it is really only the ADI that can do it. Instructors also need to raise their professional game and the way they market what they do. Technology has to be embraced as well to improve their business management and teaching skills.
Are there other threats that ADIs need to be aware of? Waiting times are a short-term issue that need to be remedied but the elephant in the room is the prospect of autonomous vehicles – it will decimate many industries and careers including driver training [and] it is coming faster than people realise.
How much influence should ADIs have on test processes and general road policies? ADIs are the main provider and practitioner of road safety, though they get almost no credit for their essential work. Instructors must raise their voices, join associations and demand in turn that those associations voice their concerns and views, so that the powers-that-be take real notice and include the ADI industry in any discussions and debates about improving road safety and general driving conditions.
ADIs are the people at the coalface of road safety and driving and that needs to be acknowledged by the government – but if you don’t have a voice, you won’t get heard so join an association and get organised.” – Paul Caddick, editor of Intelligent Instructor
How open is the DVSA and related agencies to input from the industry? From my talks with them, the DVSA doesn’t believe ADIs have a strong or credible enough voice so ADI views are all but ignored. By joining associations though, particularly the national groups, and demanding action, the ADI will gain that voice and agencies like the DVSA will have to take notice and, I dare say, often want that productive and effective input from those who are doing the work every day. That working knowledge is a valuable asset so use it.
Are ADIs doing enough to engage with one another and with policymakers? No. ADIs are good at moaning in the test centre waiting room or in online chat rooms but are barely heard in the real world and often aren’t proactively pushing for practical change. What’s more, the very nature of being an ADI means you are working on your own. While being part of a bigger school can give you that sense of working in a group with colleagues, most ADIs work on their own.
Doing that all day, every day can be very difficult, so it’s good to join a local association purely to meet other ADIs and share thoughts, ideas, complaints and to just socialise; it’s good for the soul, professionalism and careers.
Finally, how do you expect to see the sector evolve over the next five years? There will be change and the more engaged ADIs are and the louder their voices are in demanding progressive change through associations and other representative bodies – even through their local MPs – the faster that change will come. The recent government strategy document set out many possibilities and it’s up to the industry to push for the positive changes, whether it be motorway training, logbooks, signing off certain candidate/pupil skills prior to test or better test provision.
Turning to the privatisation issue that has been circulating in recent years, I think this government has an ideology that is keen on opening up whatever it can to private provision, and testing and regulation changes may well be proposed – but it will take a long time to happen. Ultimately, I think that the louder and stronger the voice for change is from ADIs, the more likely we are to witness it. After all, if you don’t ask, you don’t get!
‘We want ADIs to email their views and ideas (paul@intelligentinstructor.co.uk), engage on Facebook (Intelligent Instructor) and enter conversations on Twitter (IntelligentADI); the more we talk, discuss and formulate ideas together, the more we can do to raise the profile of ADIs, their professionalism and the credit that they deserve.’ – Paul Caddick, Intelligent Instructor