An introduction to Steve Cootes at Startermotor

I am part of a family who are almost all teachers, current and retired. I left university and decided to follow a different career path, joining Ford Motor Company as a sales and marketing graduate trainee. Someone said to me in my early days with ‘Blue Oval’, “Ford is a great company to leave.” 

 I initially raised my eyebrows in curiosity, and then the positive meaning registered – the Company is a great training ground, a wonderful place to learn about all things automotive. Having lived and worked in the US, China, Germany and the UK, and had exposure to many countries beyond, I feel privileged to have been given the chance to join the Ford family all those years ago.

So, fast forward to 2024. I was contemplating retirement, wondering if after 40 years of interesting, enjoyable but busy jobs, it was time to ‘hang up my boots’ and reach for the pipe and slippers. I didn’t contemplate for long – retirement isn’t for me, not now, at least. But how was I going to occupy myself in a productive and engaging way. Hello StarterMotor! My neighbour saw the General Manager’s job advertised on LinkedIn, and the rest is history!

I took over running StarterMotor in September. In simple terms, the mission of the Charity is to support a younger generation to find careers in the classic and historic car sector. Anyone associated with the sector will be acutely aware of the challenge posed by the demographic profile of those who maintain ‘old’ cars and make up the sector’s wider community – attracting a younger generation is key to sustaining our automotive heritage.

The Charity’s target audience is ‘Gen-Z’ – the demographic cohort aged between the mid-teens and mid-20s. We reach them in various ways, for example, by supporting careers events at schools or hosting students on the Bicester Motion campus.

What have I learned from my early days in the job? Typically, about 3-5% of a school year group have an interest in an apprenticeship programme, and a further 10-12% have an interest in motorsport or automotive more generally. So, my task is somewhat akin to panning for gold! Once I’ve found a ‘nugget’ or two, my goal is to find work experience for these young students who are just starting to collect their thoughts on career direction.

Before being able to present a candidate to a company who is open to hosting a student for work experience, it’s key to ensure that the young hopeful has a CV. I’ve received a number of CVs from Year 9-13 students and I think it’s fair to say that work has been needed on most, if not all. The approach tends to lead on academic qualifications – subjects and results or predicted grades – and touch all-too briefly on conveying who the individual is; what drives them, their interests and hobbies, and work experience already completed, where applicable. This is the ‘stuff’ a potential employer, or provider of work experience, wants to know – is there a good ‘fit’ between student and company?

I’m not trying to be unduly critical of teaching staff or, more generally, the ability of secondary schools to provide careers advice. Indeed, I’ve seen the dedication and desire of teachers who have taken on a careers education-based responsibility. I now appreciate how challenging it is for schools to deliver as thoroughly as they’d like against the ‘Gatsby Benchmarks’, the framework of eight key criteria that define what good careers education looks like in secondary schools. They have to deal with limited resources and funding, curriculum pressures and a lack of qualified careers advisors, not to mention a rapidly changing job market.

In the context of the Gatsby Benchmarks, I’ve been supporting local schools by providing opportunities for students to learn about the workplace and what employers are looking for. I do this by both engaging with whole year groups to provide access to a range of companies across different sectors, as well as mentoring individual students who have indicated a clear desire to explore what the automotive sector has to offer.

I see lots of opportunities to get involved with learning activities of all sorts, from the programmes offered by the British Motor Museum where I’ve volunteered to help out, to a newly formed multi-school forum I’ve convened, and now chair, to find synergies and share ideas across schools who are all looking for ways to enhance the quality and depth of careers education they provide to students.  

My first nine months running StarterMotor has been an enjoyable and interesting ‘education on education’, and I’m looking forward to what I can achieve in the coming months and years.