Investing In Our Industrial Future

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Middy's is driven to offer you more, one way we do that is through Middy's Industrial Cadetship...

As part of Middy’s drive to offer you more, we provide our seasoned staff with the opportunity to upskill and specialise. One such program is the Industrial cadetship, which aims to provide an intermediate understanding of the principles, terminology and brand/product specific information surrounding the industrial industry.

The outcome of this interactive course is that the cadets can confidently offer industrial electrical advice to other branch staff and customers. We caught up with recent graduate Belinda Blaess, to discuss her experience with the cadetship.

How long have you been working for Middy’s?
"I started my Counter Sales role at Middy’s Swan Hill just over three years ago."

What does that role involve?
"With Middy’s Swan Hill being in regional Victoria, we all help each other to get the job done for our customers. My day consists of answering customer calls, serving on the counter, packing customer orders, ordering and receipting goods and delivering goods to customers. We work together as a team everyone helps everyone."

What piqued your interest to apply for the cadetship?
"I really wanted to learn more about industrial before the cadetship even came about. I already had Troy Crawford, Middy’s Industrial Business Development Manager, as my mentor, so when the cadetship came up it was just perfect timing."
How was the cadetship experience (i.e. how long was it, what did it involve)?
"The course took about seven months all together. We started in March and finished in September. Throughout that time, it was a mixture of some online learning days and some face-to-face. It was a great mix as it’s important to help build my network by meeting other cadets and the instructors in person, but at the same time the online sessions were handy to avoid being out of my branch, especially when Swan Hill is so far away from Melbourne.

The course itself involved learning about the basics of Industrial; how to sell it, where to go and essentially who best to contact depending on what questions our customers ask. At the end of the cadetship we had to do a presentation which covered our journey, where we’ve come from, our sales results and what we thought of the course."

What did you achieve from doing the cadetship?
"The increased customer confidence I gained resulted in my branch's July to September sales figures to increase by 29.7% compared to the same time last year. I also gained a valuable career experience when I hosted an Industrial breakfast with the help of Troy Crawford. We spoke to customers about upcoming jobs, what we can offer and the stock that Middy’s can supply."

How do you apply your skills from the cadetship now and what does this mean for your branch?
"I apply the skills I learnt when I’m talking to customers. I know a lot more about Industrial now, so it gives me the ability to be able to offer more products and a higher level of knowledge when helping customers. As a result we’ve seen an increase in sales, just because sales that we weren’t previously able to service, we can now acquire as I know how to present and deliver them. We are also getting the harder questions coming through to the branch because customers have more confidence in us."

What is the most rewarding part of your job?
"The customer satisfaction. I suppose at the end of the day it’s all about the customers and we have some pretty awesome customers out here so it’s all about meeting their needs and getting some of those harder sales. That’s probably the most rewarding."

How do you see the future of industrial electrical?
"I think the future of industrial electrical will always be there. As it becomes more of an automated world out there, there’s going to be more and more need for it. If we can be on the front foot, knowing our products and knowing what our customers want, then I think that’s where we need to be."

"I know a lot more about Industrial now, so it gives me the ability to be able to offer more products and a higher level of knowledge when helping customers". - Belinda Blaess