“MGA Training definitely gave me my first stepping stone” – Discover how this company can help you kick-start a high-paid career in an industry which promises you’ll never be out of a job
Having seen countless trainees walk through its doors and out the other side into a reliable and well-paid career, MGA Training are the ultimate gateway to your new career in the crane industry.
Most people want a job which enables them to create a secure foundation upon which they can build a good life for themselves.
With a competitive job market which often asks for years worth of experience from the get-go, it can be difficult to find a well-paid, stable and steady career to walk into which will utilise your skill set, and offer everything you need to lead a successful life.
If this sounds like something you have been battling with, then MGA Training want to help.
MGA Training is an incredible company offering accessible training courses which enable people to work with cranes in a wide rage of sectors.
No matter who you are, or where you come from, you can build a flexible and lucrative career in a myriad of stable industries like construction, where it’s unlikely that you’ll ever be out of a job and which offers opportunities to take your qualifications all over the world.
Having seen countless trainees walk through its doors and out the other side into a reliable and well-paid career, MGA Training is the ultimate gateway to your new career in the crane industry.
MGA Training, whose slogan is ‘Developing people. Delivering results’, are dedicated to providing accessible and thorough training in a relaxed setting, to give people the perfect leg up into their new career in the crane industry.
With an impressive pass rate of 95%, MGA Training is currently offering five career establishing training courses, each providing its participants with the essential training they will need to flourish in their chosen workplace.
The most popular course at MGA Training is their four-day Slinger Signaller course for absolute beginners, but trainees can also access amazing courses to help develop their career and push them to the next step such as; the Lift/Crane Supervisor Course, the Crane Operator Course, the Appointed Person Training Course and the Mini Crane Operation Training Course.
We spoke to three ex-trainees of MGA Training to find out how their experience at MGA helped them to carve a new career path, and find out how they are getting on years down the line.
Paula’s story
Paula Deakin, 45 from Ashton Under Lyne, completed the Slinger Signaller course at MGA Training 3 years ago, and since then she has been able to access a steady flow of work that she enjoys tremendously, as well as taking home a significantly increased income.
Paula’s partner is a lift Supervisor, so after her training she joined forces with him, and now the pair work together as freelancers, picking up jobs all over the country.
Before completing her MGA Training course, Paula worked a wide range of different jobs, but didn’t consider following her partner into the world of cranes until later on, after a little nudge.
She said: “I’ve done all sorts of different jobs, cleaning, factory work, and to be honest, I’d never even considered getting into the crane business even though it did interest me.
“My partner has worked on cranes for years, and then he said, “why don’t you go for it”, so I did, and from there, it’s like a bug that you catch. You just want to keep doing it more and more.”
Paula has enjoyed working on a range of different cranes helping to build all matters of structures such as roof trusses, railway bridges and motorway bridges. The range of experience she has had in the job so far has offered ample learning opportunities, an aspect of the job which she really enjoys.
She told us: “You do your course with MGA, get that basic knowledge to get you started and then start in a job that allows you to grow every day.
“To be honest, I still love learning, it doesn’t matter how experienced you are, every job is different, you learn something new every day.
“I just absolutely love it, I couldn’t think of doing anything else.”
Speaking on one of her favourite jobs yet, she said: “I like rigging the crane, actually putting the crane together. It’s like a big Mikado set. That was one of the best jobs that I’ve done, I absolutely loved that I was learning more.
“It was just amazing to put all those pieces together, and then watch it operate as a crane.”
MGA Training centre’ s approach to teaching is one of the reasons why they get such high pass rates from their students. Paula found that when she attended, she couldn’t believe the amount of knowledge she was retaining.
She said: “You think it’s quite daunting at the time, but you don’t realise how much information you’ve been taking in all day, and the way that they teach you is really great, it’s really laid back.
“You do the written test and then the practical test, the written test includes the theory of everything you’ve learned including health and safety, whilst the practical test obviously tests your ability to safely operate the cranes.”
Working with cranes has given Paula the freedom to become self employed, her freelance work along side her partner has taken them all over the country on a variety of different jobs for weeks at a time.
Paula said: “We were in Aberdeen for seven weeks installing accropodes, which work as a defence system for the pier against the sea, I’ve also worked in Birmingham, Northwich and Newcastle.
Aside from travelling the country with her partner, another upside to the job is the great pay and the constant flow of work available. With lots of work on the horizon, Paula’s future is looking bright.
She said: “There’s definitely been a big salary increase from the jobs I had before, obviously you get more money when you work away, but if I’m honest, it’s not all about the money, I enjoy what I do as well.
She doesn’t have any problems with finding work as a freelance crane worker.
She continued: “I think the most difficult time we had recently was when we had all those storms because you can’t really be lifting things in that weather. We had work to do, but it wasn’t safe to do it, there’s loads of work out there. ”
Although the crane industry is a male dominated one, Paula found that she has been welcomed with open arms. Having thoroughly enjoyed her new career path, she thinks more women should consider getting involved in the industry.
She said: “Everyone has been so nice to me, everyone has been polite, it’s the complete opposite of what people probably think it is.
“There were 6 of us on our course at MGA and I was the only woman. I think everyone has this idea that it’s going to be uncomfortable for a woman to be with other males with no other women, but everybody is nice and no one treats you any differently.
Paula would recommend other women to complete MGA Training to kick start their career in the crane business.
She said her advice to other women that might be considering making that move is: “Go for it, because I enjoy it, I really do, and it’s a pity that there’s not more women in the industry.
She continued: “I think there should be more girls in the job, but I’d actually recommend it to anyone, male or female.”
Diego’s story
Diego Maradona Alvarado, 29 from Rhyl in north Wales, started his journey to a career in cranes five years ago when he took the CPCS Mobile crane course with MGA Training.
Since then, he has become a highly qualified and skilled professional, operating one of the largest mobile cranes in the world and forging a career that enables him to travel the globe.
When he finished his training, he was able to develop, grow and move around different companies to get the experience he needed to get to where he is now.
Diego said: “Once I completed that course, I started working with a company based out of Wrexham, just doing general crane hire, driving small mobile cranes.
“I was there for about a year and a half, and then I went to another company which was more local to myself in north Wales – onto the slightly bigger machines doing a wider variety of work across the UK, so I built my experience up slowly.
“I was there for about two years and then I came to the company I am working with now, called Windhoist, so we basically specialise in building wind turbines across Europe, the UK and Ireland on the heavy cranes.”
Diego explained that one of the many perks of his job, is that it has enabled him to travel the world and experience different cultures whilst earning a good living.
He explained: “When I started at Windhoist I was based in Holland, we finished that job and from there we went to Sweden, I was in Sweden from January last year (2021) until last week (early February 2022).”
He went on to tell us that he will be working in: “Finland next, and I know there’s work in Morocco, Greece, UK, Ireland. You can definitely see the world, 100%.”
When asked what he loves most about his job, Diego said: “Seeing different countries, exploring the world and getting paid for it. The money is obviously a massive thing as well.”
Many of the career paths available after a course with MGA Training lead onto being employed in industries where the salary is high.
He shared with us: “What I’m doing now on the heavy cranes, building wind turbines, I’ll say you’re looking at a minimum £60,000-£70,000 a year.
“That’s minimum as well, you can earn a lot lot more than that.”
Some of the work opportunities in the crane industry involve working away for several weeks and then spending a few weeks at home. This is something that Diego is currently doing and he is thoroughly enjoying it.
He said: “I enjoy the whole rotation thing. What I do now is, we work away for three or four weeks at a time and then we are home for like two weeks – so you know where you’re at, and on your weeks off you can plan to do what you want.
“You’re looking at anything between six and four weeks away working, and you’re normally looking at about two weeks off.”
Working away from home isn’t new to Diego. Before he began his MGA Training, he was in the military, often working away for long periods of time.
He said: “It suits me. Before I got into the crane industry, I was in the army so I’ve always been working away.”
MGA Training offers financial support to those leaving the army in order to provide work spaces for veterans to thrive in.
Diego was offered support from MGA Training, and he thinks it’s brilliant that they provide help for those transitioning from the armed forces. However, Diego didn’t accept this support, as he already had the money saved to purchase the course.
Unsure of where the inspiration to embark on crane training with MGA Training came from, he said: “I just sort of thought one day – I’ll give it a go, and I’m glad that I did.”
“I was in the Parachute regiment before I left the army, so I’d never even really seen a crane in my life.”
Diego was struck by how down to earth, honest and open the attitude is at MGA Training, he told us: “When I went to MGA Training to speak about my course, Steve Tarry did say ‘You’re either going to love it or you’re going to hate it’, he was honest with me, and luckily enough I do really really enjoy it and I wouldn’t change anything for the world.”
Diego expressed that although working with cranes is very different from his military experience, the discipline, work ethic and working away are traits that he was able to transfer to his new career.
Having said this, Diego thinks that a career working with cranes is accessible for all people, he said: “It could pretty much suit anyone.”
Diego was impressed by Steve Tarry from MGA Training, who ensured that he knew everything he needed to know before starting the course to be certain he was making the right choice for him.
He said: “Before I paid my money, Steve Tarry gave me a heads up of what it would involve, because he didn’t want me to waste my money, He wanted to give me as much detail as possible, so I had a good understanding of what it would be like before he took my money.
“Once we had a chat about it, I started my training, and I had absolutely no clue what I was doing to be fair – I went into the crane with not a scooby in the world.”
Diego quickly learned the ropes, he went on to say: “It was an intense ten day course, but by the end of it, you know, once you do something a few times you sort of get the hang of it.
“From then, you learn a lot on the job, but MGA gave me the basic knowledge I needed to get started.”
Not only did MGA provide Diego with the training he needed to get started, but they also provided him with the opportunity to use his newly honed skills in his first crane industry job.
Diego said: “Steve Tarry at MGA actually put me in line for my first job with a company he knew.
“MGA Training definitely gave me my first stepping stone.”
Finally, Diego advised: “I would definitely recommend going down to have a chat with Steve, he is approachable and he’ll be honest with you, and he’ll tell you what it involves.”
Gary’s story
Gary Jones, 47 from Warrington, used to be a warehouse manager before joining the crane industry.
After being sent to MGA to do their Slinger Signaler course by his employer in 2014, he was delighted to discover that the training centre’s relaxed but thorough approach to learning suited him down to the ground.
He said: “I firstly did a Slinger Signaler course in 2014 at MGA, I was already in the crane industry operating mobile cranes and was sent to MGA by my employer at that time.”
MGA Training then became Gary’s go-to centre for crane training. He returned knowing that he would benefit from the training centres unique learning style.
He said: “In 2017 I went back to MGA to do the Crane Lift Supervisor Course to open more job opportunities.
“I went back to MGA as I found Steve Tarry, the instructor, knowledgeable and down to earth which made the theory side of the course easy for me to understand.”
Gary was delighted to discover that the support from the company didn’t stop when he finished the course.
He explained: “I’ve phoned MGA many times seeking advice, and they have always been happy to assist me.”
Gary has now enjoyed a long and successful career in the crane industry for several decades, and found that work in the crane industry could be extremely flexible.
Earlier in his career, he could adapt his job to meet the financial demands of family life and now that those demands are fewer he can adapt again with focus on having a better work-life balance.
He said: “I’ve been in the crane industry now for 20 years working for a few different companies.
“I’ve always chosen my career path to suit my needs, so in the younger family times I chased the money. Now I’m a little older, the financial responsibilities have reduced so my work life balance is now my priority.
“I don’t think there are many careers which can give you as many options.”
Gary feels as though, had he not embarked upon a career in the crane industry, he might not have been so financially comfortable.
He said: “Working with cranes doubled my annual potential earnings from my previous employment as a warehouse operative, where the days got monotonous and I was working weekends – which fell in my shift rota, so I could not earn overtime.
He explained that he always had opportunities to further his career, and enjoyed a comfortable financial lifestyle.
Gary told us that some of the highlights of his career have been: “Working in different environments, meeting and working with some great people and always learning and enjoying each day.”
To find out about how you can develop your career with MGA Training, click here.
You can read the Manchester Evening News article here
You can read the Liverpool Echo article here