The Drinks Community is a big step forward for the industry, and here’s why…
As a business journalist one of the standard questions you always ask in any major interview is around training and support. What does a particular company do in order to help their staff grow and develop in their roles? Knowing that can tell you so much about its culture, and what it is really like to work for that business.
In every industry sector I have worked in - from computing, to FMCG, grocery retail and travel - the answer to that training question would usually revolve around the level of management, and people skills support they offered their staff. So imagine my surprise coming into the drinks industry, particularly the wine trade, where any question about training was only ever about the product itself. With seemingly the greater the wine knowledge, or qualification, the better your chance of success was going to be.
Now clearly knowing about wine, and how to taste and talk about it is all part of the machinations of doing business in the wine industry. It’s no different to knowing the key product jargon and details you need to get by in whatever business sector you are in.
But for the vast majority of companies wine specific training is where their support for their staff starts and finishes.
Which we have long known has not been good enough, even with all the excuses about not having the margins, the profits to be able to invest in the level of c-suite training you would expect to be given in major businesses in any other sector.
This is why the new ‘Community’ initiative from the Drinks Trust has the potential of being one of the most significant steps we have seen in the wine and spirits industry for years. When it comes to actual people training it’s arguably the biggest step ever.
The ambition for Drinks Community is for the industry itself to come together and share its knowledge, and expertise and use the power of the very strong drinks industry network to help colleagues further their careers and chances to grow and thrive.
We have seen during Covid-19 that having the all the product knowledge in the world is not going to protect your job, or give you the development and commercial skills you need to find a new role.
That’s what the Drinks Community can potentially step in and provide the vocational tools, the mentors, the practical steps that can make the drinks industry as a whole a smarter, more professional sector to work in.
This is a huge opportunity for us all and I urge you to do what you can to get involved, offer your skills and experiences and become part of this so important Drinks Community.