A ground-breaking scheme to attract and retain the best people has been launched across Mazda’s UK dealership network by Chippenham-based learning and development agency RTS Group.
Talent@Mazda aims to make the car firm the ‘go to’ brand within the automotive industry within five years. 
Its launch recognises the major issue with staff turnover across all brands and dealers, with some experiencing staff turnover as high as 60% – a reflection of the lack of emphasis put on recruitment and development of staff across the industry.
Mazda says it wants to break this cycle with Talent@Mazda, which is available to all dealers within the Mazda network to help support and enhance the recruitment and retention of talented staff.
Under the scheme they can either engage a dedicated consultant, who will work with them on a bespoke basis to identify what issues they face and put in place a solution, or they can access a new ‘talent toolkit’ of hints and tips available as an e-book.
Support includes the initial decision to recruit – including what behaviours are needed, writing the job advert and where to advertise – all the way through to how they can help to nurture and retain the best talent who will be passionate about the brand and want to develop their careers with Mazda.
RTS is staging the programme across Mazda’s UK network of more than 130 dealerships, through its existing Mazda Academy.
Mazda network talent consultant Stephen Casey, pictured, said: “Mazda likes to ‘defy convention’ but to do so we need people who share our passion and who want to make a difference. “
Field programmes and training manager for Mazda Motors UK, Alex Goddard, added: “We are already seeing the impact that Talent@Mazda is having within the network from our dealers changing their whole recruitment processes.
“One of the biggest successes to date is through the growth of our apprenticeship programme which has increased by over 100% as our dealers are now recognising the huge benefit in growing their own talent and a lot of this is down to the coaching they have received via the Talent@Mazda programme.”
Talent@Mazda joins other programmes such as People@Mazda, aimed at developing management teams, and New to Mazda, which is for all new customer-facing dealership staff.
