Technical schools do a great job of providing students an education and they also need to make sure students are prepared for what it’s like to work in a dealership environment—and that’s where the Case New Holland Top Tech program comes in, according to Top Tech Program Manager Pete Steiner.
“The Top Tech program is designed to work with technologies and our dealer network to raise awareness for the need for service technicians within our industry,” Steiner said. The program was developed in response to CNH dealers who were looking to grow in unit sales and increase the support their service departments provide.
“The complexity of our equipment has grown over the last few years, so we want to work with those tech schools to make sure that they’re teaching the students the latest technology,” he said, including precision or auto guidance systems and the electronics that are used in their machinery.
CNH Industrial relies on a network of tech schools with existing associate degree programs in diesel, agricultural or construction technology and provides them information about new products that they can incorporate into their curriculum.
“We suggest that they have specific courses to make sure that they’re meeting the needs of the dealer network so that they are graduating students that are ready to go to work,” Steiner.
Preparing students to go to work heavily involves local dealerships. “We want the student to be connected with a dealer while they’re going through school. In many cases, the dealer can help provide them with tool purchases, scholarships or incentives to help them as they go through their education in return for going to work for that dealership,” he said.
“Right now there’s some great, great job opportunities, so placement is very high for graduates out of this program. There’s always a demand for service technicians in the industry, and we’re pushing to try and help meet that demand,” added Steiner.
To learn more about the Top Tech program, contact your local Case New Holland dealer or visit CNHiTopTech.com.
