AMA Group recently welcomed 30 skilled migrant panel beaters to Australia who will work in the company’s repair centres across Victoria, the Australian Capital Territory, Queensland, and South Australia.
“Global talent search is a key pillar of our talent acquisition strategy and the arrival of our newest cohort of team members is important to our business in this labour constrained industry,” said Carl Bizon, AMA Group CEO. “While this doesn’t solve the problem, it is certainly a step in the right direction.”
Monique Hislop-Reynolds, Talent Acquisition Manager at AMA Group, said: “We are delighted to welcome our newest cohort who see joining the Group as a great opportunity to build their career with Australia’s largest collision repair network. All new employees who arrived this week have settled in nicely into homes that have been organised by AMA Group, ensuring a smooth and welcoming onboarding into the Group and Australia.”
AMA says it leads the industry in talent acquisition innovation by searching the globe for top talent and recruiting “more than its share of apprentices” to address the industry-wide labour shortage long-term. The company has invested in skilled migration for some time, sourcing top talent globally, and ramped up the strategy when international borders reopened to skilled overseas workers in Australia in February 2022.
However, like many Australian employers, AMA says it encountered ongoing challenges with delays in the visa process. According to AMA, VetAssess, the only approved skills assessment body for panel beaters and spray painters, recently advised that “an increase in demand for these occupations, along with a shortage of qualified assessors in Australia, has resulted in extended processing times.”