Introducing Beth Healy’s success story; she is a fully qualified plumber and now employs her own award-winning ATT apprentices. From starting out as an apprentice in 2012 to now running a successful plumbing business, Beth has come a long way in a short time.
Beth as an apprentice (2012-2017), Beth as Pipewise business owner (2021)
Beth said “my apprenticeship began with a company that was based in Kumeu. It was tricky to start out with as I had sole charge of my three-year-old daughter. It was difficult trying to manage the training wage and the hours, but it was a challenge that was definitely worth doing. I loved all of the learning and I had to really discipline myself to be able to make the whole thing work. I feel that it was it was good for my daughter to see me working towards my qualification too. I really enjoyed my apprenticeship. I met my husband, Aaron, during this time too, it was an exciting phase. I remember turning a few heads when I entered the final registration exam room as I was heavily pregnant with my son – and I was chuffed to pass and become a fully qualified plumber.
Aaron and I joined forces with Tom of Pipewise and it's been fantastic journey, I love running our own business. We all understand the business from the ground up, literally. Then the icing on the cake came in 2019 when I was phoned by the CEO of the PGDB – that's the plumbers, gasfitters and drainlayers board and they wanted another female plumber on the board, so they asked me to apply for that role. They had seen my profile with ATT as I’d won an award during my apprenticeship and this helped to raise my visibility. After many interviews and discussions I was appointed by the Minister in September 2020. I’m now a board member and it’s been fantastic, I’m loving having an input into the industry and learning so much more and seeing the wider picture rather than just our slice of the world.
“Our company, Pipewise Plumbing & Gasfitting Limited, is based in West Auckland and we cover a variety of work; heavy commercial, light commercial, residential, including new builds renovations and some maintenance plumbing as well. There is a depth of experience in our tradies as between us we’ve worked on high-rise apartment buildings, prisons, commercial premises, residential plus plenty of gas appliances and systems – and we’ve been issuing a lot of gas certificates. This gives us three qualified tradies the ability to offer a wide range of experience and training to our apprentices.
“We use the Apprenticeship Training Trust (ATT) as they support the apprentice from start to finish. ATT recruit them, interview, assess their competency, make sure that they're clever enough and they've got a good aptitude for work. They then find a match and place them with a host employer. They offer us a list of potential candidates and they’ve already done the hard work of screening them for suitability. ATT area managers meet regularly with the apprentices, have a talk to them see how they're going, see what type of work they're doing, they support them through all aspects of their theory training and their other types of courses, and they report back to us which is really good because between ATT and our tradies, it’s the best way that we can help support the apprentices and train them on as many different aspects of the plumbing trade as we can.
“We take on apprentices because we like to train them from scratch. We focus a lot on culture within our company as we like to be a really good team. We want to instil a good work ethic and a good culture into our people from day one. We want our guys to be an absolute force so we ensure that they've got the best training so when they come out qualified they're awesome and ready to rock and roll.
“We take on apprentices through ATT because we have a long-standing history with ATT. I did my apprenticeship through ATT, Tom was also an ATT apprentice and proud to be so, and Brent is an ex-ATT apprentice and now we have our apprentices too, it all makes sense. I love the support that we get from ATT. One of the big drawcards is the ATT annual awards, it's an exciting event for everybody and it gives our staff a real drive. They all want to win an award and it is pretty exciting as we've done well over the years. I was so thrilled to win my award with ATT back in 2013 and I can say that it helped me in getting onto the plumbers, gasfitters and drainlayers board, which has been such a learning opportunity.
“Our apprentices are great. We have Robbie, he’s been with us for over two years. Robbie was young and shy and quiet when he first started with us and it's been exciting watching him grow as a person and grow in confidence and he's doing so well. He's mainly doing work out of a van at the moment too, which is to say he’s running his own projects and has enough skills to work autonomously, which is really exciting to see.
“Jake's been with us 12 months now. Jake is a very likable character he's fit in so well on site. All of the boys love hanging out with him and chatting to him, and he's learning really fast and he's been amazing.
“Plus we have Brannon, he’s from the UK. He actually worked for us for some time before he came on board with ATT but he had to take a break due to his visa conditions, so it's amazing to have him back on board and we're really excited to get back into it with him.
“We love having apprentices, I think the most difficult part is making sure that when we're busy to take the time out to make sure that we can train them properly, because we want them learning. The other most difficult thing is getting them to remember to do their time sheets! And that's where the area managers are also quite good at reminding them.
Our industry at the moment is booming. We've been experiencing a trade shortage for the last few years and we thought that Covid would have a negative impact, but it hasn’t, yet. Who knows what's going to happen around the corner? But right now we are still in a boom and we desperately need more people in into the industry. If we don't replace the good people that we have what are we going to end up with? I started my apprenticeship at the end of a recession because I knew that I would always have work as a plumber even if we're not going to have so much new construction, there's always going to be maintenance and it's restricted work, so if you are not qualified and you do not hold a license you are not allowed to touch plumbing, so we will always be relevant.
“Looking to the future we are obviously very invested in Pipewise, we’re focusing on quality work and culture. We want to see all of our amazing apprentices become qualified and move up through the ranks and become the formidable tradies that we know that they can be. I think a plumbing apprenticeship is a great choice because it's really exciting.
“My advice to somebody starting a career in the plumbing, gasfitting and drainlaying industry would be to speak to people in the industry. Have a really good feel around for what the type of job it is, and the places that you can go and the things that you can do. Where it can lead you potentially within the industry. What do you want – where do you want to be? Where do you see yourself? Do you see yourself working for somebody else? Do you see yourself working in a particular area? Do you see yourself owning a business? There is so much opportunity in plumbing. I was delighted to hear ATT interview our apprentices, who all said how much they love their jobs and how pleased they are that they’ve chosen this career – because it’s exactly the way I feel.”
At ATT we love working with companies like Pipewise and people like Beth Healy. See more of our hosts and apprentices’ stories on YouTube – click here or on www.att.org.nz/news. If you would like to find out more about becoming an apprentice, or hosting an apprentice, we have candidates looking for apprenticeships – see: www.att.org.nz