Forging a new path after military service

The rise of Mission Motorsport in the past 12 years is to be admired. Not only is it giving people with a military background a new-found confidence and purpose, but it’s also helping support the automotive industry with tailored IMI training courses. From small beginnings, Mission Motorsport has expanded with dedicated support for the car industry – Mission Automotive – but also with the renewables sector with Mission Renewables.

Workshop Manager, Aston Dimmock has seen it all, having volunteered at the charity’s launch back in 2012, while still a serving soldier. With 24 years of service behind him, Dimmock can relate to the many people that Mission Motorsport helps to build a new life after they leave their old one.

“We started out with just wounded, injured and sick service leavers – and that has now been extended to all service leavers, with our wider Mission Automotive programme,” he explains.

Offering training at IMI Levels 2, 3 and 4 – covering both vehicle and component courses – the charity carefully curates the courses to meet the needs of the trainees, fully aware of their specific needs. For example, the training is suited to an adult’s lifestyle rather than a teenager – 10am starts mean that learners can take their kids to school, for example. Also, the training blocks tend to be between nine and 12 months, as opposed to drawn out over two years.

Along the way, Mission Motorsport has forged very strong relationships with car manufacturers, such a JLR, Stellantis and Lotus. “We’ve directed around 1,500 people into the Jaguar Land Rover scheme, while Stellantis is offering free training and guaranteed interviews for any of our beneficiaries coming through,” explains Dimmock. “Stellantis has been supporting us financially and, to be honest, a lot of the kit that I have in the training wing is from there,” he explains. “I’ve got a couple of Peugeots and lots of engines – and that has all come after the Calex UK site in Coventry was upgraded. It’s a bit different to the MkI Mazda MX-5 that we started out with.” Dimmock adds that Lotus also has a strong cohort of the veteran community and says they were recently invited up to the company HQ in Hethel, Norfolk to find out more and to also do some laps of the track in an Evija! 

New beginnings

When qualified, learners are able to go into all manner of automotive environments, whether it’s a manufacturing facility, a showroom or a workshop. “Stellantis might not have the same level of manufacturing in the UK that we have seen with JLR, so we are more focused on the retail side of things,” he explains. “Trying to get our people into the dealer network is the main aim here.”

If, for whatever reason, automotive isn’t for the ex-service people, there are other opportunities offered through Mission Motorsport. “The new element for us at the moment is Mission Community, which replicates what we’ve done with automotive and motorsport,” says Dimmock. “Through our networking activities with our supporters, we’ve ended up with people who have become carpenters and got other jobs in construction. It’s helped by things networking days that we hold at Goodwood, which are attended by real captains of industry who see these people and can often offer them jobs.”

One thing that is especially humbling for Dimmock is the feedback they get from service leavers who have found Mission Motorsport and gone onto pass through their training and then thrive in the automotive industry. “There are learners who have been through our doors who have told us that their involvement with us has genuinely saved them – and we really have,” he says. “We’ve picked up and taken on some people from very, very dark places and bought them through.”

The charity’s mantra of ‘race, retrain, recover’ still rings true, even though it offers so much more than racing now. And broadening its horizons has enabled a greater number of service leavers to become valued members of the automotive industry, an incredibly important thing for both the individuals and the sector.