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When the professionals who supply water and wastewater services need to gain continuing education, increasingly they look to a Sioux Falls company.
When the professionals who supply water and wastewater services need to gain continuing education, increasingly they look to a Sioux Falls company.
Maguire, an industry-leading provider of water tank construction and maintenance services to municipalities, rural water districts, and private owners in 34 states, prides itself on being a partner in the industry for education and training.
“Without training classes to obtain continuing education credits to stay certified and maintain their licenses, these operators would no longer be able to provide the vital services we take for granted when we turn on the faucet or flush our toilets,” said Jamie Mays, Maguire vice president of sales.
“Water Tank Experts” might be a motto at Maguire — but the company has shown in recent years it’s also a mindset.
“We love providing our expertise to help educate the industry,” Mays said. “The better-educated water professionals are, the better they can run and maintain their systems for the citizens that rely on those services.”
Content matters
Maguire uses a multi-faceted approach to its content and training that started with listening.
“We thought it was important to listen to our customers and the industry professional when developing our training talks,” Mays said. “We want our talks to be on the content they want to learn about and that will benefit them in their day-to-day job.”
From these listening sessions, Maguire came up with a long list of topics that interested the industry.
“Once we determined the topics, we designed our presentations to be engaging,” Mays said. “No one wants to go to a training class, sit in a room full of people, and have the presenter read slides off the screen for an hour.”
But, with a century of history to draw on, Maguire easily had the stories to help guide its training. Those took the form of written content, videos and photos that illustrated and enforced what was being presented.
“Telling stories from personal experience is one of the best ways to connect with your audience,” Mays said. “If the crowd can relate to the example, you are providing and apply it to their daily work, that is when the concepts and content hit home for them.”
Industry Association Partnerships
Developing strong partnerships at the local, regional, and national levels is important to ensure the right training and information are being presented to the right groups of people.
Maguire began partnering with state rural water associations like the South Dakota Association of Rural Water Systems.
“The level of expertise and professionalism brought to bear by Maguire is second to none,” said Kurt Pfeifle, South Dakota Association of Rural Water Systems executive director.
“They are a recognized leader in the elevated water storage tank industry, and they achieved this level for a reason. Working with the great folks at Maguire is easy and truly a pleasure.”
Rural water associations across the country host training talks at conferences and other venues throughout the year to ensure water professionals have every chance to secure CEUs. Maguire prides itself on providing industry-best training for the industry.
“You don’t have to look far to hear accolades about Maguire Iron,” Pfeifle said. “The membership of SDARWS is comprised of more than 300 utility systems around the state (regional and municipal systems). The vast majority of our membership know the people at Maguire personally and, more often than not, have had Maguire working for them at some point.”
South Dakota “is fortunate to have a premier elevated water storage tank manufacturer in our state,” he continues. “And with their new facilities nearly complete, Maguire is poised to take it up a notch! It’ll be exciting to see how it develops. We’ll be watching for sure.”
Thinking outside the box
Maguire not only provides training at industry conferences but also uses new media platforms to provide training and communicate information to the water industry.
“During COVID when no one was traveling and in-person conferences and training were not happening, we had to get creative with how we continued to provide content,” said Brian Cooper, Maguire vice president of business development.
“Water professionals still needed their continuing education credits, so we thought outside the box and developed a podcast and webinar series to help fill the gaps.”
Maguire began by providing monthly national webinars where water professionals could sign up and attend training to receive CEUs from the comfort and safety of their homes or offices. These webinars went over so well that four years later they are still providing online training.
“When we started the webinars, we wanted to make sure we were providing the same high-level training like we were in-person,” Cooper said. “Now, four years later we have continued the webinars because they have been such a big hit in the industry.”
The 2024 Maguire Webinar Series already has begun.
At the same time, Maguire saw a need to share not only training but information the water industry would find timely and useful, so they began The Maguire Podcast.
“The podcast has been a fun addition to our training and information delivery,” Cooper said. “It allows us to sit down with decision-makers, industry experts, and regulators to ask the questions people in the water industry want to know and keep them up-to-date on the latest news from the people making it.”
The Maguire Podcast can be found wherever you get your podcasts. At the end of the day, the company’s goal is to deliver the best and most engaging content to help water professionals across the country — no matter how or where they consume it.
“At Maguire, we pride ourselves on providing high-level content,” Cooper said. “Our in-person and online webinars, along with The Maguire Podcast are ways for us to give back to the industry and help educate others. It doesn’t get any better than that.”
