Phil Hirst

I am Phil Hirst. I am married to Helen with whom I run our family business, Learn Driving UK, a busy driving school based in our home town, Harrogate. I am co-director of LDUK and responsible for the Company’s instructor recruitment and training.

I qualified as an ADI in 1993 and started training instructors in 1995; over six hundred instructors have been trained by me. Over the last fifteen years, I have been helping qualified instructors to train their own ADIs and build their driving schools (see Train the Trainer courses).

I am a firm believer in professional development. Some instructors rest on their laurels once they have qualified; LDUK instructors are actively encouraged by me to go on developing their teaching skills and diversify and broaden their experience within the industry. This keeps them abreast of latest trends within our ever-changing profession. This commitment to personal development certainly benefits our customers as our ADIs are completely up-to date.

As well as my core business of training new instructors, I help qualified ADIs prepare for and pass their Standards Checks; these are the regular assessments of all driving instructors carried out by the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency.

As part of a busy portfolio of activities, I also deliver training courses for the Police in North Yorkshire and find time to support PDIs, ADIs and their Trainers with training resources which can be found in the “Shop”.

I have been the Chairman of the Harrogate Association of Approved Driving Instructors for the last five years.

My qualifications and experience include:

• Member of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development
• Further and Adult Education Teacher (C&G 730-7)
• BTEC level 4 Coach for Driver Development
• Diploma in Driving Instruction (DIA)

RoSPA Advanced Driver (Gold)