Shane Louwerens was a jet engine mechanic with the U.S. Air Force for six years. He says he’d never driven a tractor when he applied for a job as a service technician at a local John Deere dealer. But once he put his mechanical skills to Green, he knew he’d found his career.
“Today’s service technicians aren’t seen as grease monkeys anymore,” says Louwerens. “A farmer needs to think, ‘I trust this technician with my $100,000 tractor or $300,000 cotton picker.’ A farmer and his family rely on the technician’s ability to do a good, thorough job and get that equipment back to work in the field.”
Louwerens was a service technician for five years. He liked his job, loved the variety, but knew he wanted to help build future John Deere service technicians. So he combined his love of John Deere with teaching by becoming a John Deere TECH instructor at Northwest Mississippi Community College in Senatobia, MS.
He wants his students to know that a John Deere career offers security—if they work hard and keep learning. “Job security lies in education and skill sets,” Louwerens says. “I tell my students, ‘Be good in lawnmowers, but also be good in transmissions, diagnostics, computers, electronics, air conditioning, customer relations, and all these other things. Be able to work on anything that comes in the door. If your stall is always full, that makes you valuable to a dealership.’”
And being valuable to a dealership can take you across the country or help you stay in your hometown. Louwerens says one of the strengths of the John Deere TECH Program is how it helps young people earn a good living and stay close to home, something that can be difficult for those from small towns. But he also knows that a TECH degree can be a ticket out.
“If you have your degree with John Deere, you’re not going to have a problem finding a job anywhere,” he says.