Megan Whitbread always knew university was not for her, because she wanted to study engineering on the job.
So, halfway through sixth form, just after sitting her AS-levels, she decided an apprenticeship would be her best route to becoming qualified. Four years on, she hasn’t looked back.
“I just wasn’t happy at school, it wasn’t for me,” she recalls. “We had a lot of free periods and there was a lot of sitting around – I just wanted to get out there and start doing something. So I researched apprenticeships and found that you could work and gain a degree at the same time. So that’s what I’m now doing.”
Megan joined national building services engineering design consultancy Troup Bywaters + Anders [TB+A] in London, where she works four days per week and studies for the other. After earning a BTEC level 3 and an NVQ in her first two years with the company, she is now studying for a degree in building services engineering at South Bank University.
TB+A started offering apprenticeships in 2008, when the schemes were just starting to come back in favour among businesspeople and Gordon Brown’s government was in the process of launching the National Apprenticeship Service (NAS). It supports the delivery of apprenticeships in England and encourages businesses of all sizes to see the benefits of taking on cost-effective talent and training people on the job.
This is particularly true of companies with a large workforce. TB+A employs more than 200 people in eight locations across the UK and so pays the apprentice levy, like any company with a wage bill above £3m a year. It requires 0.5% of their wage bill to be paid to HMRC, so it can be used to fund the training costs of their apprenticeship scheme.
Neil Weller, the TB+A partner in charge of apprentices, explains the decision to invest in apprenticeships was made because 10 years ago, as the global financial crisis unravelled, there was a stark choice confronting the business community: if companies did not start taking on apprentices there could be a lost generation with low skills and poor prospects.
“We feared so many young people couldn’t afford to go to university, so they would end up leaving school without jobs or vocational training to go into,” he says.
“So we committed to taking on apprentices each year. The majority of partners at the firm had started out as apprentices, and we felt we owed it to young people and to our industry to bring people in and train them on the job.”
When it comes to training, the NAS has recently updated its approach to bring in the voice of the employer in what are now called “new” or “trailblazer” apprenticeships. Businesses are encouraged to discuss with training providers the skills they require and how they can be incorporated into the curriculum apprentices study.
Neil Weller chairs two trailblazer groups, for level 3 and level 6 qualifications, and is also chairman for the London region of the Apprentice Ambassador Network (LAAN). Separately, the firm joined the Technical Apprenticeship Consortium (TAC), whose members helped to form the trailblazer group. This allowed him, and other companies in the groups, to sit down with South Bank University and to ensure its courses deliver the skills the industry needs.
“Companies really need to get behind the new trailblazer apprenticeships because the training is designed around what employers similar to them have said they need,” he says.
“It means we’re getting people with relevant skills, and it helps us to show we’re dedicated to developing our people rather than just using them to do the filing and make the tea. If you can show people there is a fulfilling career ahead of them, then they won’t leave.
“We’ve got a very near 100% record of holding on to our apprentices once they qualify, because everyone knows they can go on to become a partner. That’s good for continuity and it keeps recruitment costs down.”
This very high retention rate is aided by TB+A taking an untypical route. While many apprenticeship providers offer a job once an employee is qualified, TB+A employs all its trainees from day one. This, he maintains, shows trust and a commitment to developing an employee from the start of their career at TB+A.
