The 12th annual National Apprenticeship Week runs from the 4th until to 8th March in 2019 with the theme “Blaze a trail”. Just a quick conversation in our office flagged up just how important apprenticeships and their like can be.

Helen Tiffany, our founder MD, started her career on the Youth Training Scheme. “I was desperate to become a retail manager and, at 16, it was the only option. Every week I worked on the shop floor (Debenhams ) and once a week I had classroom based training.

“It gave me a brilliant start, allowed me to learn with others similar to me and gave me my love of learning that drives my businesses today. I hope that as both my companies grow we can offer apprenticeships to anyone who has an appetite for learning.”

Jo Smith, who heads up our Programme Design & Delivery, began assessing vocational qualifications 25 years ago. “What matters is how people do in the workplace. Apprenticeships and vocational qualifications allow people to get recognition for what they can do whilst adding real and relevant business value at the same time. I’m a big fan!”

This is echoed by Anne Caborn, our Head of Content Strategy. “I started my working life as a journalist and was “indentured” as an apprentice on a local newspaper for 4 years. It gave me a brilliant grounding and I still call on those skills today. As an apprentice, the whole organisation took on a mentoring role, not just those in the newsroom. If you are an apprentice today, wear that label with pride.”

While Elly De La Rue Browne, who is stepping up to oversee a lot of our activity around The Coach House Coach Training, our sister coaching brand, is currently looking at apprenticeships from a family perspective. “Apprenticeship opportunities have been on my radar of late, driven by my son’s secondary school as he approaches GCSEs.

“It was quite unexpected to see how the apprenticeship route to the workplace provides such possibilities for valuable skills acquisition and education by talented, passionate, encouraging individuals. He will be more work ready and employable than I ever could have hoped.”