BT
Name: BT
Address: British Telecom, Bt Centre, 81 Newgate Street, London, EC1A 7AJ
Apprenticeship Award: Macro Employer
Sector: ICT
Telecommunications giant BT has a well established Apprenticeship programme. It currently has 777 apprentices, and expects the number to grow to 1,026 by September 2009. The BT Apprenticeship vision is “to be the best in industry for delivering highly motivated and capable individuals for the benefit of its customers”.
The BT Apprenticeship programme offers a diverse range of career opportunities with guaranteed continued employment on completion of the scheme. Its ‘Skills Escalator’ approach enables its apprentices to progress their career aspirations. It has expanded the range of Apprenticeship frameworks from four to eleven over the past year and is the first employer in the communications industry to develop a foundation degree in Customer Service and Contact Centre Management.
Dave Walsh, Head of BT Apprenticeships said: “BT’s Apprenticeship programme showcases how apprentices can be a successful and integral part of a company’s productive workforce. BT proactively encourages the development of new learning methodologies by exploiting emerging technologies, such as Dare2share, which won the ‘e-learning solution of the year’ at the World Learning Awards 2008. This demonstrates a unique pledge by a large-scale employer to develop integrated solutions that benefit apprentices both individually and collectively, from joining to successful framework completion, and beyond.
“BT understands that Apprenticeships make business sense for our own business and we are actively working with our suppliers to support them in developing similar solutions. BT has calculated an annual net profit to the business of over £1,300 per apprentice compared to other recruitment. They also show a 1.5 per cent increase in the quality of work. We currently have 88.24 per cent achievement and 90.39 per cent retention rates.”
Kieron Mullan, Professional Development Manager at Accenture said: “BT’s vision in developing apprentices and the frameworks they undertake ensures its learners acquire the challenging skills the sector demands even in today’s economic downturn. This is further underpinned by a diverse range of technical, social and interpersonal skills which learners attain within BT. The programmes of learning cement the learners’ commitment and development yet also empower the learner to reinvest their life skills by helping local and regional as well as global communities. BT’s respect and confidence in its young workforce demonstrates, in such a public way, its commitment toward Apprenticeships.”
Last Updated: 10/03/2010