Date 2017
Region North West
Size 50-249 employees
Sector Nuclear
graduates recruited so far
%
graduates remaining in nuclear industry
years spent on the training programme
industry sponsors
Tackling a nuclear skills shortage
In 2009, the programme was moved under the auspices of Energus, which acts as an umbrella organisation for a group of 12 industry sponsors, including Rolls Royce, Sellafield, and the Environment Agency, who employ the graduates directly. Each cohort consists of around 40 participants.
The scheme lasts two years and serves as a key starting point on the graduates’ journey to chartered status. After a rigorous recruitment period, participants undergo four two-week residential training courses, interspersed with three secondments lasting between six and eight months.
Fostering flexibility
Graduates are given a choice of organisations for their next two secondments, to allow them to achieve certain competencies towards their chartership, and determine whether they are going to be an engineer or a scientist.
As the programme progresses, all graduates are required to spend ten per cent of their time working on Footprints, the scheme’s corporate responsibility programme, which includes working as a STEM ambassador as well as founding a start-up company, to help understand the challenges faced by small businesses.
Kathryn stated that because training is entirely fitted to individual needs, “no two cohorts have the same programme, and no two graduates will have the same programme”. This flexibility means that participants can choose the secondments that interest them. “It’s up to them,” said Kathryn. “We have graduates going international, whether it is to Tokyo or Sydney, or to a really small SME where they can see a programme through from start to finish and they have quite a bit autonomy.”
The consequence of this flexibility is that the scheme has a 98 per cent retention rate among the 270 graduates recruited so far, with a further 40 having joined in October 2017.
Forward looking
Energus has calculated that the scheme has a return on investment of 4:1, allowing the business to expand and become self-financing. The company has plans to extend the programme, and broaden the number of sponsors, but Kathryn is clear that this will not result in the quality or the reputation of the scheme being diminished.
Looking forward, the company would like to address challenges including helping to change the perception of the industry as “a bit male, pale and stale”. “It’s about getting new ideas in there, so people understand that bringing new graduates through will bring new ideas through,” said Kathryn.
Adapting to changing skills needs
As a result of the sector’s changing demands, the programme has now branched out to cater for graduates from a wide range of fields. “This time round we have more diverse roles,” Kathryn said. “We have got organisational psychologists on board, economists and mathematicians, so we are getting a more diverse range of disciplines as well. Working with the NDA, we have now recruited 15 apprentices this year across cyber security, IT and business administration.”
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