As South Yorkshire businesses report problems recruiting new staff, The Source Skills Academy is urging them to ‘grow their own’ by turning to apprenticeships.
The Sheffield academy, a registered charity which has got thousands into work, is backing Feb 7-13 National Apprenticeship Week’s message to Build The Future.
Its team is taking a virtual seat at NAW’s national online event on February 9th to help potential learners, advise bosses how to develop ‘perfect fit’ employees via apprenticeships and detail the funding available.
The Sheffield-based training specialist says apprenticeships can play a crucial part in avoiding a major skills gap.
In the latest Economic Update from South Yorkshire’s Chambers of Commerce, covering 2021’s final quarter, local businesses reported high demand for products and services, but 86 per cent said the joint effect of the pandemic and Brexit was increasingly impacting on their workforce.
The report, South Yorkshire’s largest private survey of business opinion, found bosses also viewed the cost of staff training as an obstacle..
“Fewer workers are coming from the EU and the pandemic has led to working practises which need different skills. There is a growing need to train and re-skill as many people as possible across the region,” said Dale Robinson, the Source’s Director of Business Development and a Sheffield Chamber council member.
“Apprenticeships should be key in an organisation’s recruitment, skills and business strategies. They are a time-trusted and inexpensive way of bringing in and training people your way, with government grants for every recruit.”
