Kirkstall Precision Engineering
believe they’re only as good as the people they employ. They aren’t content
with simply filling vacant positions – every member of the team embarks on a
journey of progression and professional development when they arrive at work
every day. As the company operates in such a fast-paced environment across a
spectrum of sectors, bolstering their team with new blood and ensuring the existing
team are being constantly challenged is pivotal to achieving lasting success.
All of this hard work begins in their
Apprenticeship Academy.
Due to their record of success with
hiring apprentices since the 1990s, KPE have invested in a new premise and
purpose-built infrastructure solely for the development of apprentice
engineers. The motives behind its opening were twofold. Firstly, training up
the next generation of industry talent would give them instant access to a
talent pool that was not only promising and hungry to learn, but also proven.
Secondly, it was their way of giving back to the engineering community. From first-hand
experience, they know that great engineers thrive off working with other
engineers and it also ensures traditional craftsmanship stays at a high level
and doesn’t die out.
It’s something that makes them
unique among their competition, as Managing Director, Adam Thornton, is keen to
point out. “A lot of manufacturers choose to neglect person-to-person training
and instead focus solely on machinery upgrades. We’re one of the very few
companies that actually run and operate an apprenticeship scheme with a
purpose-built facility, and the reason for that is simple. While it’s important
to stay up to date on the latest technology, we believe there’s no substitute
for traditional, hands-on training.”
The Academy itself covers anything
from nine-week T Level qualifications to four-year advanced apprenticeship programmes,
consisting of one day a week theory at a local college, then four days of
practical training at the academy. Once an apprentice has proven themselves
competent, they will then be promoted to work in manufacturing workshops, where
they will spend 12 months in each department, learning and developing the
necessary skills to thrive as an engineer. Managing Director, Adam Thornton,
firmly believes it’s this extensive programme which guarantees graduates from
the academy are ready for life beyond the classroom.
“We have a 95% retention rate among
graduates. In fact, 75% our current workforce is made up of academy graduates,
with some 50% of our supervisor or manager roles filled by a graduate too.” added
Adam.
The academy is obviously something
that instils a great sense of pride among the employees here, which should come
as no surprise seeing as many of them directly benefitted from the scheme in
the past. However, it’s clear that the academy isn’t just as a box ticking
exercise, it’s a real, functioning part of Kirkstall Precision’s business model
and it would be a lot poorer without it.
In the majority of cases, once an
apprentice has finished their training, they are offered a full-time position. Kirkstall
Precision believe they are best placed to oversee the transition from apprentice
to fully-fledged engineer, as they have been monitoring their progression over
the past four years. Throughout their training, they will have made notes and
earmarked specific candidates for specific career progression routes based on
their strengths, weaknesses and areas of interest.
The Apprenticeship Academy is an
invaluable resource. It puts KPE in contact with the best and brightest upcoming
talent, enabling them to refresh and enhance their workforce, but also places
the apprentice in an environment that is centred solely around their
professional development and progression.
The employees here at KPE don’t need
to be convinced of the Academy’s benefits – they’re living success stories –
but they do believe it has its merits over a university education. “Our
curriculum is a perfect balance between the practical and the theoretical.
Every apprentice will have to effectively execute what they’ve learnt in the
classroom in a real-life setting before progressing, which isn’t always the
case when studying engineering at degree level.” – Craig Dowling, Manufacturing
Manager.
Adam is buoyed by the success of the
scheme so far, but has his eyes set on how it can be improved even further. “We
not only want to encourage young people to consider a career in engineering,
but we want to increase our duty to helping other, less represented groups
discover the joys of working in engineering. We currently have one female
second year apprentice on our books, who is progressing well, but we’d like to
see this evolve into more of a normal thing and less of an anomaly in years to
come.”
