Why Apprenticeships Offer Great Value to Build a Skilled Team

There is no doubt that apprenticeships can help you build a skilled and loyal workforce. They are also a highly cost-effective way of training new employees and upskilling existing team members.

Here are four reasons why apprenticeships can provide better value than traditional training:

1. Many organisations have already paid into the apprenticeship levy

If your organisation has a payroll exceeding £3 million per year, you will already be contributing 0.5% of your annual pay bill into the apprenticeship levy. The government then adds an extra 10% to your account.

That means that, even at the lowest level, you will have enough in your levy account to fund one or two apprentices each year at no additional cost. You could invest in training a member of your marketing team, hire a new business administrator, or retrain an existing team member as a service designer—all without needing to allocate extra budget for training.

As part of the apprenticeship fee your apprentices receive expert tutoring and skills coaching from subject matter experts for a 12-18 month period.

2. For non-levy payers, costs can be as low as £500

If your organisation is not large enough to be required to pay the levy, the government will fund 95% of the apprenticeship. The remaining costs to your organisation are no more than the price of a one-day training course. This means your apprentice receives a full programme of learning and skills development over 12 to 18 months for the same cost as a single day of training.

Even better, large organisations can ‘gift’ levy funds to support smaller, non-levy-paying organisations. This means you may even be able to cover the remaining 5% cost, develop your team, and provide a social value boost to a larger organisation at the same time – all for no money!

3. Incentives for starting young people in their careers

If you employ a young person under 25 in a new role, you won’t need to pay secondary Class 1 National Insurance contributions. This could save you up to 13.8% of everything the apprentice earns above £8,840 per year. Entry-level apprenticeships like Multi Channel Marketer, Business Administrator and Event Assistant are an excellent way to bring new talent into your organisation and equip them with specialist skills.

There is also a £1,000-£3,000 cash incentive for all employers, regardless of turnover size, if a newly recruited apprentice is aged 16-18, or is aged 25 or below and has an Education, Health and Care (EHC) plan or was previously in care.

4. Apprentices can apply what they learn in real time

The overarching benefit of apprenticeships is that learners can immediately apply the new skills they learned. Apprenticeships are designed to address real-world challenges through projects and tasks aligned with your business. Marketing executives learn marketing concepts and theories, as well as techniques to create content that supports your customer journey; bid and proposal co-ordinators learn how to apply best practices across the entire bid process and, early in their programme, service designers learn practical approaches and methodologies that they can use in their roles straight away.

If you haven’t previously considered apprenticeships as a way to develop your team’s skills, perhaps it’s time to explore the benefits. Click here for the full list of our apprenticeships or talk to us for advice on the best fit at sales@jga-group.co.uk