For many reasons, investing in an apprentice programme is not just of commercial and business benefit, but speaks of a business interested in managing its own long term needs, and willing to invest in people who may be their future employees – or may well contribute the health of the sector in other companies.
Investing is the right word – based on the full cost of employing apprentices, it’s not an exaggeration to measure that investment, for a four year Modern Apprenticeship, in the six figure category; for salary, training costs, support from existing staff and the people who manage them.
In any workplace, making an investment decision of £100k, with no guaranteed results and no fixed return on capital employed rate makes for a thin, and unlikely business case. Making an ethical or ‘it’s the right thing’ argument doesn’t really add to the bottom line, at least not in the short term.
However what you might hope to gain from your investment is an employee who is competent, fits with your culture, knows your work and how you work and is – unlike a recruit from outside – a known entity in terms of their behaviour, conduct and attitude. On top of that, apprentices tend to ‘stick’ to the companies who supported them more than other recruits.
There is a huge dearth of engineering apprentice opportunities across Scotland – its not unusual to get 100 applicants for one role. So, unlike in many other areas of recruitment, you will have the luxury of choice – but of course with that comes the burden of sifting and reviewing applications.
Historically employers would select potential apprentices based on their academic performance – with Maths, English, Arithmetic and maybe a Science being regarded as important – and any interest in engineering a huge bonus. Now?
One thing to always bear in mind is that, for all the greater exposure to more of the world that young people have now compared to their parents, most apprentice applicants will be school leavers. If you genuinely put yourself in that zone of your memory, you will perhaps appreciate that 18 is still very, very young.
Like any potential recruitment, there are a few key things we should consider;
- Define exactly what you want: Be clear about the skills, knowledge, experience (if any), attitude and abilities that you need. Any work experience is good work experience – even if nothing to do with the apprenticeship subject. A pattern of work – getting to work, doing a decent job – is one of the major issues that impact on ongoing apprenticeship management. Detail the requirements, both in ability and behaviour expected in your advert and job description. One hugely important element, often overlooked is fit; how will they fit into your team, and will the job meet their expectations now and in the future?
- Establish how you will recruit; There are many different routes to determine whether someone is suitable for an apprenticeship, from the traditional interview, tests (both arithmetical and verbal reasoning), group assessments, presentations and others besides. There is no one size fits all approach, so consider what you want to test, and set that up. Where are you finding your potential applicants? Are you using job boards?
- Score fairly and without prejudice. You are making a huge business decision, so make sure that all who are involved in the recruitment, and the decisions are trained and are clear on the requirement, the risk and the mechanisms for selection.
In Scotland, the law essentially determines that the main role of an apprentice is learning – they are not held to the same standards as a normal employee but get additional protection in law.
In broad terms, apprentices should be managed – in terms of their conduct, behaviour and performance – on the same basis as other employees; where any of those is not acceptable we should address them and, where they do not improve, issue warnings as appropriate.
We need to bear in mind though that the decision on whether or not to dismiss an apprentices is based on different criteria – the law regards apprentices as trainees, therefore the main mechanism for dismissing an apprentice is if they are ‘untrainable’; that means by their performance we and they are not able to complete the elements of the apprenticeship. This could be for capability reasons – they are simply not able to learn the appropriate skills – or for conduct. We need to be aware however that, in plain terms, what you might dismiss an employee for might not – and in fact probably isn’t – sufficient grounds to dismiss an apprentice. Any act of conduct needs to be so serious that it seriously undermines the mutual contract and relationship. Acts of violence, or offensive behaviour of a serious nature may be an example; persistent lateness which does not affect the ability to train are probably not. It all comes back the main purpose in the mutual contract – you provide training, the apprentice is there to learn – not to contribute, during the apprentice period, to outputs. The exam question is ‘are they untrainable?’. Compensation can be high if an apprentice is dismissed as damages for breach of contract at common law include future loss and loss of potential future earnings. This is in addition to statutory rights carrying compensation, such as unfair dismissal.
Even dismissal by reason of redundancy is problematic – we cannot apply the same economic arguments that we would for other employees; we can’t simply dismiss apprentices because we can’t afford to run the programme – so the decision to invest is essentially final. We can dismiss for redundancy if – for example – we can no longer support the apprenticeship; if we fixed cars and employed apprentice mechanics, and the business closed then that is generally OK, though we should take steps to support them in finding an alternative employer who could support them. If in this example we changed business direction – from running a garage to solely focussed on car sales for example – then that might be reasonable grounds to make apprentices redundant, if we were no longer employing mechanics who could provide on the job training.
Where warnings are to be issued, issue them; where performance is not acceptable intervene and support in the same way you would for employees; where there are conduct concerns address them. However, taking the ultimate step requires careful examination.
Apprenticeships are generally of a fixed term or duration, and in most cases is in excess of 2 years, meaning that the majority of apprentices will acquire employment rights; on that basis, at the end of the apprentice period, the employer must make a decision on whether to retain them, and where they decide not to, they need to dismiss fairly, for one of the 5 potentially fair reasons: conduct, capability (health or poor performance), redundancy, statutory bar or some other substantial reason, (SOSR). Its vital therefore that any decisions are reasonable and that we have acted fairly if we intend to dismiss; noted any performance concerns and acted on them, issuing warnings where appropriate; dealt with behavioural or conduct matters etc. such that, if that decision is to be taken, we have some basis in fact for helping us deal with it. With apprentices, dismissal has to be the absolute last resort, and you should take advice if you are contemplating dismissing an apprentice.
Scottish Engineering are here to support you in dealing with these issues, so please contact our team if you want any more details, or if you need support in managing apprentices.
Can we support you in dealing with issues like this? Call the ScotEng team on 0141 221 3181.
