With International Women’s Day taking place this weekend, we are celebrating the talented women in tech that make up part of the Giant iTab team. Event and Operation Assistant Holly Flintham is Giant iTab’s rising star. Holly joined the business in 2018 as part of a Government sponsored Digital Marketing apprenticeship and is looking forward to extending her training and career with the company.
Taking part in the apprenticeship was a better option for Holly than going to university and ending up in thousands of pounds worth of debt. Balancing on the job training with learning has given her a fast track to success and the opportunity to hone her skills within a team and to take control of her own projects and responsibilities.
Over the last few years there has been a major Government drive to make business and organisations in the UK aware of the benefits of apprenticeships for both employers and employees and there has been a large rise in numbers of apprentices joining the UK’s workforce. Recent research carried out for the Centre for Economics and Business Research found that, on average, each apprentice brings a gain in productivity of more than £10,000 per year for their employer, with figures for some sectors being even higher.
As well as boosting productivity, apprenticeships can also help companies to compete in the modern marketplace. In industry research, 77 per cent of employers agreed that taking on apprentices helped to make their organisations more competitive. Another finding was that more than eight out of 10 customers prefer to buy from companies which employ apprentices.
Holly has been able to gain a qualification while also working full time and improving her work experience and skills and after only one year and four months is about to receive a Level 3 qualification in Digital Marketing. It has allowed her to have hands-on training while putting her skills to practice in the quest to build more confidence in a business environment.
A skills gap is currently affecting many organisations and companies in the UK, making it hard to fill vacancies. However, by recruiting and training apprentices, business can develop people in a way that promotes the specific skills required by their business and industry, therefore investing in the future of their people and their business as a whole.
For Holly, the experience has been “life-changing”. “Giant iTab has been brilliant in offering me this opportunity”, she says. “The team includes me in strategic and planning discussions, all the senior management take an active interest in what I do every day and I am made to feel a valued part of the business.”
