IN DEPTH
The value of new experience
Apprenticeships are a great way to pursue career opportunities and develop skills as an individual, but they also offer benefits for employers that can go far beyond the obvious. Sally Brock, Head of Operations, Libraries & Collections, King’s College London explains why and how the university embraced the scheme.
WE were delighted to welcome our first apprentice, Red Tanner, to Libraries & Collections at King’s College London in November last year. Red has thrived and is a much-valued member of the team. Their 18-month level 3 Library, informa- tion and archive services assistant post had been nearly a year in the planning and this article covers our motivation for employing an apprentice, along with planning, implementation, recruitment, benefits and lessons learned. Our motivation was the commitment to recruiting and retaining staff from underrepre- sented groups, part of our Libraries & Collec- tions People Plan. This is not just a concern at King’s, but for the library profession more widely (see CILIP’s latest workforce mapping
www.cilip.org.uk/workforcemapping). We had been investigating different solutions
and, although we were aware of apprenticeships, it wasn’t until I attended the CILIP Employer’s Forum towards the end of 2022 and where the level 3 apprenticeship was briefly mentioned, that a germ of an idea formed. The apprenticeship scheme offered a framework and qualifications but, more importantly, was likely to attract a much wider pool of applicants. I returned from the Forum enthused and began sounding out senior colleagues to gauge the level of support for an apprentice.
Positive feedback
Initial feedback was positive, so I then undertook some research with the assistance
34 INFORMATION PROFESSIONAL
Sally Brock, Head of Operations, Libraries & Collections, King’s College London
of Gavin Beattie, Associate Director, Research & Impact. We met with colleagues from CILIP who, in turn, put us in contact with colleagues at the University of West London. At King’s we spoke to the End User Services Campus Manager in IT and colleagues from Organisational Development, who were at the time responsible for supporting apprenticeships across King’s. All were incredi- bly encouraging and offered practical advice. In May, Gavin and I put a wrote a proposal for our Senior Management Team to consider, which recommended:
1. Trial of one apprenticeship on a fixed-term contract of 21 months for the start of the academic year. The contract would cover the 18 months duration of the course, with a buffer in case re-sits were required and also to provide
September 2024
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