Making Engineering and Apprenticeships Accessible: Skills, Stigma, and Culture Change

Dame Ruth Cairnie DBE on Babcock, Defence Skills, and Building Talent Pipelines

Steph interviews Dame Ruth Cairnie DBE, Chair of Babcock International Group, patron of the Women in Defence Charter, member of the CBI Board and venture capital investor with a distinguished international career in the engineering sector. Dame Ruth talks about Babcock’s role as an international defence contractor and major UK employer, contributing an estimated £4.3bn to the UK economy, and shares her thoughts on skills, culture, and teamwork, outlining the wide range of workforce needs - Babcock will require around 8,000 more UK hires over the next five years - and how company is approaching its talent recruitment. Steph and Dame Ruth also discuss shifting perceptions of defence needs and a change in the understanding of nuclear initiatives, the role of the UK Nuclear Skills Charter, the importance of diversity, retention and progression within the workforce and the community initiatives Babcock are championing to support their talent supply chain.  00:00 Welcome and Guest Intro 00:27 What Babcock Does 01:45 Why Skills Matter 03:04 Roles and Career Paths 04:53 Early Careers Pipeline 07:02 Supporting SMEs Supply Chain 08:25 Nuclear Skills Push 09:55 Defence and Nuclear Perception Shift 11:59 Community Skills Partnerships 14:28 Making Careers Tangible 16:12 Skills Gap Challenges 16:43 New Routes into Trades 19:52 Pre Apprenticeships and NEETs 21:45 Immigration and Resourcing 23:04 Diversity and Inclusion 25:05 Ruth Career Journey 27:23 Facing Bias and Advice 29:03 Final Takeaways and Wrap Up Get in touch with us at sospod@enginuity.org [sospod@enginuity.org] ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.

Mind the Gap - The £5 Billion Black Hole in Skills

A recent report from SQW, a leading UK-based consultancy specialising in economic and social research, which was commissioned by Enginuity, estimates the skills gap is costing the sector about £5.2bn each year.  Steph is joined by Cathryn Moses-Stone, Senior Policy and Public Affairs for Enginuity, and entrepreneur and former SME managing director James Greenham, to discuss this new research and dig into the realities that this economic impact is having on manufacturing and engineering SMEs. 00:00 Welcome and Guests 00:42 Why Measure the Skills Gaps? 02:35 The Reality of Hiring as an SME 04:58 The £5.2 Billion Black Hole 06:23 Productivity and Apprenticeships 07:45 SME Constraints 10:12 Navigating Skills Reform 12:48 Grants and R&D Tax Credits 14:07 Fixing Vocational Education 14:52 Networks and Final Takeaways Get in touch with us at sospod@enginuity.org [sospod@enginuity.org] ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.

NEET Solutions – What Happens Next?

Steph is joined by Phil Smith CBE, Chair of Skills England, and Ann Watson, CEO of Enginuity, to discuss Skills England’s recently published Annual Skills Report which sets out the key challenges facing England’s skills system and actions for how they can be addressed. They also chat about the industrial strategy’s growth sectors, potential opportunities over the next 5–10 years, pathways for moving between sectors and how to tackle the NEET challenge of about a million young people who are not in education, earning or training.  00:00 Welcome 00:17 What is Skills England? 03:58 How Job Titles create Gender Bias 06:12 Work Experience Changes Minds 08:05 Manufacturing Hidden in Plain Sight 09:17 Skills England Annual Report Insights 12:07 Essential Skills in the AI Era 14:24 Creativity and Hands On Learning 15:48 Skills Classification and Passports 16:34 The NEETs Challenge 16:58 Recognising Hidden Strengths 20:09 AI Confidence Story 23:38 SME Skills Struggles 27:55 Skills England Wishlist Get in touch with us at sospod@enginuity.org [sospod@enginuity.org] ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.

Apprenticeships Beyond Engineering

Steph chats with Kathryn Marshall, Senior Apprenticeship and T Level Manager at Lloyds Banking Group, to challenge the misconception that apprenticeships are mainly for engineering and manufacturing.  With Lloyds Banking Group employing over 1,300 apprentices across more than 30 disciplines, Kathryn explains the breadth of roles on offer such as audit, digital, data, software engineering and cybersecurity. Kathryn dispels the myth that you need maths qualifications to work in banking, revealing the only role where A-level Maths is a requirement, and sharing which skills matter more than subjects studied. Steph and Kathryn also discuss the way AI is impacting jobs, as Kathryn outlines how Lloyds’ AI Academy is helping its 60,000 colleagues and the ways their youth outreach is aligning with their purpose of ‘helping Britain prosper’.   00:00 Apprenticeships Beyond Engineering 01:24 Routes into Banking Careers 02:29 Actuarial and Audit Explained 06:28 School Outreach and Awareness 07:20 Digital and Tech Apprenticeships 10:00 Who Thrives as an Apprentice 11:01 Networking and Squiggly Careers 14:01 Standing Out in Applications 20:13 Family Journeys and No False Starts 23:31 AI Academy and Future Skills 25:31 Purpose and Community Outreach 27:13 Key Takeaways and Goodbye Get in touch with us at sospod@enginuity.org [sospod@enginuity.org] ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.

Sisters Are Doing It for Themselves; Building Culture in a Family-Run Business

Steph meets Laura McBrown, Managing Director of G&B, an electronic manufacturing service provider, who has been running the family business with her sister, Kate, for the past 11 years.  Laura explains how she got into the industry entirely by accident but loved the creativity and diverse range of roles so much that it inspired her to study electrical engineering. She shares the story behind her father founding the company during the recession of the later 1980s and how the business has grown since that time, now serving the defence, aerospace, medical, and other highly regulated sectors.  Laura discusses how she and her sister are shaping the culture of the business, why team morale matters and how they approach recruitment in the face of a sector wide skills shortage.  00:00 Welcome 00:28 Family Business Origins 01:24 Industry Shift to Manufacturing 04:06 Learning on the Job 08:02 Proving Leadership and Culture 09:51 Business Today and Growth Goals 10:57 Skills Pipeline Challenge 12:20 National Manufacturing Day Tours 15:08 Making Outreach Work for Business 17:39 Building Confidence and Upskilling Get in touch with us at sospod@enginuity.org [sospod@enginuity.org] ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.