The New Graduate Apprentice – Emily Williams checks in…

A week after starting as the Graduate Apprentice and I’m starting to settle in. I was really quite nervous the night before my first day in the office, but I had no reason to be! The people that I’m working with are really nice, and are happy to help me with the many questions that I’ve got! I spent a couple of days in London, doing an induction, and then my first couple of days in the office were mainly training based. But now I’m doing more work, and I’m enjoying it. There’s a lot to learn, but I look forward to the challenge that it brings me.

As I’ve only been at Deloitte for a week, and am concentrating hard on getting to grips with everything, I haven’t had much time to think about the next placements. But it will be very interesting to see how the different organisations work, and what role I have in each of them. It’s definitely going to be an exciting year!

I feel proud to be the Graduate Apprentice, especially at such a difficult time. I really want to give it my all, have an open mind whilst at each placement, and get the best from it all. I don’t know what I’ll be doing this time next year, but I know that whatever it is, I’ll definitely have an advantage, having been the Graduate Apprentice. The experience and skills I will gain, I am sure will be vital to me, for the future. I have been told, and can well believe, that the year will fly by. However, as much as I want to learn from it, I also want to enjoy it, and I have already seen that there are plenty of people on hand to help me do this. Let’s hope it goes well!

Birmingham Future appoints the fourth Graduate Apprentice…

Graduates are facing a difficult time in securing jobs during the recession so it became great news to twenty one year old Emily Williams when she was announced this week as Birmingham Future’s fourth Graduate Apprentice.

This year’s successful candidate overcame a field of seventy other graduates all hoping to be given the unique opportunity to experience three diverse sixteen week placements within the city’s professional sector.

Emily, from Coventry, has recently graduated from Lancaster University with a first in mathematics and will start her year as the Graduate Apprentice in September with Deloitte in Birmingham. She will also enjoy placements with the HR department of Matthew Boulton and Sutton Coldfield Colleges as they prepare for the merger of the two colleges to form Birmingham Metropolitan College before completing her year with business consultants, VC Consulting.

Emily is the fourth Graduate Apprentice and the first female to be given the unique opportunity to sample three diverse working environments during a structured year since the innovative scheme was launched in 2006 by Birmingham Future.

The programme is run by the organisation’s Talent Retention and Development Committee and supported by Graduate Advantage.

Emily recently visited all three of the placement companies and enjoyed a tour of the city that will become her home and was excited at the prospect that lies ahead;

“Very few of my university friends have managed to secure a graduate job so I am even more excited and pleased to be given this unique opportunity. Like so many other students, I was unsure of the exact direction I wanted to take after leaving university which is why the Graduate Apprentice programme is so appealing.

“I will now have the opportunity to experience three different working environments and with three very different projects to work on. I shall get to know how a major business operates at Deloitte, be involved with Matthew Boulton and Sutton Coldfield Colleges at a highly important and significant time in their development and find out about life in an SME at VC Consulting. I know this will be a fantastic journey.”

Chair of Birmingham Future’s Talent Retention and Development Committee, Anthony McCourt commented;

“Congratulations to Emily on becoming the latest Graduate Apprentice. The introduction of the Government’s new Graduate Internship Programme highlights the importance they are putting on work placements. The Graduate Apprentice, which has been acknowledged as an innovative scheme by leading politicians, goes one step further by offering three diverse placements which gives a far broader view of the opportunities that exist within professional services. This year’s applications were the strongest we have seen which reflects clearly that this opportunity both excites and stimulates graduates.

“During these challenging economic times, I am delighted we are able to continue to offer this unique programme which is only possible due to the continuing support of our placement firms and Graduate Advantage.”

Future Debate – How is Young Professional Confidence?

With all the furore and column inches devoted to MPs expenses, the rise of fringe parties and Susan Boyle, the financial crisis and its implications for British business have ostensibly taken a back seat. Birmingham Future and its newly reprised Debates committee hoped to bring the issue back into the spotlight with the first of several debates focusing on the issues affecting Birmingham’s young professional community. Taking place on a balmy summer’s evening at Bevan Brittan as an open forum session (rather like Question Time, though with an audience less likely to heckle), the motion hoped to address a topic close to every young professional in Birmingham: can we be confident about the city’s ability to weather the financial crisis?

Future’s Got Talent

Graduates into Employment Committee re-brands and goes on the Talent hunt… 

One of Birmingham Future’s standing committees, Graduates into Employment Committee, has changed its name, and with it, its remit.  The newly formed Talent Retention & Development Committee will focus on graduates getting into work in Birmingham but also look at how, as a city, we can embed those graduates and young professionals into the Birmingham fabric. 

Talent doesn’t stop when a graduate gets the job they want, it’s about career and personal development.  As a city, we can sometimes be accused of not shouting loud and proud about what Birmingham has to offer every graduate, not just in the first few years of their chosen career, but right through to becoming business leaders.  This is what the Talent Retention & Development Committee is all about.  Anthony McCourt, current chair of the committee said ‘It’s testament to the members of the committee that they are up for expanding their remit and with it, providing a greater offering to the Future membership.  Make no mistake about it, our bread and butter starts with graduates in this city but from today onwards, it doesn’t end there either”.

Look out for upcoming events led by this committee.