BenP (00:01.406)
Hey folks and welcome to the Tech World Human Skills Podcast. It is wonderful to have you with us. You know, there is a huge skills gap in tech and all the predictions are that it's only gonna get bigger. So today we're talking about one potential solution, apprenticeships. Now our guest today has loads of experience with apprentices. He is...
the co -founder and technical director of Microsoft partner, Alician IT. So please welcome to the show, Luke Smith. Luke, it is lovely to have you with us.
Luke Smith (00:41.575)
Hi Ben, thank you for having me today and I'm really looking forward to talking about IT apprenticeships and how that can help the IT industry.
BenP (00:51.038)
So for all our wonderful listeners out there, could you introduce yourself and tell us a bit about your background?
Luke Smith (00:58.279)
Yeah, sure. My name's Luke Smith and as you've mentioned I'm the co -founder of Elysian IT. We're an IT managed services consultancy based in the UK and we provide technical IT services across many different sectors from professional services, public sector, manufacturing and those organisations may be of a local based organisation or they might have a global footprint and we'll help to support them.
to implement secure environments, generative AI, application bespoke development, and pretty much anything else in between. And we started the business in 2014, so we're into celebrating our 10th year anniversary, which is exciting.
BenP (01:45.662)
That is exciting time. I have got a few years until I catch you up. Congratulations on 10 years.
Luke Smith (01:52.775)
Thanks Ben, and I'm sure you'll get here and beyond as well.
BenP (01:55.966)
Now, I think, could we start with your background? Because there's a reason that we've got you in to talk about apprenticeships. So I wonder, could we start off, could you sort of share your background from an apprenticeship perspective?
Luke Smith (02:00.103)
Thank you.
Luke Smith (02:13.811)
Thank you.
Yes, yeah definitely. Well, as a youngster I was really into IT and I was fortunate enough to be surrounded by electrical circuit boards and different computer components. My dad's an electrical engineer. So it felt like a natural progression to go into computing as I sort of how to love for it and I started a college course and as a part of the college course I how to work placement
And through that work placement, I then looked at apprenticeship options. So I ultimately undertook an apprenticeship with the Microsoft consultancy that I worked with back then and did evening classes. I think they were two to three nights a week to gain my H &C in computing. And at the same time, I was working full time for that Microsoft partner.
and was gaining the benefits of being paid and also learning about leading edge technologies as it was back then in the early 2000s.
BenP (03:22.494)
So, a lot of experience then, that was your kind of entry way into apprenticeships. And then what about now? Because you're still involved in apprenticeships now. So in what capacity are you involved in apprenticeships now?
Luke Smith (03:38.023)
Yeah, no, let me go through that. So one of the things that we've done as a list in IT is that we know that IT skill is important. So from the very first days of starting the organisation, we've always been engaged with apprenticeship schemes and bringing on new individuals and giving them the education to gain that deeper insight. So yeah, from our side, I guess we're...
my learnings as an apprentice and then seeing the benefits that that has given to myself. And also through that journey with other organisations I've worked for, we've also used apprentices and worked with giving skills to those apprentices that are valuable within this day and age. So it just seemed a logical course for us to sort of continue that.
that journey and sort of help to sort of educate that you know an IT workforce.
BenP (04:40.83)
Yeah and...
And also, you know, I've had some good experience with apprentices. I will say, you know, my background was a bit more, you know, we'll come to this later, but a bit more traditional, which was I did a degree at university and then I got into a graduate programme. That was the way that I got into tech. But then I've managed many apprentices over the years, interviewed apprentices and found them to be really powerful and really good things. So it's great to kind of have that conversation. And I think
Perhaps if we now sort of back up a little bit and think a little bit more about the challenges, you know, so what's the space that we're in, what challenges are there? And then I guess why do we think apprenticeships are really valuable? So if we start there, you know, what's the challenge at the moment? Why do we need things like apprenticeships?
Luke Smith (05:37.959)
Well, I guess the first place to start is around skill. Definitely from what I've seen through maybe the younger generation is not necessarily having the capability to be able to fully understand the IT stack, but also just a general lack of IT resources within the industry. So there's...
there seems to be a lot less individuals coming in which is making recruitment much harder and also having that back knowledge from an IT perspective.
BenP (06:15.614)
Right, okay. And it's funny that you say that, you know, because I think in many ways...
certainly I think around my kids and that kind of stuff. They've grown up with tech, they've grown up with digital and so their digital skills are really strong but I guess what you're talking about there is the behind the scenes bit. They get that the phone works with a quick a click or a swipe but what they don't know is all the stuff that's going on behind the scenes which when you were young you had to build that out yourself I guess because you were a bit of a geek at heart.
Luke Smith (06:46.727)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely right. Then I think, you know, it's progressed so quickly that a lot of the technical skill sets that people, I guess, think they're gaining doesn't sort of give them that true technical background that we had to go through. So as you've mentioned, the example of taking a device
like an iPhone out of the box and it's just connected to the internet, or the ability to install a piece of software onto your computer, such as your word processor or a computer game. Back when I needed to do it, and I'm sure the same for you, Ben, was that you needed to have a much more technical knowledge background to be able to do those exercises.
And you might think, well, the IT has become so much more simplified, why would you need to go back? And why would you need to know how a network card is initialized and what an IP address is used for and how you troubleshoot it? But in an IT business, there is still need to be able to troubleshoot those more highly technical skills that are not necessarily coming through. And there is a lack of that skill within the industry.
So it's more about giving people that baseline understanding on how you troubleshoot a network card. Why is the machine not on the internet? How can I go about root cause analysis and how can I go about troubleshooting it? And that's across all the technologies. We now have a world of a low code world, which is fantastic because business users.
BenP (08:08.318)
Yeah.
BenP (08:26.238)
Mm.
Luke Smith (08:35.399)
citizen developers can build solutions quite quickly, but they can also not understand how that's being created and they might not realize how they could expand what that solution is doing. They may see it being very prescribed and restrictive when actually as having more of a developer background, you would understand that you could create stool procedures, you could use CSS to style what an application looks like. So
It's great the technology is much more simplified to use nowadays than it was back in our day, but it also means that there isn't enough knowledge to sort of back up around how you would go about troubleshooting. And that's what I'd say I'm sort of seeing in the industry is that there's not enough skill to be in the marketplace that can undertake those technical troubleshooting techniques or that deeper application development knowledge.
BenP (09:29.086)
Yeah.
Yeah. And so I guess the more traditional route of getting entry level tech, you know, so people that are new and early to the tech career would have been university, which is the route that I went down. But I guess that isn't...
perfect solution for everybody. I mean the things that spring to my mind as some of the challenges with university is firstly you seem to be left with a meant debt.
Luke Smith (10:03.911)
Yes.
BenP (10:04.414)
I had some good university debts as I came out of it. And that is a drop in the ocean compared to the scale and the size of the debts that people are coming out with university now. So that seemed to be a challenge. The other challenge was it's all very theoretical because you've just spent three or four years at a university and it's not the hands -on reality of how that tech is gonna get used in the real world. That seemed to be. And then the other thing was sometimes the tech
Luke Smith (10:16.839)
up.
BenP (10:34.32)
tech that I did at university, which was a long time ago anyway, but the tech I was using then was even more dated. And I think that's often still the case. You're learning about tech that isn't the cutting edge stuff that perhaps is needed and is actually being used in industry. It's some stuff that might be maybe great for teaching, but it's not that reality of what they're going to use. So maybe these are some of the challenges with the typical university approach at the moment.
Luke Smith (11:01.767)
Yeah, definitely. I would say that the universities have improved the curriculum, but still the curriculum is still slightly behind. So as you're probably aware, technology is changing almost on a monthly basis and it can be difficult to have curriculum that is kept in line with and up to date with how that technology is moved forward. So the apprenticeship
gives you the hands -on experience of how that technology is evolving and how customers, organisations are consuming it and then they are able to apply that knowledge directly. But also with the educational background that can give them some of the fundamentals in regards to how core programming should be undertaken, what the core components are within a computer.
but enriched with having that placement within an organisation where they are utilising that technology for real. So universities definitely have a place and there are definitely courses which allow for newer tech, but it's that ever evolving technology stack that this is really, I think it really helps to sort of engage people in and give them that learning.
BenP (12:26.494)
Yeah. So for those people that haven't come across apprenticeships before, how do they work? And I guess our experience is more UK focused, but apprenticeships aren't limited to the UK. They're available in many countries around the world. And having done a bit of digging, they seem to be a similar sort of format to the experience we've got. So, you know, what do they work? How do they work, these apprenticeships at the moment?
Luke Smith (12:54.599)
Yeah, so we can talk about it from two parts really, one from the apprentice side and then one from the employer. So from an employer perspective, at least here within the UK, what you typically do is to subscribe to an apprenticeship scheme and that scheme is run by a training academy and there is funding that's provided through the government to help facilitate the
costs that are associated to it. So in our example, we currently use an organisation called iTech. They are throughout the UK, but we're based in Basinstoke, so we use the local Basinstoke College to facilitate that. What then happens is you sign up to that apprenticeship scheme and then the iTech or the organisation that's running it,
will then provide you with some apprentices and those apprentices could either come through the organisation that you're working with or it can come through the government portal. So there's a portal that apprentices can sign up to and then they can request a position within our organisation or we can look within that catalogue to see who is local to us that would like to be on that apprenticeship scheme.
Another route, you can, as an organisation, you can also publicise a role and that role you might then nominate, it might be an apprenticeship role that you're looking for and that you could then yourself put that new employee or existing employees through that apprenticeship scheme. So sort of two ways that you can find an individual or multiple individuals to be on that scheme itself. And then what happens,
BenP (14:48.83)
Okay.
Luke Smith (14:49.863)
is that the organisation that you're working with, that academy, they will look to request funds from the government and that will help to pay ultimately for the training that that student is getting, that apprentice is getting.
BenP (15:07.614)
And that training, you can get different levels of apprentices, aren't you? So you can get people that are doing degree level apprenticeships. You can get people that are age 16 doing almost like A -level -y type apprenticeships as well. So there's different levels of education and different lengths of apprenticeships.
Luke Smith (15:21.287)
Right.
Luke Smith (15:25.735)
That's absolutely right. So what we've typically been doing is the ones that are related to an NVQ level three. And that is what you've mentioned is around the A level sort of standard. So, you know, they'll end up doing as a part of that sort of, you know, English as well as doing the more formal computing training. And that would be done, as I say, either
BenP (15:34.942)
Okay.
Luke Smith (15:53.479)
as evening classes or a dedicated day out of the five days that we actually work ourselves. And the other thing that they'll also do is enrich that educational level, NVQ in this case, with, for us at least, Microsoft certification. So as a part of the programme, they can also gear your apprentice not only to gaining an NVQ or a HN...
or a degree, but also gain industry accreditations and in our case that would be the Microsoft certifications that would be needed for that particular role that that individual is doing. So you might be more of a infrastructure help desk type individual or you might be more of a developer, application developer and therefore align Microsoft accreditations in that way or industry led.
accreditations.
BenP (16:54.398)
So just thinking about that from an apprentice's perspective, so you kind of come out of the program with certifications.
Let's start with academic certifications, whether that's NVQ, HND, or if you're on the A level, sorry, the degree programmes that I've also had people on. So you come out with that formal certification there. You also come out with on the job experience. You also come out with industry certifications that have been useful for you in your job. And the government has paid for the education part.
and you the employer have given them wages so they have been paid so they sort of come out of the apprenticeship with a certification, industry certification and less debt and some real world experience.
Luke Smith (17:42.695)
Correct, yeah, exactly. And yeah, when you sort of put it like that, Ben, in that nice summary, you sort of like, why wouldn't you, in a way? You're gaining all that experience and having a much lower debt as a course of that process.
BenP (17:54.174)
Yeah.
BenP (18:04.03)
So that's great from an apprentice perspective as to why that's so good. What about if we flip this round, you're running a company, what's the benefit to you as an employer of having apprentices and taking people very early in career, particularly if you're talking the NVQ apprentices, they're sort of 16 year olds, that sort of age, of taking people that sort of age.
and investing, I guess, a lot of time and energy into them, because you're helping to develop their skills. What's the benefit to you as an employer?
Luke Smith (18:41.959)
Well, ultimately we get to sort of shape somebody into how we operate as an organisation, our way of working, our ethos and that moulding of that type of individual, which I think is quite important. And you typically find that those individuals will stay with you for longer because you've put a lot of time and energy into it.
the skill that they gain out of it is very beneficial from that side, so the stickiness of an individual. And the other thing as well that the apprenticeship scheme provides is a teacher effectively who is, or a coordinator who's working with us as an organisation to help improve that skill of the individual.
So although there is effort from us as an organisation to make sure that they are working on projects, that they're working through their curriculum, that is also supported by the academy, the university, the college on that course as well. So we have an individual outside of our company that will help our apprentices to
you know, give them that educational coursework for them to work through and give us some guidance on the sort of things that we could be doing to help educate those individuals as well. So, yeah, I would say that you've got the stickiness.
BenP (20:24.574)
and how long so how long sorry to interrupt you there how long does it take until you start seeing some value back from the apprentice you know where they're they're contributing in a way where you think actually there's now value versus the energy and the salary we're giving them versus them giving us something of value back to the company how long does that sort of take on average
Luke Smith (20:52.327)
Yeah, as you say, I think on average, because every individual is slightly different, but you could typically see a real sort of value after a year, sort of that initial on -ramp that you can then start to see the benefit coming into the organisation. It might be slightly longer, it might be slightly shorter, but it would be typically around that sort of period of time.
BenP (21:20.542)
that you start to see that. And then certainly in the UK, you are not committed to your apprentice or are you committed to your apprentice beyond the end of the apprenticeship? So let's say it's a four year degree apprenticeship that somebody was doing at the end of that four years. Are they guaranteed a job at the end and are you committed to them at the end of the apprenticeship or is it just you're committed for the duration of the apprenticeship?
Luke Smith (21:46.567)
So you're committed for the duration of the apprenticeship. However, I like to look at it that because the investment will give into those individuals that we want to invest in them beyond their apprenticeship and take them on as a full -time employee, adding value into the organisation. But you don't have to commit at the end of that period.
BenP (22:10.078)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it might make sense perfectly for them to come on onto a full -time employee salary band, you know, because that's the thing that would be different to any, an apprentice salary band, and to come onto that and then be, you know, contracted in the same way that normal full -time employees would be and all of that kind of stuff. So that may be the things that both of you wanna do. And hopefully if it's all going well, then that's the route that you follow.
But if it hasn't gone well for whatever circumstance, then that could be that the apprentice perhaps doesn't want to do this and isn't looking forward to doing this, or terribly the business doesn't have space and headcount at the moment to offer an FTE opportunity. You can get out at the end of it. Nobody wants to, ideally, but that's still available to employers.
Luke Smith (22:59.975)
Yeah it is, as I say, I've always looked at it as that they would be onboarded as a full -time employee into the organisation, but for whatever reason, it may not materialise in that way and that may not be down to you as an organisation. As you say, that might be the apprentice decided that they wanted to take a different avenue, they want to maybe join a different organisation.
BenP (23:12.35)
Yeah.
Luke Smith (23:27.975)
and that's absolutely possible.
BenP (23:31.134)
Yeah, so it seems to me like, you know, a great way to fill the skills gap, a great way to get some untapped potential. And also, you know, I'm thinking back to a podcast I did now with Neil Marley a few episodes ago on social mobility, you know, where, you know, for many reasons, university might not be the route that people want to take. And so therefore an apprenticeship maybe gives you a more diverse pool of talent to hire from. So it's going to get you different people.
that maybe come into your organization early in career that help you with your skills gap. But the downside of that is you're going to need to invest some time into managing those people as they are so early in career. So I guess we thought about that from an employer's perspective, from an apprentice's perspective. So if anybody's listening this and wants to send this episode on to somebody that's early in career and thinking about
maybe an apprenticeship is the right thing for them to do next. Any tips that you'd have for people that are thinking that they themselves wanna get into an apprenticeship program and maybe how to prep for it?
Luke Smith (24:43.56)
Yeah, definitely. So I would say first of all, you want to be passionate in the apprenticeship scheme that you're going into. And apprenticeships are beyond IT, but I would say you need to sort of be passionate in that subject. You don't have to really know the in -depths of how it would work, because that's what the apprenticeship scheme is there for, is to help educate an individual in that particular area. But I would say that you need to sort of show some passion.
for that particular subject area. I'd also say that as an apprentice, you still go through an interviewing process. So the potential employer that you want to sort of join, you'll need to have an interview with them to see if you'd like to be onboarded into that particular role. And when it comes to that, I would recommend highly that you sort of do a little bit of background to the company that you're looking at joining.
You don't have to know the ins and outs of what they do, but probably a little overview looking on their website, what they're doing and what they are putting out as a message would be a key thing to understand. From our perspective, we do manage services and we provide consultancy services. So having a little background to that and we're a Microsoft partner would definitely benefit you when you go through that interview.
And I think then also sort of dress appropriately for the interview as well, you know, come prepared for it and look the part, I would definitely say would be, you know, give me some great ticks in the box. So it's really those three items, I would say, the keen interest in the subject, coming prepared about knowing what the company is doing, even at just a high level.
BenP (26:07.326)
Hmm.
Yeah.
Luke Smith (26:34.375)
and sort of dressing sensibly for it.
BenP (26:37.534)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I'm sure if you just jump around YouTube a little bit, you can find loads of tips and loads of videos on interview prep techniques and all of that kind of stuff to try and maximise your chance. I mean, if I just sort of flip back to the fact that sadly I'm now a little older than I wish I was, I remember managing apprenticeships when we went through the COVID pandemic and
It was very different for me as a people manager managing somebody that was very much earlier in career, but also just earlier in life versus managing somebody that was around my age, you know, that had their own house, their own office, their own whatever, as opposed to somebody that is perhaps sharing a bedroom with a sibling, doesn't have a desk and is very early in life, very different life circumstances. And as a manager, the things I needed to do,
skills I needed to show and the way I needed to manage the situation with apprentices was very different. So it's also for those you know wanting to develop their people management skills it's a great way to build another set of skills that are really useful in life as well.
Luke Smith (27:51.175)
Yeah, definitely. Yeah, I think, you know, as you've mentioned, you know, managing people who come from the background of having a longer tenure in employment and having their own house and outgoings and having to manage, you know, their own life and paying mortgages to a youngster who is still at home is completely different. And...
I guess in a way you end up becoming that mother or father figure to them as well in trying to guide them and help them through their experiences. It's not necessarily always for the faint -hearted as a company or a manager, but it definitely adds and enriches what you do on a day -to -day basis. And you reap the rewards from that apprentice as you've been working with them and you know...
being able to mould them into something that suits you as an organisation and as an individual.
BenP (28:56.222)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Luke, I just glanced at the clock and we are almost out of time. So before we finish, what would the, I guess the highlights or the key takeaways that you'd like everybody to take from this podcast?
Luke Smith (29:14.727)
Well, I guess the first one is for businesses. And the first thing I'd like to say is definitely look at investing in the apprenticeship schemes. Check on the government websites for apprentices. And as we've mentioned, they're not just for the UK, USA and further afield. Look at the process that you need to go through and start that journey. And then for...
the apprentices or someone looking at coming into employment, once again look at the apprenticeship schemes that are available. If you're coming out of school, the schooling system will have careers advisors that will point you in the right direction on where apprenticeships lay. But also maybe for the older generation that are looking at wanting to change what they're doing from a career perspective.
Once again the government website for apprenticeships is another place to go and look at maybe wanting to change what you're doing on, you know, currently into a different particular role and the apprenticeships are there to support both youngsters as well as sort of adult educators as well.
BenP (30:34.27)
Yeah, yeah, brilliant. I think from my perspective, it is that as an employer, you can help shape the future with some great talent from different backgrounds.
that is quite cost effective to you to bring, you know, you get them a relatively lowish salary whilst they're an apprentice and give you some good value, certainly for that second year and beyond as we were talking about, you know, so they're good things to think about from an employer perspective. And then I think about it then from an apprentice perspective. I mean, my kids are still too early to do this, but if the world carries on as it is, I would definitely think about, right.
University is potentially one option for them. Apprenticeships, definitely another option for them. Both have got their pros and both have got their cons. I think when I was a kid, the only really way to get into tech was either you got a job straight at 18 or you went to university and got on a graduate scheme. It felt like those were the two ways into tech.
and it feels like that apprenticeships is a very viable and potentially the best way to get into tech. So it's definitely something I consider. Brilliant, thank you so much for sharing all that Luke. Final thing, how can people get hold of you? If people either wanna find out and ask you questions about apprenticeships or find out about Ellision IT, where can people go to find out and contact you?
Luke Smith (31:38.343)
Yes.
Luke Smith (32:05.543)
Yeah definitely, so you can find us on LinkedIn and at Alician IT. You can visit our website, just Google Alician IT and you know they're going to be the best ways to sort of connect and reach out and yeah we'd be more than interested to listen to other people's stories or apprentices that are looking for jobs, more than welcome to reach out.
BenP (32:33.662)
Yeah, brilliant, brilliant. Well, so I'll put those in the show notes so everybody can, in case you didn't know how to spell it, listen, it's E -L -Y -S -I -A -N. It always catches me out, but I'll pop all that in the show notes. So the only thing for me to say is Luke, thank you so much for taking the time to come and talk to us.
Luke Smith (32:53.959)
No problem, thank you Ben and yeah, take care everyone.
