A groundbreaking new expertise funding programme ‘Be the Digital Business’ is being launched right now to assist hundreds of small and medium-sized businesses in England to coach folks in digital careers.
Data, digital and tech apprenticeship supplier QA and mentoring supplier Be the Business have joined forces to ship the programme, which is able to provide collaborating SMEs totally funded coaching for folks to enter new roles in Data and AI, Cyber Security and Cloud IT, in addition to direct access to business leaders for useful perception.
Be the Digital Business will use unspent Apprenticeship Levy money from main family names – together with Amazon, Capita, Nationwide and Salesforce – to supply full funding for digital apprenticeship programmes to assist SMEs sustainably thrive within the digital financial system.
The Apprenticeship Levy is a tax that each one employers with a payroll of greater than £3m pay. It is designed to create a pot that may then be drawn upon by the identical business to pay for apprenticeship coaching. However, many giant businesses don’t spend the money they’re entitled to, with Treasury figures suggesting that £418 million of apprenticeship funding went unallocated within the 2022-23 monetary yr.
In response to this, QA and Be the Business are inviting giant businesses that at present pay the Levy to make use of a mechanism known as the Levy Transfer System, to donate as much as 25% of their Levy funds to a different employer. It is that this money that may assist fund the brand new Be the Digital Business initiative.
Under the ‘Be the Digital Business’ initiative, enrolled apprentices will obtain coaching by means of the programme’s Digital Academy. During their time on the programme, apprentices will likely be geared up with the instruments to grasp in-demand digital expertise akin to information evaluation, adopting AI and coding, all of that are vital for the UK’s financial competitiveness, innovation, nationwide infrastructure, and safety.
QA and Be the Business are set to host a sequence of webinars and occasions for SMEs and potential apprentices to shed additional mild on the programme and roll out the coaching.
Jo Bishenden, Managing Director of Apprenticeships at QA, mentioned:
“With digital expertise predicted to be required for 90% of roles throughout the subsequent twenty years, small businesses might want to entice, prepare and retain expertise order to thrive within the digital financial system.
“The Be the Digital Business initiative will allow SMEs to succeed in the digital landscape by unlocking funds that would otherwise go unspent, without any additional cost to the public purse.”
Anthony Impey, CEO at Be The Business, mentioned:
“It’s nice to be launching this partnership with QA.
“I speak to leaders of small businesses every day who tell me about the challenges that they’re facing finding the skills they need, especially digital and tech skills. And we know from our work with 13,000 businesses that those that become more digital, increase their productivity as a result. So this new partnership with QA to help more small businesses access the digital skills they need will also generate big productivity wins for those businesses who get involved.”
