Just over six years ago, Peter Marples and Di McEvoy-Robinson teamed up to form training company Aspire, Achieve, Advance. Today, it is one of the country’s top training providers, delivering apprenticeships in IT and accountancy.
ONCE upon a time, apprenticeships were seen as something for school-leavers deemed not academically bright enough for university.
They were for those young people who were good with their hands and looking to learn a trade.
Today, these “earn while you learn” schemes are very different to those of 30 years ago, when YTS was introduced by the government of the day.
National Apprenticeship Week, which starts on Monday, celebrates these modern-day apprenticeships, which cover a range of sectors, helping to produce young skilled workers that companies want to employ. One organisation that is helping to nurture this new generation is Derby training provider Aspire, Achieve, Advance – also known as 3AAA.
The business is the brainchild of co-directors Peter Marples and Di McEvoy-Robinson. Before deciding to go into business together towards the end 2007, Peter and Di had achieved success in their respective fields of finance and education.
Di said: “Our families had known each other for years. Our children grew up together. It was over a cup of coffee that we came up with the idea for Aspire, Achieve, Advance.
“Peter’s background was in finance and training and mine was in the learning and skills sector, so we decided to pool our respective talents.
“We saw what we believed was a genuine gap in the market – and that was to create a quality training provider.”
And so, in January, 2008, Aspire, Achieve, Advance was born. Initially based at Peter’s Derbyshire home, the business started out providing training to people working in the logistics sector, working with clients including TNT, NFT Distribution and UPS.
But, in 2010, Peter and Di sensed a definite shift in the training and skills market. The Government was putting apprenticeships back on the agenda.
Peter himself knows first hand the worth of apprenticeships. He left school at 16 to be one, as did his two children.
He said: “I think for people of a certain generation there was still a stigma attached to apprenticeships. They probably thought of the YTS schemes of old.
“For some, apprenticeships are associated with learning a trade such as carpentry or plumbing.
“And I guess this has probably led to a lot of dinner table snobbery towards them. Some parents believe that the route for their child should be school, college and then university. If your kid didn’t go down that route then they’d be considered a failure.
“But, the fact is, modern-day apprenticeships are completely different from the days of YTS.
“They are a credible alternative to university. It gets young people into practical learning from a very early stage. They are earning while they learn – and are not saddled with a big pile of debt at the end.
“Most important of all, they lead to a job – something you are not guaranteed when you finish uni.”
In 2010, Peter and Di considered what type of apprenticeship training 3AAA would offer. A common gripe among businesses in recent years has been that our schools, colleges and universities are not producing candidates with the skills they want.
Peter and Di came up with two areas which they felt there would be future demand for – IT, social media and accountancy.
The firm made a conscious decision to target their training to young apprentices, aged between 16 and 24, an age group Di and Peter say most training firms were shying away from.
Peter said: “Training 16-year-olds in not easy. As any parent will know, it is hard work getting teenagers to do what you want them to!
“Many training companies focus on the over 25s and people who are already in work, who need extra training. But our focus is on young people who have just left school.”
But there is little point to any training courses if there is no job for the candidate at the end of it.
In this respect, the approach of 3AAA is different.
Instead of training its candidates and then finding them a job, 3AAA finds the job first and then provides apprenticeship training.
Key to 3AAA’s success is forging relationships with businesses and persuading them that taking on apprentices is a good idea.
Peter said: “There is an increasing demand from businesses for young people with the right skills. We have some extremely talented apprentices right here in Derby and businesses should utilise that talent.
“There are people from my generation who are not particularly good at understanding the power of things like social media. What these young apprentices can do is come in and actually teach people like me how it’s done.”
Of course, 3AAA puts a lot of work into matching businesses with apprentices.
Di said: “It’s rather like a dating agency. We try to match the right candidate with the right company and bring them together but, before that happens, we prepare the candidate as much as we can so the whole process runs smoothly.”
The successful training formula employed by 3AAA has led to rapid growth at the firm. Derby is the company’s base and is home to the 3AAA Derby Academy, which trains IT and social media apprentices aged between 16 and 18.
The firm also has 14 IT academies dotted across the country and four accountancy academies. In total, the company has around 200 staff – 23 of whom are based in Derby. This year, it is planning to open a further 10.
On average, each academy trains around 80 to 100 apprentices, which means 3AAA is helping to create opportunities for between 1,400 to 1,600 apprentices a year.
