Utility Week

UTILITY WEEK | 14TH - 20TH FEBRUARY 2020 | 9 Utility of the Future: Business models and skills The Utility of the Future is also the theme of Utility Week Live taking place at the NEC in Birmingham on 19-20 May. Visit www.utilityweeklive.co.uk for more information. "We have to widen our appeal to attract more people who may not have considered a career in energy." T he UK government has ambitious targets to achieve net zero by 2050 – 2045 in Scotland – and we need a skilled workforce ready to deliver. As a major developer and operator of low-carbon assets and infrastructure, SSE is well placed to be at the frontline of delivering on these goals. The decarbonisa- tion of the UK will require a huge push to develop, build and upgrade massive swathes of infrastructure. And we are going to need a mighty green workforce to help us do this. For young people, who have been at the centre of the climate change movement, they have the opportunity to kick-start a meaningful career where they'll be at the forefront of climate action. Our business is investing £6 billion over five years to help decarbonise the UK and Ireland, so apprentices coming into the energy sector have a bright future. But our industry, as with many others, faces its chal- lenges. The energy sector has a well known future skills gap, which will be exacerbated by retirement at a time of growth – particularly in certain areas. In the past five years, SSE has recruited more than 650 apprentices with around £80,000 invested in the training and development of each of them. And they have long- term careers with us – 92 per cent stay with the business once their traineeship ends. Apprentices joining the business can take up a wide variety of roles, from working on renewable assets such as wind farms to maintaining the flexible electricity grids to transport clean energy. We also have to widen our appeal to attract more people who may not have considered a career in energy. That for us means thinking differently and doing things differently. As a business we've taken a new approach to appren- tice recruitment in order to widen access. We realised that by having restrictions on qualifications we may be inadvertently screening out candidates who have the potential to be great, or come from more challenging backgrounds which has impacted on their educational performance. Our new approach has seen us look not just at quali- fications or skills, which can be developed, but rather select against innate strengths which are defined as something you do well, enjoy doing and do regularly. Research has shown that moving from a skills to strengths approach, such as Drive, Ownership and Safety, which we defined and validated as being essential for our specific SSE apprenticeships, can result in more engaged and productive employees who are will- ing to stay, increased diversity of applications and hires and innovative, efficient practices. If the industry is going to retain and grow this talent from a wider, more inclusive pool, we need to make sure that apprenticeships are enjoyable and engaging. And we believe this new approach will broaden access to the sector and improve the apprenticeship journey. But that is just half the picture. What about govern- ment policies? If the policy of training and developing future gen- erations is about getting them into meaningful employ- ment – which it surely must be – funding and delivery models should be focused on not just contributing to initial training delivery costs, but set in a way that the creation of sustainable employment can be recognised and rewarded. In reality this would mean that funding wasn't just set to reflect a contribution to the cost of delivering train- ing but that funding also rewarded the creation of sus- tainable jobs by providing some financial reward if the apprentice was still employed say three years a—er suc- cessful completion of training. Apprenticeship spending too is projected to exceed current Apprenticeship Levy funding – the tax on employers which can be used to fund apprenticeship training. Decisions need to be made regarding future funding choices. As a sector critical to the delivery of a low-car- bon economy, there should be consideration of allow- ing greater access to levy funds for employers in sectors designated as essential to the government's Industrial Strategy. Levy funds should also be retained within the sector and be used for tackling skill shortages and developing skills which will be vital to achieving ambitious govern- ment targets. By their very nature an apprentice working in the energy sector must be considered vital to net zero. In this sense government must do all it can to help to get them in the race. John Stewart, director of HR, SSE continued overleaf, inclusion and diversity ☛ Solution 1: Boost training Cast the net wide SSE's John Stewart says the government's Apprenticeship Levy could, and should, be skewed to bolster the energy sector.

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