This is an exciting week for SSE as we welcome 84 new faces to the company. And by new faces I’m talking about the real talent of tomorrow.
We welcome 25 trainee engineers and 10 graduates to our Generation and Networks business as well as a further 49 apprentices into Contracting, Generation and Networks.
Next month will also see no less than 88 young people join the business at our training facility at Thatcham. That’s a total of 172 people SSE will be investing in; testament to the company’s commitment to championing future talent.
So how does it work? We offer apprenticeship programmes lasting three to four years in nine different areas ranging from contracting (electrical, mechanical and heating & vent) Power Distribution (overhead lines, fitting & jointing), Generation (electrical, Mechanical and C&I) and finally home services (gas engineers).
The trainee engineer programme lasts three years and encompasses a foundation degree through Aston University and the University of Highlands and Islands in Electrical Power engineering.
Trainee engineers attend their local training school to understand the business better and complete several placements. Each trainee aims to complete a degree, become a senior authorised person and works towards roles in engineering management.
And finally graduates join a two year rotational programme to develop their skills and experience to becoming professional engineers. As well as real work experience, they will undertake numerous projects to challenge their innovative thinking and entrepreneurial skills in preparation to becoming engineering leaders.
Here at SSE we’re already fully aware of the enormous benefit of investing properly in the talent of tomorrow. Every year since 2007 over 100 new apprentices have joined our apprenticeship programme, which offers sustainable long term jobs.
And by long-term I mean long-term. Some of our senior executives joined SSE themselves as trainees or apprentices, and have never looked back since.
As well as these programmes we also recruit Business Graduates into our Business Academy and we have a number of direct entry roles available on our website.
SSE employs almost 20,000 people and has opportunities in Generation, Power Distribution and Contracting at 50 locations across the UK, including Inverness, Perth, Glasgow, Reading, Portsmouth and Cardiff.
I’m looking forward to meeting the new intake, but in the meantime I wish them all good luck.
And anyone interested in applying can do so by visiting our careers page.