Commercial Procurement apprentice Review

Commercial Procurement Apprenticeship has the apprentice moving around in different teams to understand Procurement in the Public Sector and within Transport for London. On a typical basis, Procurement would include building Requests for Quotations, looking at the market to find suitable suppliers, using current contracts or frameworks to request resources, liaising with project teams to understand their requirements for a new procurement, inputting data into a master database to update statuses on contracts, reviewing contracts to understand Terms and Conditions, submitting Procurement Strategies to Management for approval. This role is heavy in admin/document control.

Soft skills are developed, such as learning to deal with people in a professional environment, learning to manage stakeholders, managing your workload, managing your time, improving your written language, a lot of Excel/Word skills involved. Negotiation skills are developed through dealing with stakeholders as well as external suppliers. Contract knowledge is developed. An understanding of European Union regulations and UK law governance is developed.

I enjoyed the programme almost entirely as it allowed the apprentice to move teams every 6 months into areas where the workload was different and varied. This allowed exposure to different opportunities to learn, use of different skills and dealing with different challenges. A core understanding of Procurement is developed throughout the two years and weekly sessions of classroom-based learning also adds variety to the week. What did bring the programme down was the lack of understanding that the different teams had on the responsibilities of the apprentices and the workload can become tedious, reducing the amount of learning one can achieve.

My programme had a good overall structure but also had clear gaps where there was no structure. Being a part of the first group to do the Procurement apprenticeship, it was only natural but a lack of organisation at times could be quite frustrating. Generally, the level of organisation was on two levels. The higher level would be those who were in charge of the apprenticeship side and managing which team the apprentice would go to and other general admin related stuff. The other level would be the management of the workload and how the apprentice fit into the team that they were doing a placement with. This level of structure was on a team level and the apprentice was managed as though they were a part of the team.

Support was provided on different levels on different matters. On the learning side, we were in a classroom once a week and so we were out of the office which helped tremendously. Depending on the team you are in, you may be allowed to have some time in the office to do your learning/college work in the office but it was generally said the learning aspect was to be done outside of work hours and that when in the office, it was about learning the job. Support was largely seen by the team the apprentice you would sit with. Those in charge of the apprenticeship offered little help against what was expected.

We received a good amount of help. It is easy to say the support provided was sufficient to allow one to pass qualifications. The training provider's programme allowed some time between finishing learning the material and the exam to allow for revision sessions. Exam practise as well as learning of material was very helpful.

I would not say it helps on a daily basis as majority of what I learnt that helps me in my job was learnt on the job. The theory side can be useful for ad hoc jobs or areas where the role does not typically cover and so it may be useful to refer back to the learnt material to adapt methodology.

The apprentices and graduates have regular social events at bars and clubs. There are also a lot of professional networking events but that is also due to the nature of the qualification, the qualification provider will send emails notifying the apprentice about different events that may be suitable for them to go to. Football after work was organised amongst the different teams I had worked for.

Yes

A good structure and commitment to learning and developing an apprentice to become fit for their role. A lot of the apprenticeships allow early stepping stones into good careers. Generally, the pay is better than most apprenticeships and there is also job security. TfL also allow flexible working and emphasise good mental health which means TfL are looking to ensure their employees remain happy.

Consider the job advert page, see what key skills they are looking to develop or they would want for someone in that role and try to emphasise those skills in your applications and how you used those skills in previous situations/jobs. There are also open days for the different apprenticeships so it's definitely helpful coming to one of those fairs to understand what the apprenticeships offer and what the current apprentices have to say about their apprenticeships.