Supplier Manager Review

I manage a portfolio of suppliers and run a number of MI reports for the team I am based in. I complete compliance and assurance activities for those suppliers, alongside risk management for the whole team. I am also responsible for a digital transformation programme within my team, as I have a technical background.

New skills: stakeholder management, supplier relationship management Developed skills: presenting, formal communications, MI management, supplier management. Throughout the previous degree I developed a number of new skills, including report writing, academic writing, critical reflection and analysis. All of these skills have since been used within my role at Lloyds Banking Group.

I really enjoy my programme at MMU, I have previously completed a degree apprenticeship with them (2015-2019) and am now completing a Master's degree apprenticeship. It's been a big step up in terms of the work and challenge, but both my employer and MMU have been fully supportive.

This degree apprenticeship is run as monthly training blocks, as opposed to weekly day release training on the previous apprenticeship. I have found this suits me better, as it gives me a chunk of time each month to really focus on my university work and take a step away from my day job.

I receive a lot of support from my line manager, who has regular check ins with me to understand my current workload and pressures of the apprenticeship. They offer support regularly in the form of proof reading assignments, helping me find information or pointing me in the direction of someone who has expertise in an area that is coming up on the course.

I receive a great deal of support, including quarterly employer liaison sessions, the opportunity to email at any time to my unit leaders or employer liaison tutor, I can email the student hub for generic queries and the apprenticeship team regularly send out feedback surveys or arrange sessions for us to come together to provide informal feedback as a group.

I think having an apprenticeship degree to work towards focuses my employer on the training and development aspect of my role. It empowers me to control my own training and development also, by either choosing elective modules or picking up extra pieces of training in work which compliments the degree.

I often get involved in social activities at work and, in the current climate, I have taken on the responsibility of sending out daily trivia or quizzes to keep everyone talking to each other while we are all working from home. I have also been sending a list of free activities to the team to help with their childrens' education while home schooling.

Yes

I would recommend Lloyds Banking Group to a friend because they have given me to opportunity now to complete 3 apprenticeships and continued to support my training and development while at the company. I don't think I would have gotten that same support in any of my previous jobs, as quite often the focus is on new starters, but LBG has continued to push me to keep learning and keep growing which I think is very commendable.

I would advise that, in the first instance, they look at the Lloyds Banking Group apprenticeship website to find out what opportunities exist within the bank. Following this, I would look at the current vacancies, and if none of these sound of interest, I would recommend looking once more at the available apprenticeships, choosing a few that would suit, and then setting job alerts for when those vacancies are released.