Finance Apprentice Review

I rotate placements every 6-12 months which gives me exposure to a variety of roles within my company and the finance function - therefore this varies. In my current cost base role, I'm responsible for producing monthly financial reports for my budget holders, forecasting and helping produce budgets. Aside from this, I am involved in lots of off the job training including chairing our National Apprentice Council and participating in our local business acumen working group.

Throughout my apprenticeship, I have learnt and developed many skills. Whether this be developing my analytical and financial knowledge in my day to day roles or developing my leadership and communication skills through chairing our council - the opportunities are endless... Through the structure of my scheme i.e. rotating roles and teams, I have learnt to be agile and adapt to any situation which has vastly increased my resilience.

Despite being the first cohort ever on the Finance Apprenticeship at BAE, I have really enjoyed my time on the scheme. Coming to my final year, I will most certainly be sad to leave and enter my exit role. My favourite elements of the scheme is the structure (placements and CIMA timetable), the amazing support network we have (scheme lead, skills coach, placement managers etc...) and the great off the job training opportunities. An example of this is the Outward Bound programme that our apprentices have the chance of attending...

Very well... Our scheme is different in the sense that we don't have one set college day per week. Our CIMA courses are done through Kaplan in 'blocks'. I prefer this as it creates more flexibility for progressing through the exams as you can do them at your own pace so long as you achieve the yearly milestone e.g. completing the May case study exam. This has enabled me personally to balance my work and social life, for example, when I bought my own house, I was able to plan my CIMA studies around this to ensure there were no clashes.

The support throughout my apprenticeship has been outstanding. We have a few POC who specialise in certain areas e.g. a skills coach who ensures we complete our CIMA qualification, our scheme manager who helps ensure all placements are adding value and we are progressing through the apprenticeship happily and also our placement managers who ensure we are developing our specialist finance and business knowledge.

We receive a lot of support from Kaplan through the college tutors. One thing I have found useful is the 24/7 service online where there is always someone to answer any queries we have. This has helped massively whilst learning in a virtual environment. We can utilise this function via a live chat, email or telephone call and get a very quick response.

The knowledge I have learnt through my CIMA qualification has always been applicable to my roles in BAE Systems. Understanding the basic theory and being able to confidently apply this to large, business scenarios has helped both ways (for my studies and daily responsibilities). The one way I can describe it, is they fit perfectly, hand in hand together!

At BAE, there are plenty of opportunities for this both on and off an apprenticeship scheme. Examples of things I have participated in are social events i.e. teamworking at mini golf/meals out etc, Outward Bound, raising money for charities and our yearly Finance conference. Even throughout Covid, there has been a great effort to keep as much going albeit, virtually!

Yes

The opportunity given to every employee to develop on a personal and professional basis is second to none. Each individual is valued by the company and I don't know anyone here who is 'unhappy' in their job. We spend the majority of our week and lives in work so you need to be happy and get fulfilment from it to lead a happier life!

Be yourself! Research what we do, what we stand for, our values etc... ask yourself whether your values align. All experience is valuable experience so sell yourself! If you had a Saturday job, you've shown commitment and developed so many skills! Get a pen and paper and have a 10 minute brain dump on everything you've ever done and all of the skills you've developed!