The Apprentice Development Programme is made up of six monthly sessions each covering a key topic.
Each workshop will equip the apprentice with the vital knowledge, skills and attitude to allow them to be a successful part of your business, and reflect upon and discuss each key area to contextualise their new skills specifically for their industry.
Session 1 – Managing Yourself
- Self-assessment of their skills to benchmark strengths and areas for development
- Identifying preferred working style, and when and how to ‘flex’ to get the best out of people and situations. Administration of the psychometric tool to identify behavioural preferences
- The importance of a can-do attitude and seeking, creating and grasping opportunities
- Development of a personal action plan to address areas for development and achieve personal and business goals
Session 2 – Team Working
- Understand different types of teams and how to be an effective team player
- Administration of the Team Profiling tool to identify their Team Role preferences
- Practice of key skills to develop and maintain effective relationships (rapport-building, questioning, listening, feedback, communication and body language)
- How to deal with different people (including difficult ones)
Session 3 – Confidence Building
- Techniques for improving their confidence and self-worth
- Developing practical strategies for handling criticisms
- How to give their opinion and give feedback
- Learn strategies for saying “no!”
- What things might affect their confidence and what they can do about it
Session 4 – Communication Skills
- Questioning and listening skills to acquire information and avoid misunderstandings
- The importance of understanding perspectives and relating to the thoughts and experiences of others
- Active Listening – listen effectively to avoid misunderstandings
- Importance of non-verbal signals, gestures, facial expression, body language, appearance, etc.
- How to give positive and negative feedback
Session 5 – Time Management
- The importance of good time management
- Review of their daily, weekly and monthly activity, identifying what is consuming their time and minimising any time wasted
- High pay-off activities versus low pay-off activities and techniques for managing time well
- How to prioritise tasks so the urgent and important things get done
Session 6 – Customer Service
- What is ‘customer experience’
- Customer needs, wants and expectations, and how does the business compare
- Customer-focused skills and behaviours
- How to handle complaints and turn an unhappy customer into a happy one